---
election_year: 1987
party_id: labour
party_name: Labour Party
party_leader: Neil Kinnock
political_spectrum: left
victory: false
government_outcome: opposition
sections:
  - economy
  - taxation
  - health
  - education
  - housing
  - defence
  - foreign-policy
  - environment
  - transport
  - law-and-order
  - welfare
  - democracy-and-constitution
  - agriculture
  - energy
  - science-and-technology
  - local-government
---

# Labour Party Manifesto 1987

## Britain will win with Labour

## Foreword

### By the Leader of the Labour Party

Every election is a time of decision. But this General Election on June 11 faces the British people with choices
more sharp than at any time in the past fifty years.

The choices are between Labour's programme of work for people and Tory policies of waste of people: between
investment in industrial strength, and acceptance of industrial decline; between a Britain with competitive,
modern industries, and a Britain with a low tech, low paid, low security economy increasingly dependent upon
imports.

The election will decide whether we and our children are to live in a country that builds high standards of care
for all who need treatment for illness, pensions in retirement, good grounding in education, fair chances to
get on; or in a country where the Conservatives go on running down the vital health, education and social
services of every community, imposing higher charges and lower standards.

This election will decide whether our country is to be a United Kingdom or a divided kingdom; one that is
brought together by proper provision, prudent investment and concern for the interests of the whole
nation, or one that is pulled apart by poverty, cuts, increased privilege for the richest and neglect for the
rest.

This election will decide whether we put our resources into the real defence provided by a modern, well-equipped
army, navy and airforce safeguarding our country an d supporting NATO; or spend those sums on maintaining an
ageing system of nuclear weapons, while buying a new generation of missiles which cannot give our country
effective defence. It will decide whether Britain is part of the international process of nuclear build down or ruled
by a government uniquely intent upon nuclear build-up.

We already know what a third term for Mrs Thatcher would mean for the people of Britain.

Under the Tories there have been:

Eight years of record unemployment, relentless industrial closures and redundancies, of flooding imports and
shrunken investment.

Eight years of the highest ever tax burden on the family and the nation as VAT, National Insurance, rates and
fees have all been put up in a shift to taxes on spending and employment.

Eight years of cuts and closures and charges, of intensified means tests and reduced services.

Eight years of increased state control, of centralising government of abolition of rights of representation and
negotiation.

Eight years of rising crime, of greater insecurity on the streets and housing estates and in the home.

Eight years of meanness towards the needy in our country and towards the wretched of the world.

Eight years of growing division - in health in opportunity. in housing conditions in work and in income - between
regions communities classes. families, white and black, rich and poor.

The Tories say they are 'proud of their record'. So proud indeed that they would want to do more of the same if
they were re-elected.

Their plans for a poll tax would penalise millions of families, pensioners and young people. Their refusal to
provide the resources needed for the Health Service and their plans for imposing further payment and
privatisation will hit everyone in the service and everyone needing to use it.

They would, if they won power again, privatise water, electricity, steel and other services, and industries built
up by public investment over past years. They want to impose penal increases in rents for private and public
tenants. They are committed to introducing compulsory labour for young unemployed people.

All this and worse would come with a third term of Tory government.

Britain cannot afford more of that run-down, sell-off and split-up, nor all the costs and waste that they bring.

Britain does not have to.

Britain can stop the rot - but only by voting Labour.

There is no other way to prevent thirteen years of Thatcherism.

No party other than Labour can possibly win enough seats to form a government.

The Liberals and SDP know that. Their hope is to profit from confusion. To divide the non-Conservative vote in
such a way as to make them the 'hook' in a 'hung' Parliament and have power far beyond their responsibility.

And, while one of their leaders clearly favours an arrangement to sustain a Conservative government, the
other hasn't the strength to stop him.

That offers no way ahead for a nation that needs to get on with investing for change, for quality, for confidence
in the future.

Proper support for education, strengthened research and development and long-term, low interest finance for
industrial growth are all essential if Britain is to gain the vitality necessary to outpace competitors who have
been building these assets for years.

They are essential too if we are to generate the wealth needed for the security, care and opportunity fundamental
to the individual freedom of women and men of all ages and origins. When our country faces the common
pressures on the environment, the common dangers of crime, the common costs of unemployment,
under-investment and under-performance together, our country has every commonsense reason to meet those
challenges together.

That is democratic socialism in action. And just as a family uses its combined spirit and resources to overcome
crisis, so Britain can once again make common cause to achieve common good.

Only a Labour government can give that lead. Only we are committed to such concerted action. Only we believe
that the whole nation should win and can win.

That is why Britain will win, with Labour.

**Neil Kinnock**

## Britain Will Win

### Britain is crying out for change. Only a Labour government can bring it about.

Mending divisions, building new strengths will need determination and realistic priorities.

Commonsense and the common interest require that the Tory philosophy of selfishness and short-term gain
is replaced by the democratic socialist philosophy of community and caring, of investment in people and in
production.

We must as a priority tackle the immediate tragedy and waste of unemployment. We must commit resources
to modernising and strengthening the industries and services that earn Britain a living. We must ensure the
continuity of expansion that is necessary for a lasting economic recovery.

That is our strategy.

It begins from the understanding that people are Britain's most precious resource. It is rooted in the
confidence that, with the right skills, the right equipment and the backing of a government that is committed
to encouraging enterprise and innovation, Britain's people can make our country more efficient, more
competitive and more socially just.

It is a message of hope and confidence - the alternative to the divisive and dictatorial approach of the
Conservatives.

