From NHS waiting lists to new homes – are Labour’s key pledges achievable?
Sir Keir Starmer presented the Labour Party’s general election manifesto in Manchester on Thursday, emphasising a commitment to prioritise “wealth creation” above all.
Starmer detailed Labour’s comprehensive plans to generate £8.6bn in new tax revenue, which will be used to support a wide range of commitments covering education, policing, housing, and more.
The money will be raised primarily by closing the non-dom loophole, which allows some residents to avoid paying UK tax on overseas income, imposing VAT on private schools to address educational inequality, and implementing a windfall tax on oil and gas companies to ensure they contribute their fair share during times of extraordinary profits.
Here are some of Labour’s key pledges, and how difficult they would be to achieve:
Creating 40,000 new NHS appointments
One of Starmer’s “first steps” if Labour gain power is to cut NHS waiting times by creating 40,000 new appointments yearly, with the goal of clearing all waits over 19 weeks within his first parliamentary term.
This is an ambitious goal, as the current target of 92 per cent of patients being treated within 18 weeks of referral hasn’t been hit in over a decade. But, as suggested by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), hitting this target is possible and major cuts to waiting times were achieved by Labour under Tony Blair.
Earlier in the campaign period, Max Warner, a research economist at IFS, warned that the biggest barrier to this goal is the current economic climate, adding: “The challenging fiscal situation facing the next government will make it incredibly difficult to increase health spending at anywhere near similar rates, and will make achieving this commitment much harder.”
The think-tank said it was difficult to predict if this target is feasible as there are a lot of competing factors at play, but commented that the pledge to create 40,000 new appointments “represent a small but noticeable increase in activity” and that it would “need to see more details on Labour’s overall health spending plans for the next parliament” to make a full judgement.
Difficulty rating: 4/5
Recruiting 13,000 more neighbourhood police
Labour’s pledge to bring in an additional 13,000 police and community support officers has been a long-standing commitment by the party and has received a cautious welcome from policing organisations.
Responding to the announcement when it was first made in February 2023, the Police Federation of England and Wales (PFEW) said it welcomed the proposals, claiming that “an uplift in police officers is desperately needed”.
The challenge will be how the pledge is paid for – Labour has said the £360m needed would be raised through instituting a shared procurement plan. This would centralise much of the buying of equipment like police cars and computers, which the Police Foundation charity has previously suggested could bring in up to £800m.
But PFEW national chair Steve Hartshorn warned at the time that a boost in funding from central government was needed as “forces are already having to make multi-million-pound budget cuts”.
There is also the issue of retention – a recent survey by the PFEW found that more than one in five police officers are planning on quitting the police service, with 78 per cent highlighting poor government treatment as the driving reason.
The Conservatives have managed to recruit over 20,000 police officers since 2018 – bringing the overall levels back in line with where they were in 2010 – which suggests that boosting the numbers is possible.
Difficulty rating: 2/5
Building 1.5 million new homes
Labour has promised that it will build 1.5 million homes within the first five years of government, representing a significant boost in housebuilding in the UK.
The pledge effectively matches one previously made by the Conservatives – to build 300,000 homes a year – but this has not been hit in recent years.
In the 2022-23 financial year, just over 212,000 homes were built, only slightly up on the year before.
When the pledge was first made in October 2023, it was cautiously welcomed by the industry, with the National Housing Federation describing it as “welcome and promising”.
Key to achieving the pledge will be reforming planning laws to make it easier to build on “low quality” green belt land and create new towns across the country. Developers would also be given the power to buy land at lower prices.
With the Conservative government having struggled to build enough homes during its time in power, largely due to local opposition to new developments, Labour faces an acute challenge in building the homes Britain needs.
Difficulty rating: 3/5
Delivering 6,500 new teachers
Key to Labour’s plans for education is its pledge to recruit 6,500 new teachers if the party wins the next election, with a focus on filling shortages in key subjects.
The plans were mostly welcomed by education unions, but doubts remain about how the teachers would be recruited and whether the pay and working conditions could lead to retention issues.
Responding to the policy when it was first announced, the National Education Union said it was a “welcome commitment” but added that “there isn’t a simple fix to correct the scale of neglect the education system has endured”.
The union added that the pledge would need to come “hand in hand” with boosting teachers’ pay and “a different approach on education policy”.
The target for teacher recruitment has not been met for ten years, and recent figures show that only half of the required number of secondary school trainee teachers were recruited in 2023, representing the scale of the challenge Labour faces.
Difficulty rating: 3/5
Make energy grid zero-carbon by 2030
While the Conservatives want to decarbonise the electricity grid by 2035, Labour has set a more ambitious target of 2030.
This, however, has been described as a “moonshot” by some in the sector, with many fearing it may be impossible to do in just six years.
Last year, Gary Smith, general secretary of the GMB union, told the Spectator magazine that it “cannot be done”, citing the slow pace of development, the lack of existing infrastructure and global shortages of key components such as undersea cables.
There are also worries about the cost, with a recent analysis by Aurora Energy Research, founded by academics from the University of Oxford, warning the bill could reach £116bn by 2030.
Difficulty rating: 5/5
Election 2024
Rishi Sunak, Sir Keir Starmer and other party leaders are on the campaign trail, and i‘s election live blog is the go-to place for everything on the general election.
On Monday, the Lib Dems launched their manifesto, followed by the Tory manifesto launch on Tuesday, which included a further cut to national insurance. On Wednesday, the Green Party launched its manifesto, which it hopes will secure them some important seats.
Labour’s manifesto launch was interrupted by a protester urging for more policies for youth, but Starmer was undeterred as he announced changes to voting age and confirmed his party’s position on tax and spending cuts.
i has urged the parties to commit to its Save Britain’s Rivers manifesto to improve our waterways. The Lib Dems became the first to back the campaign, followed by the Green Party.
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