Embed from Getty ImagesI read the manifestos, so you don’t have to!

With the election campaign now well under way, I took a look at the manifestos of the five main parties, as well as Scottish and Welsh nationalists. After trawling through hundreds of pages of policies, here is a brief summary of the main points for each party:

LABOUR

  • Increase the minimum wage to more than £8 an hour by October 2019 and introduce Make Work Pay contracts to provide tax rebates to firms becoming Living Wage employers
  • Freeze energy bills until 2017 and give the regulator the power to cut bills this winter
  • Reduce tuition fees to £6,000 a year
  • Reverse the 50p tax cut for people earning over £150,000
  • Replace the House of Lords with an elected senate and extend the voting franchise to 16 and 17 year olds

CONSERVATIVES

  • Keep the economy secure by running a surplus
  • Increase the tax-free personal allowance to £17,500 and the 40p Income Tax threshold to £50,000
  • Increase spending on the NHS, provide 7-day a week access to your GP and deliver a truly 7-day NHS
  • Referendum on UK membership of the European Union by the end of 2017
  • Crack down on tax evasion and aggressive tax avoidance and ensure those who can afford to pay the most do

LIBERAL DEMOCRATS

  • Aim to balance the structural current budget by 2017/18
  • A Digital Bill of Rights to protect privacy by updating data laws
  • Free childcare to all 2 year olds and free hours from 9 months for working families
  • Raise the personal allowance to at least £12,500
  • Invest an extra £8bn in the NHS and treat mental health with the same importance as physical health

UKIP

  • Referendum on British membership of the European Union, advocating in favour of a ‘Brexit’
  • Abolish inheritance tax, dubbed the ‘death tax’
  • Introduce an Australian-style points based system to manage the number and skills of people coming into the country, treating all citizens of the world on a fair and equal basis as a welcoming, outward-looking country
  • Provide and extra £3bn for the NHS in England and put the ‘national’ back into the national health service, by getting tough on so-called ‘health-tourism’
  • Cut the foreign aid budget from 0.7% of GNI to 0.2% of GNI

GREEN

  • End the privatisation of the NHS and repeal the Health and Social Care Act
  • Increase the minimum wage to reach a living wage of £10 an hour by 2020
  • Scrap university tuition fees, reverse cuts and invest in further education
  • Ban fracking, phase out coal power stations and say no to new nuclear power plants
  • Return the railways to public hands, saving money and improving services

SNP

  • Restore the 50p top income tax rate for those earning over £150,000
  • Put an end to austerity by increasing spending by 0.5% a year to enable at least £140bn extra investment in the economy and public services
  • Abolish the ‘bedroom tax’
  • Increase the minimum wage to £8.70 by 2020
  • Scrap Trident and reinvest the £100bn saved into education, better childcare and the NHS

PLAID CYMRU

  • More devolved powers for the Welsh Assembly, including responsibility over policing, broadcasting and criminal justice
  • Oppose any moves towards privatisation of the NHS in Wales, and strongly oppose the inclusion of the NHS in TTIP
  • Provide a living wage for all employees by 2020
  • Scrap the so-called bedroom tax
  • Implement rent controls to help tenants

I will posting a little bit more regularly with some election-themed posts in the next few days!

Be back soon,

Daniel

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