We do not believe that everything could or should be done by government. But we know, from our own
history and from the example set by our competitors, that national economic success cannot be achieved
without government.

Britain will win with a Labour government that invests to enable people to use their abilities and to
stimulate modern training, research, development, production and marketing. These are the ingredients
of economic vitality, and the foundations of fairness.

## The Priority Programme

For our first two years in government we Will concentrate resources on the essential tasks of combating
unemployment and poverty In the course of that action, we will strengthen the health, housing, education,
social services and crime-fighting services that are vital to social and economic well-being, and begin to
rebuild our manufacturing industry.

Clearly, all other programmes that require substantial public finance must take lower priority in terms of
timescale and public resources.

### The Jobs Programme

Immediately after the election the Labour Government will call together **a National Economic Summit**
to assess fully the condition of the economy and set the recovery programme in motion - producing the jobs
that need to be done by people who need to do them in a country that wants them done.

The Summit will establish the first stage of the National Economic Assessment. This will identify the concerted
action that will need to be taken by government, employers in the private and public sectors and trade unions
to increase investment, contain inflation and achieve sustained recovery.

**We will reduce unemployment by one million in two years** as the first instalment in beating mass
unemployment.

Half a million jobs will be generated in private industry and in the public sector by the repairing and building
of the houses, the hospitals and schools, the transport improvements and sewers that the nation needs.
This will be achieved by public investment and by reducing employers' National Insurance contribution in
targeted areas.

Another 360,000 new jobs and training places will be created. These will provide new skills for young people
and adults - with proper opportunities for women.

A further 300,000 new jobs will improve the health and education services and the neglected community and
caring services. The depleted customs services will be strengthened in the fight against drugs. The revenue
and benefit departments will be staffed to increase efficiency.

We will extend the voluntary Job Release Scheme to men over 60 so that those who want to retire early
vacate jobs for those who are currently unemployed. This could take as many as 160,000 people out of
unemployment and into work.

### The Anti-Poverty Programme

The spread of poverty in the past eight years has stained the whole nation, and widened misery and
disadvantage amongst old and young. Much of it is the result of deliberate government policies. Millions
of poor people endure it in despair. Millions who are not poor regard it as a disgrace. The Labour government
will combat poverty directly.

We will immediately increase the single pension by £5 a week and the pension for a married couple
by £8, as the first step in re-establishing a link between pensions and average earnings or living
costs, whichever is the most favourable to pensioners. We will begin the abolition of the TV licence fee for
pensioners.

We will provide pensioners on supplementary benefit and others on low incomes with a £5 winter premium
to help with fuel bills. We will begin discussions with the fuel industries with a view to phasing out standing
charges.

We will fully restore the State Earnings Related Pension Scheme as part of the process of achieving our
objective of a pensions level of one-third average earnings for single people and half average earnings
for married couples.

We will restore and increase the death grant.

We will increase child benefit by £3 a week for all children, raise the allowance to the first child by
£7.36, and increase one- parent family benefit by £2.20.

We will restore and increase the maternity grant.

We will start to phase in a new disability income scheme and provide resources to give special support to
young people with disabilities. Our special Minister for the Disabled will be put in charge of our programme
for the disabled.

We will extend the long-term supplementary benefit rate to the long-term unemployed.

We will implement a comprehensive **strategy for ending low pay**, notably by the introduction of a
statutory national minimum wage. This will be of particular benefit to women workers, and will help lift
families out of poverty.

### The Anti-Crime Programme

We will introduce crime prevention grants for home-owners and tenants.

We will work with the police to get **more police on the beat**. Uniformed police officers will be relieved
of non-law-and-order tasks which take them away from crime prevention, pursuit and detection.

We will reverse the Tory cuts in the number of those who can claim criminal injuries compensation. We will
give the Criminal Injuries Compensation Board more staff to cut the all-time record 64,000 queue awaiting
compensation.

### Paying for the Recovery Programme

These immediate programmes will cost £6 billion a year net for the first two years. We will pay for
them by:

- Putting directly into generating 300,000 jobs the money that would be used up by the Thatcher
 government on its 2p income tax bribe.

- Adopting the same practice as most successful industrial countries and companies, by
 prudently borrowing £3 billion for useful wealth generating national investment.

We will reverse the extra tax cuts which the richest 5 per cent have received from the Tory government and
allocate that money instead to the most needy. We will also bring forward other reforms to capital taxation -
including the introduction of a wealth tax, which, whilst applying to only the wealthiest one per cent of the
population, will, over the years, bring a significant contribution from those in our society best able to pay.

### Changes Without Charges

Apart from legislating where necessary for the Recovery Programme, the new Parliament will swiftly enact
many other worthwhile measures. These will cost little to implement but produce significant improvement
in the quality of administration, provision and response to the needs of ordinary citizens.

They will include:

- **A Minister for Women**, with a place in the Cabinet.

- A Freedom of Information Act, to be accompanied by the repeal of Section Two of the Official
 Secrets Act.

- Parliamentary scrutiny of the Security Services.

- Appointment of an Education Ombudsman.

- Appointment of an Ombudsman for Police Complaints.

- An Energy Efficiency Agency to co-ordinate conservation programmes for domestic and
 industrial energy users.

- A new Ministry of Environmental Protection.

### Programme for a Firve-Year Parliament

Labour's Programme for Recovery will be the start of a strategy for a full Parliament. We have to halt the decline
in manufacturing industry, not only to generate jobs and increase our world trade share but to create the wealth
to finance the rescue and expansion of education, health, housing and the social services.

