Just days to go; all the manifestos are now out; the campaign can start properly. Read them all in full below…
Manifesto Contract with the people
*Sorry, ‘Contract with the People’…
As in 2017, Corbyn has attempted to address the public’s concerns about the cost of his proposals by claiming Labour’s 2019 manifesto is ‘fully costed’.
According to Labour’s supplementary “Funding Real Change” ‘Grey Book’, their spending plans come to a pocket change amount of merely £82.9 billion, and their tax rises meet this amount pound-for-pound.
The claimed amount of tax each increase will raise are frankly fanciful. The document says that whacking up corporation tax will raise £30 billion, ignoring the fact that the corporation tax cuts that the Coalition government brought in actually raised revenue. The proposed yield from the financial transactions tax is frankly fanciful. Changed behaviour would wipe out receipts…
The document also has some enormous spending omissions:
- Labour’s £400 billion ‘national transformation fund’ – including a £250 billion Green Transformation Fund and a £150 Social Transformation Fund
- Their 4-day working week – estimated to cost £17 billion a year in public sector wages
- All Labour’s nationalisation programmes, including water, rail, energy and the royal mail – estimated by the CBI to cost £196 billion
Guido hopes broadcasters will remind any Labour politicians of these glaring black holes if they claim the manifesto’s fully costed…
Read Labour’s pretend costing document below…