## New Strength for Industry

For eight years British industry has been left to drift and decline Our oil revenues have been wasted and the
City has concentrated upon short-term movements of capital at the expense of British manufacturing industry.
The huge capital outflow of £110 billion since 1979 is ruinous evidence of the Tories' lack of concern
for the strength of the British economy.

Labour is committed to **rebuilding our industrial base**. Our country must make the best use of
computers and information technology to develop the modern means of making a living as the oil runs
down and the pressures of technical change and international competition intensify.

We will:

- Establish a capital repatriation scheme using the tax system to attract and retain British
 savings and investment in Britain.

- Set up the British Industrial Investment Bank, with strong bases in Scotland, Wales and
 English regions, to ensure finance for industry where it is needed, when it is needed and on
 terms which encourage long term development.

- Implement a dynamic and properly funded **regional policy**. This will include the
 establishment of Regional Development Agencies (starting with the North, North-West, Yorkshire
 and Humberside); the promotion of local and regional enterprise boards; greater scope for local
 authorities to participate constructively in economic development; and creating high technology
 innovation centres throughout Britain.

- Create a new Ministry of Science and Technology to promote a major increase in research
 and development.It will co-ordinate the activities and budgets of government departments
 involved in these areas and will encourage, in conjunction with industry and the scientific
 community, the full application of science to industrial processes and products.

- We shall extend social ownership by a variety of means, as set out in Labour's detailed
 proposals. In particular, we will set up British Enterprise, to take a socially owned stake in
 high-tech industries and other concerns where public funds are used to strengthen investment.
 Social ownership of basic utilities like gas and water is vital to ensure that every individual
 has access to their use and that the companies contribute to Britain's industrial recovery,
 for instance, by buying British. We shall start by using the exist mg 49 per cent holding in
 British Telecom to ensure proper influence in their decisions. Private shares in BT and British
 Gas will be converted into special new securities. These will be bought and sold in the market
 in the usual way and will carry either a guaranteed return, or dividends linked to the company's
 growth.

- Encourage the establishment and success of co-operatives of all forms.

- Strengthen the Department of Trade and Industry as the spearhead of this new national
 industrial strategy.

- Bring in a stronger regulatory framework to ensure honest **practice in the City of
 London** and introduce new **safeguards** on mergers, takeovers and monopolies
 to protect our national industrial, technological and research and development interests.

### Plan for Training

For modern, wealth-creating industry we need a well-trained workforce. British industry now carries out less
than half of the training of our main competitors. Labour will therefore establish a national training programme
to bring about a major advance in the spread and standard of skills.

For young people we will establish an integrated, high quality **Foundation Programme** that will guarantee
for all 16 year olds at least two years **of education, training and work experience** according to their
needs.

The Adult Skillplan will develop lifelong training and education for everyone needing to supplement and update
skills in work, with particular emphasis given to training for women.

The Jobs, Enterprise and Training Programme will expand existing programmes for unemployed people with
a guarantee of a job or new skill for the long-term unemployed.

### A Sensible Energy Policy

Efficiency in industry and security in the community both depend on reliable and safe supplies of energy
available at acceptable cost. Britain's oil reserves have a limited life. We have huge reserves of coal
which will last for centuries. Labour's co-ordinated energy programme will ensure the most sensible use
of our reserves while protecting our environ ment and stimulating employment.

Labour will initiate a **major energy conservation programme** and ensure that Britain develops the
full potential of its coal, oil and gas resources, whilst gradually diminishing Britain's dependence upon
nuclear energy.

We will invest substantially in research into, and development of, the renewable energy resources as part
of the alternative means of power.

We will not proceed with the building of the proposed Pressurised Water Reactor at Sizewell.

We share national concern about the problem of nuclear waste. We will ensure a safe future for Sellafield
and develop a new strategy for the monitoring, storage and disposal of nuclear waste.

Labour will take effective steps to improve the service provided by the energy industry to energy consumers.
These will cover quality of supply, frequency of metering, general service arrangements and proper
provision for the disabled, those in poverty and others with special needs.

### A Prosperous Agriculture

A more efficient agricultural industry can clearly make a valuable contribution to Britain's recovery. We will
support good environmental practices in agriculture.

To give Britain's producers the backing they need, the burden of agricultural support must be shifted from
consumers. The direction of support must be shifted away from blanket support for commodities, towards
helping the farmers who need it most, such as those who work in the hills or on marginal land. To help
bring this about we will introduce new, long-term programmes for agriculture.

We will also help new farmers and young farmers by offering farms to rent. And we will reverse the cuts in
the Agricultural Development and Advisory Service and research.

## Freedom and Fairness for All Britain's People

We are determined to make Britain a fairer and freer society.

To us and to the majority of the British people a civilised community is one in which citizens band together to
provide, out of community resources to which all contribute, essential services like health, education and
pensions that the great majority of people can not afford to provide for themselves at time of need.

When the Tories talk of freedom, they mean freedom for the few, for those who can afford to buy privilege. What
they mean, as their record so plainly shows, is more tax cuts for the rich and less help for the poor and for
that great majority who are neither rich nor poor.

Labour's objective is to broaden and deepen **the liberty** of all individuals in our community: to free
people from poverty, exploitation and fear; to free them to realise their full potential; to see that everyone
has the liberty **to enjoy real chances, to make real choices**.

It means collective provision for private use. The British people know that this is the most effective way for
them to secure their freedom as individuals whilst meeting the moral obligations which they feel towards
others and seeing that fairness is a way of national life, not just a fine word.

These values are the essence of our democratic socialism.

### Investing in Health

Labour's proudest achievement is the creation of the National Health Service. The Conservatives voted
against it then. All who use and value the service know only too well how it has been neglected and
downgraded by today's Tories.

Labour will establish the NHS in its rightful place as a high quality service for the prevention and treatment
of illness, free at the time of use to all who need attention, equipped to meet the changing pressures of
need as they relate, for instance, to an aging population and the requirements of proper provision for people
suffering from mental illness.

The biggest single deficiency in the NHS today is the excessively high hospital waiting lists which, under the
Tories, are increasing year by year. We shall speedily **reduce** them by computerising bed allocation,
encouraging more consultants to work full-time for the NHS and targeting increased resources where
**waiting lists** remain excessive.

The basis of the NHS is the Family Doctor Service We shall act to improve it, with shorter GP patient lists,
more convenient surgery hours, more choice and information for patients.

We will develop local family health care teams and more local health centres.

**Women's health care** has been seriously neglected. Our Charter for Womens' Health will include a
network of Well-Women Clinics, and a computerised call and recall screening system as a universal
service for all women at risk of cervical and breast cancer. We shall see that all women have the chance
to see a woman doctor if they choose.

We will step up the fight against AIDS by increasing research resources to find a vaccine or cure and also
ensure adequate resources for the supply of drugs capable of arresting the affliction.

We will improve outpatient and emergency facilities and ambulance services and repair and build hospitals.
We intend to improve both the quantity and quality of services for the National Health. The Tories have
increased **prescription charges** twelve fold. We will begin to **reduce them** with the purpose
of securing their eventual abolition.

Labour will ensure that nurses get proper and justified pay increases by right and regularly, not exceptionally
as pre-election sweeteners. Other hospital staff, on whom the effective running of the service depends, must
also be fairly rewarded as part of the effective health team.

Privatisation means a Health Service run for profit rather than in the patients' interests. Labour will end
privatisation in the NHS, relieve the pressure on NHS facilities by beginning to phase out pay beds and
remove public subsidies to private health.

### A Caring Community

The quality of life of the elderly and of disabled people can and must be improved by community services.
We believe that retirement should be comfortable and interesting - a time of freedom and choice, not
anxiety and loneliness. We believe that disability should not be a disqualification from good standards
of living and liberty.

Apart from our commitment to higher pensions and the beginning of a new disablement allowance, Labour
will support the National Health Service and local government in providing more meals on wheels, home
helps, chiropody services and health visitors.

We also recognise the immense contribution of the three million people - mostly women - who care for their
elderly, infirm and disabled relatives at home. They save the community huge sums of money, often at
considerable sacrifice to themselves. The Labour government will consequently provide **a carer's
allowance** to give extra help to those who serve their loved ones and our society so well.

We appreciate and will support voluntary efforts that supplement services which are essential to the
community. We share the view of many who are engaged in such efforts that they achieve best results
working in the context of high quality public provision.

### Education for Britain's Future

Our children are our future. We have a moral and material duty to see that children and young people are
fully equipped to deal with the complexities and challenges which face them now and which they will
meet as citizens; parents and workers in the future.

They must be provided with a system of education that enables them to control that future. We must see
that it is democratic and just, that it is creative and compassionate, and that it is one in which they can
fully exploit the advantages of science and technology with confidence and in safety.

In pursuit of those objectives, Labour will invest in education so that the abilities of all children and adults
from all home back grounds and in every part of our country are discovered and nourished.

We will make **nursery education available for all three- and four-year-olds** whose parents want this
opportunity. We will make provision for smaller classes and ensure that children have up-to-date books,
equipment and buildings without having to depend on fund-raising for those essentials.

The entitlement to free school meals and the restoration of nutritional standards are, like the strengthening
of the school health service, commitments which are necessary to safeguard the physical and social
wellbeing of growing children.

We will see that teachers are recognised properly as well qualified professionals, in their systems of
rewards, in the procedures for negotiation of their employment conditions and in participation in the
development of education.

In addition we shall work with local education authorities to secure a flexible but clear core curriculum
agreed at national level, a School Standards Council, and a new profile of achievement recording
individual progress through school for all pupils. We will improve links between schools and home
so that **parents and teachers** act **in partnership** to foster the best interests of children.

We shall foster achievement with other policies such as providing proper funding for the GCSE curriculum
and examination, for improved supply of teachers and equipment for science subjects so that girls as
well as boys increase science learning. There will be maintenance allowances for 16- to 18-year- olds
whose family circumstances would other wise impede their further education.

We will spread the provision of a comprehensive tertiary system of post-school education.

These policies will all contribute to **raising standards of performance in schools**. At the same time
as we improve the quality of publicly provided education, we shall end the 11 plus everywhere and stop
the diverting of precious resources that occurs through the Assisted Places Scheme and the public
subsidies to private schools.

Labour values the research and teaching contribution made by Britain's higher education system. We will
ensure that our universities and polytechnics get the resources they need to restore and expand the
opportunity for all qualified young people seeking higher education to secure places. We will ensure
that more adults have access to higher education to give them the 'second chance' of personal
development

We will also invest in research in higher education, in order to provide the facilities and opportunities
necessary to sustain standards of excellence, to retain and attract the highest talents and to encourage
the industrial and commercial application of research output.

Education for life through a well-funded adult education service will help to provide the means by which
rapid economic and social change can be embraced.

### Real Choice in Housing

Public funding for housing has fallen by 60 per cent during Mrs Thatcher's eight years in office. Far fewer
homes are being built. Millions of dwellings are in serious disrepair. Yet there is record unemployment
among building workers. This policy is immoral and grossly inefficient. Labour will reverse it. We will
also improve the quality of housing workmanship and establish a new system of registration in the
construction industry.

We will launch a **major housebuilding and** public and private sector housing **renovation
drive** as part of our jobs programme and to combat the problems of bad housing, over crowding
and homelessness. Owner occupiers will benefit from increased availability of improvement grants.

We will maintain mortgage tax relief, at the standard rate of income tax. To assist house-purchasers we
will introduce a housing 'log book', giving each dwelling's history, condition and construction so that
purchasers will know exactly what they are buying. This will be transferred with the sale.

For council tenants, we will **maintain the right to buy**. Local authorities, at present limited by the
Tories in using the receipts from council house sales, will be required to use these proceeds to invest
in new housing. For the millions who choose to remain council tenants, we will give a legal right to be
consulted about rents, charges, repair and improvement programmes. Tenants' associations will be
given representation in the decision-making structure and a say in spending budgets on their estates.

Groups of tenants who want to take over the running of their homes will have the right to set up management
co-operatives.

Leaseholders who own their homes will be given the legal right to acquire their freeholds at fair prices and
without the costly current impediments to that right. Leaseholders in flats will get the legal right to hire and
fire the managing agents in blocks of flats. They will be empowered to have the freeholder's accounts
examined by an auditor of their choice and be given the legal right to extend their lease.

Security of tenure will be protected for private tenants. These tenants will be given a legal right to get
repairs done.

### Protecting Our People

The Thatcher government has broken its promises on law and order. Last year 4,311,000 crimes were
committed in Britain. The clear-up rate fell to 32 per cent. Millions of women are scared to go out
at night. Many old people lock themselves into their homes. Drug trafficking is increasing.

Labour will take urgent action to make people safer.

Our **crime prevention programme** will:

- Help local councils to implement a Safer Streets policy, with more street-lighting, more
 caretakers, park-keepers and other public employees whose presence deters crime.

- Bring in a Safe Estates Policy, assisting councils to provide stronger locks, stouter doors
 and vandal-proof windows for tenants and home-owners - especially older citizens - who have
 difficulty in meeting the costs of such security improvements.

- Introduce a Safer Transport policy, to protect passengers and crews, including better
 services, especially at night, adequate staffing, better sited bus stops and well-lit stations
 with alarm buttons.

- Lay down crime prevention standards for buildings, open spaces and vehicles to combat
 vandalism and to deter criminals.

- Combat violence against women - specially domestic violence - by seeing that the laws that
 already exist against beating and abuse are vigorously enforced.

Our **victim support programme** will fund a national network of victim support schemes, providing
practical help to victims of all crime, ranging from victims of rape and child abuse to mugging and burglary
victims.

We shall assist family and support groups in their efforts to work with professionals in the health, education
and other services and within the community to deal with the great and growing problem of drug abuse.

Locally elected police authorities will be given clear statutory responsibility with the police to enforce the law
and uphold the Queen's peace. The police themselves will remain responsible for all operational matters.

Fraud in the City of London is a serious crime. Too many get away with it. Labour will bring in effective
regulation by establishing an independent statutory commission.

### Making Travel Easier

Efficient, inexpensive public transport is essential in any society. Tory policies have made travel more
difficult by cutting services and pushing up fares. Deregulation of buses has brought chaos to many
parts of the country both in towns and cities and in the rural areas where efficient and cheap public
transport is so important.

Labour will invest to co-ordinate and improve bus and rail services, which will improve travel and reduce
congestion. There will be Local Transport Plans for every area.

Action will be taken to keep fares down. There will be good **concessionary fare schemes** for local
travel for pensioners and people with disabilities.

We shall promote services for those with special needs, such as dial-a-ride and taxicard schemes offering
cheap travel for the disabled.

We shall invest to ensure a continuing future for British Rail Engineering as a high-quality supplier both for
British Rail and to world markets.

### A Safter Environment

The countryside and the urban areas all suffer from pollution and the misuse of the environment. Labour will
establish a **Ministry of Environmental Protection** to take positive action to safeguard the quality and
safety of life.

We will:

- Set up an Environmental Protection Service and a Wildlife and Countryside Service.

- Extend the planning system to cover agricultural forestry and water developments requiring
 them, and industry, to take account of environmental considerations.

- Invest more in land reclamation and cleaning up, in recycling and conservation, in
 development of new products, processes and pollution control equipment. This will not
 only make the country cleaner but will create jobs as well.

- Take action to deal with acid rain.

- Stop radio-active discharges into our seas and oppose the dumping of nuclear waste at
 sea.

- Provide for better monitoring, inspection and enforcement of pollution control, to cover
 areas ranging from air pollution to beaches, from hazardous chemicals to food additives,
 and from water quality to vehicle emissions.

- **Protect green belts** and other specially designated areas.

- Bring in a new Wildlife and Countryside Act and provide for public access to all common
 land, mountain, moor and heath.

- End all forms of organised hunting with hounds. Special account will be taken of the
 conditions applying in National Parks. These changes will not affect shooting and fishing.

- Update animal protection legislation - for example, to eliminate unnecessary
 experimenting on live animals.

### Strengthening Democracy

We will seek to strengthen parliamentary democracy and introduce state aid for political parties, along the
lines of the Houghton Report.

We shall establish a new democratically-elected **strategic authority for London** and consult widely
about the most effective regional structure of government and administration in England and Wales.

### Scotland

We shall legislate in the first Parliamentary session to establish a democratically-elected **Scottish
Assembly** in Edinburgh. This will have a wide range of powers over health, education and housing
and over significant aspects of industrial and economic policy. It will take responsibility for changes in
the structure of Scottish local government.

### Wales

Wales and the Welsh economy will clearly benefit from Labour's programme for investment in jobs and
vital services. In addition, the **Welsh Development Agency** will be given greater powers and
funds and there will be a new Wales Economic Planning Council. Welsh agriculture will benefit from our
measures to help the livestock farmers especially the marginal and hill farmers.

A separate Arts Council for Wales will be established and the development of the use and choice of the
Welsh language will be encouraged.

### Northern Ireland

Labour's policies for economic renewal are essential to combat the record unemployment and social
deprivation in Northern Ireland and to encourage the economic security which is fundamental to the
development of harmony and trust in the community.

We believe in a united Ireland: to be achieved peacefully, democratically, and by consent. We
consequently **support the Anglo-Irish Agreement** and its commitment that there should be no
change in the constitutional position of Northern Ireland without the con sent of the majority of the
people who live there. No group or party will be allowed to exercise a veto on political development,
or on policies designed to win consent.

We will combat para-military violence from wherever it comes. We will promote discussions aimed at
encouraging mutual confidence and eliminating conflict whilst ensuring that the respective identities
and basic rights of both communities will be protected. We will replace present strip-searching practice
with more effective and acceptable security measures.

### Local Democracy

The Tory government has undermined local democracy and plans to continue to diminish the importance of
votes in local elections.

It has made huge cuts in rate support grant and imposed financial penalties to prevent councils maintaining
and improving the quality of essential local services. Employment, and sensible and sensitive investment
in local communities and their services, have been damaged.

Labour will restore the right of councils to decide their own policies and plans, which will be subject to the
decisions of local people at **annual local elections**.

We will halt the cuts in rate support grant and end financial penalties. We will make the legal liabilities
of councillors similar to those of Ministers and Company Directors by ending surcharge and
disqualification except for criminal offences.

We will abolish the Rates Act and **repeal** the legislation which established **the poll tax
in Scotland**.

We will give local authorities the necessary powers to enable them to build on existing successful
initiatives for enterprise and employment, to develop new technologies and to train young people.

Labour will examine the structure of local government to ensure that it is democratic and effective. We
will **establish a new Quality Commission** to ensure the spread of 'best practice', efficiency and
high standards of local authority provision and response to the public.

### New Life for Inner Cities

Except where it has turned areas over to speculators so that they can create luxury accommodation at
astronomical prices, this government has left inner-city areas to rot.

Experience has shown that the Conservatives' City Action Teams have never had the means or the
purpose of making any real impact on inner city problems.

Tory cuts in funding and in housing, together with mass unemployment, have turned too many of our urban
areas into dingy, hopeless places.

Yet the people who live there, given the chance, have the zest and initiative to make these areas thrive
socially and economically.

Labour will launch a **drive against inner-city deprivation** both as a way of generating employment
and as a means of making such areas safer and better places to live.

Labour's approach will be to develop the partnership between central and local government, with the direct
participation of the voluntary and private sectors.

We will:

- Give local authorities in key areas the power to **declare Public Action Zones**. In these
 areas, local councils will have additional resources and powers to undertake programmes of
 investment. Land will be identified for housing, jobs and amenities and extra government
 resources allocated to help with comprehensive regeneration. Local people will be fully
 consulted about their needs and ideas.

- Strengthen the Urban Programme and Partnership Schemes.

- Make Urban Development Grants available for local needs.

- Increase resources for reclaiming derelict land.

### Rural Area

Under the Tories, the problems of the rural areas have become steadily more serious - the lack of jobs, the
poor housing, and the loss of buses, post offices, shops and schools.

Labour will give our rural communities the chance to thrive again. Our policies include better public transport,
**new mobile facilities for health care and social services** and extra help to keep open local schools
and post offices.

## Enhancing Rights, Increasing Freedom

Under the Conservatives, Britain has become a harsher place. Freedoms built up over generations have
been weakened or removed. Labour will restore and enhance those freedoms in a Britain where life can
be more pleasant and fulfilling.

We believe that positive steps are needed to help women and ethnic minorities get a fair deal, and to attain
more democracy in the workplace. In addition, we will take steps to ensure that homosexuals are not
discriminated against.

### Women's Rights

More than half of Britain's people - the women of our country - are still denied many essential rights. Labour's
**Ministry for Women** will make sure that, in framing their policies, all government departments
listen and respond to women's needs and concerns.

In particular, women must have the right to work and **equal rights at work**. In addition to our new
provision for training opportunities and protection against discrimination, Labour will help the large
number of women who are part-time workers. We will legislate for them to have the same hourly rates,
rights to sick pay, paid holidays and job security as full-time workers.

We will give homeworkers the status and rights of employees; introduce effective laws for equal pay for
work of equal value; provide better-paid leave for parents when their child is born; and encourage a
shorter, more flexible working week.

### Democracy in the Workplace

Workers' rights have been eroded, or in some cases removed entirely, during the Thatcher years. Labour's
policy for new rights and responsibilities means legislation to foster good industrial relations and
democratic participation in industry and trade unions. We believe that the law should be used to
enlarge, not diminish, the freedom of workers to control their environment.

We will:

- Replace Tory legislation that gives employers and non-unionists the means to frustrate
 legitimate trade union activity. New laws will strengthen the legal rights of representation,
 bargaining and trade unionism that are essential in a modern democracy.

- Improve the **protection** available **against unfair dismissal**. We shall make
 the legislation apply from the time of employment. Reinstatement will be the normal outcome
 of a successful finding of unfair treatment. We will ensure that justice is done in cases where
 miners have been unfairly dismissed.

- Extend employment protection to all workers, including part-timers.

- Improve statutory protection in respect of health and safety at work.

- Restore provision for fair pay, such as the Fair Wages Resolution, Schedule 11 of the
 1975 Employment Protection Act and the powers of the Wages Councils.

- Strengthen ACAS to put more emphasis on conciliation and arbitration.

- Take steps to develop stable and effective negotiating machinery, promote trade union
 membership and organisation, and encourage union recognition by employers.

- Restore the **right to belong to a trade union** to every employee - including those
 at GCHQ.

- Ensure that the law guarantees the essential legal freedom of workers and their unions
 to organise effective industrial action.

- Provide a statutory framework of measures to underpin the participative rights of union
 members, for example by laying down general principles for inclusion in union rule books.
 These will be based on a **right for union members to have a secret ballot** on
 decisions relating to strikes, and for the method of election of union executives to be
 based on a system of secret ballots.

- In consultation with the TUC, we will establish a new independent tribunal, presided over
 by a legally-qualified person. This will have the duty of acting on complaints by union
 members if they consider that these statutory principles have been breached.

### Equality for Ethnic Minorities

All the people of this country - whatever their race, colour or religion - must enjoy the full rights of
citizenship.

Our policies for employment, education, housing, health care, local government and much else will clearly
be of benefit to people of the ethnic minorities as they will be to the whole community.

In addition, Labour will take firm action to **promote racial equality**, to attack racial discrimination
and to encourage contract compliance and other positive means of ensuring equity for all citizens. We
will strengthen the law on public order to combat racial hatred and take firm action against the growing
menace of racial attacks. We will make prosecution easier in order to encourage the reporting of offences.

Labour's policy of **firm and fair immigration control** will ensure that the law does not discriminate
on the basis of race, colour or sex.

### A Better Deal for Consumers

When people make a purchase, they often feel they are treated unfairly, or even cheated. Labour's Charter
for Consumers will provide proper safeguards suited to modern conditions.

There will be firmer **protection against unsafe goods**. We will make producers strictly liable for
defective products.

We will provide easier means of redress for purchasers and stiffer penalties to deter illegal practices.

We will take action to make sure that public bodies respond better to the needs and complaints of people
who use their services.

We will bring in a statutory code of advertising practice. There will be powers to order the correction of
misleading advertisements.

We will improve access to legal services where necessary.

There will be more safeguards for customers when companies go bankrupt.

### Towards a Fuller Life

Life is not only work. Labour will make pro vision for the co-ordination and development of leisure amenities
and the leisure and cultural industries.

Our **Support Sport programme** will provide more resources for physical education and training
through more playing fields and facilities, better equipment and well-trained teachers and instructors.
We will nourish special talents and encourage wider participation in sport.

We will encourage schools to open up their recreational facilities to the whole community and prevent
the selling off of school and other sports grounds.

We will set up a Sports Trust to channel resources into the development of community sporting facilities
and the attraction of major international sporting events to Britain.

We will establish **a Ministry for the Arts and Media** with responsibility for the arts, crafts, public
libraries, museums, film, publishing, the press, the record industry, the development of broadcasting
and access to it, fashion, design, architecture and the heritage. The Home Office will remain responsible
for regulatory and statutory powers in relation to broadcasting.

The development of central and local government support for the arts, culture and entertainment is essential
to the extension of choice, access and participation, and to the development of the related industries.

We will **protect the independence of the BBC and the independent broadcasting organisations**.
We reject subscription TV for the BBC and the auctioning of ITV franchises.

We will legislate to ensure that ownership and control of the press and broadcasting media are retained
by citizens of Britain and to place limits on the concentration of owner ship. We will strengthen the Press
Council and set up a launch fund to assist new publications in order to encourage the diversity necessary
in a healthy democracy.

## Modern Britain in a Modern World

The globe is torn by strife and oppression A Labour Britain must play its part in promoting freedom and
reducing conflict.

Labour will play a full part in the United Nations Organisation and the Commonwealth.

Under the Conservatives, Britain picks and chooses which authoritarian countries to condemn and which to
befriend. Labour will stand up for freedom wherever it is oppressed - whether in Eastern Europe, Latin
America, Asia or Africa.

The Thatcher government has made no real effort to foster freedom in South Africa and Namibia. Labour
will make the arms embargo complete, halt investment and commercial loans and ensure that British
measures against apartheid embrace those already adopted by the US Congress, the Commonwealth
and the EEC. We will support the imposition by the UN Security Council of **comprehensive
mandatory economic sanctions** and provide help to the Front Line States who bear the brunt of
South African military and economic attack.

We uphold the principle that it is wrong for one country to dominate or threaten another. We oppose the
Soviet presence in Afghanistan. We oppose United States intervention in Nicaragua and the financing
and arming of the Contra terrorists.

Labour will actively seek a stable peace in the Middle East which protects the security of Israel and
recognises the right of Palestinians to self-determination.

Labour supports genuine guarantees for the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of
Cyprus and supports the efforts of the United Nations to achieve that.

We support the human rights movement throughout the world. We champion the demand for free
trade unions in Poland. We will press the Russians to honour their obligations under **international
human rights** agreements.

International terrorism is a growing menace to liberty and security. Labour is firmly committed to
strengthening national provision and international co-operation in combating and defeating it.

Labour's aim is to work constructively with our EEC partners to promote economic expansion and combat
unemployment. However, we will stand up for British interests within the European Community and will
seek to put an end to the abuses and scandals of the Common Agricultural Policy. We shall, like other
member countries, reject EEC interference with our policy for national recovery and renewal.

### Defending Our Country

Labour has a proud record of acting in defence of Britain. It was a Labour government which helped to
establish the North Atlantic Alliance. It was a Labour government which in the 1970s put resources into
rebuilding the Royal Navy and equipping the Royal Air Force with the most up-to-date aircraft.

At the same time, Labour has always linked necessary defence with the need to reduce hostility between
East and West. We must be alert in protecting our country and equally alert in helping to keep away the
scourge of war and nuclear destruction.

The incoming Labour government will maintain that record of effective defence whilst working to lower
international tension, fear and distrust.

Labour's defence policy is based squarely and firmly on **Britain's membership of NATO**. We are
determined to make the most useful possible contribution to the alliance. We can best do that by
concentrating our resources on the non-nuclear needs of our army, navy and air force.

The Polaris system of nuclear delivery is ageing and will soon be obsolete. The Tories are buying the
expensive American Trident system - a policy which increases nuclear armament without increasing
security and, at the same time, diminishes our effective defences. Trident's cost of up to
£10 billion will take up so much of our defence budget as to deny modern and necessary
equipment to our front line forces. Indeed, this process is already happening.

Labour rejects this dishonest and expensive policy. We say that it is time to end the nuclear pretence and
to ensure a rational conventional defence policy for Britain.

So Labour will decommission the obsolescent Polaris system. We will cancel Trident and use the money
saved to pay for those **improvements for our army, navy and airforce** which are vital for the
defence of our country and to fulfil our role in NATO. We will maintain a 50-frigate and destroyer navy. We
will play a full part in the development of the European Fighter Aircraft. We will invest in the best up-to-date
equipment for the British Army of the Rhine.

That **commitment to conventional defence** will be based wherever possible on buying British-made
rather than foreign equipment. This policy will provide greater security for workers in our vital industries
like aerospace, shipbuilding and engineering where jobs are in danger from the reductions which the Tories
are making in conventional defence.

We have always recognised that a **properly negotiated and monitored international agreement to remove
nuclear weapons** from European soil would provide the most effective guarantee against the horrors
of nuclear war. It would be the most significant step towards an eventual worldwide renunciation of, and ban
upon, nuclear weapons. That is why we were the first to propose to the superpowers the zero option in
respect of intermediate nuclear weapons.

Labour therefore strongly supports the talks between the United States and Soviet governments aimed at
reducing nuclear armaments. Success in these efforts to negotiate the removal of all intermediate nuclear
missiles in Europe would be warmly welcomed. It would mean the removal of America's Cruise missiles
here in Britain and in the rest of Europe, as well as Pershing IIs in Germany and the Soviet SS20s and other
shorter-range missiles.

We naturally, therefore, want to assist that process in every way possible. If, however, it should fail we shall,
after consultation, inform the Americans that we wish them to remove their cruise missiles and other nuclear
weapons from Britain. We would then become the ninth - of the sixteen NATO members - which do not have
US nuclear weapons on their territory. This change would, of course, not affect the other US, British and
joint defence and early warning systems in the United Kingdom.

We will oppose the extension of the arms race into outer space and will seek an international agreement to
abolish chemical weapons.

### The War We Must Fight

The world is aware, as never before, of the horrors of famine and poverty in many countries. A Labour
Britain will play its full part in defeating these scourges.

We will set up a Department of Overseas Development and Co-operation, headed by a Cabinet Minister.
We will **double Britain's aid budget** in order to achieve the United Nations' target of 0.7 per cent
of national income within five years. We will restore funding for development education. We will give
greater support to voluntary agencies. We will promote international action to lift the burden of Third
World debt and improve the trading conditions of the developing countries.

In all of our policies for making our aid commitment more effective we shall consult the agencies and the
men and women of the communities that use the aid to help to win their freedom from want and poverty.

## Britain will Win with Labour

On June 11, the people of Britain have the opportunity to put behind them the bleak years of Thatcherism
and to give our country a fresh start Labour's plans, carefully costed, prudently programmed, can
provide that start.

To go on under Toryism is to accept lower expectations and narrower horizons: it is to surrender to national
decline and national division.

We must not shackle ourselves or burden our children with that future of failure. Together, we can be
successful not just in material and economic terms, though these are vitally important, but also in
terms of our sense of purpose, our freedom, independence and confidence.

That success can come only when the nation is restored to strength and unity in their fullest sense.

Labour has the policies to generate efficient production and secure high standards of justice. Labour has the
vision and commitment to stimulate the energies, the skills and the will to succeed of the British people.

In our precious democratic tradition, a general election passes power back from Parliament to the people.
We urge the people to use their power in their own interests, their families' interests, their country's
interests.

Britain will win with Labour.

###