Thread by @ThangamMP

Shortages of food, fuel and essentials. Rising costs of food and energy. Taxes going up. People in #Bristol West are seriously worried about the future. So what would Labour do differently? THREAD

The government lurches from crisis to crisis and has no plan to deal with problems as they pile up.

Take the shortage in lorry drivers, causing food and fuel shortages.

Over the last couple of weeks, ministers first denied there was a problem, then tried to blame the public for panic buying, and now they say that this chaos is the intended outcome of their failed Brexit deal.

Let's not forget ministers were warned about this shortage months ago – and they ignored it.

The country deserves better than this Tory incompetence. We need a plan out of this mess to get skilled people into important jobs and get the economy back on track.

Labour has that plan.

First of all, we would not have ignored the warnings as the current Tory government has and continues to do.

Next, the government needs to stop hammering people’s incomes. That means stopping tax rises on income and reversing the #UniversalCredit cut. The Tories are choosing to take money from pockets of hardworking people to fix their mistakes. debbonaire.co.uk/blog/2021/10/0…

It doesn’t have to be this way. Labour will tax fairly, spend wisely, and get the economy firing on all cylinders.

We want to save money and stop waste because we respect taxpayers and our public services. This money should help improve people’s everyday lives, and address big challenges like climate change.

We will reform the tax system to make fit for the 21st Century, making it fairer, more efficient and shifting the burden of business tax.

To resolve the immediate crisis of shortages, we need more HGV drivers on the roads, quickly. Labour would appoint a Minister for the supply chain crisis. We would extend temp visas to meet the immediate shortages and use that time to urgently recruit and train new drivers.

We should be using everything at our disposal to resolve this, including MOD capacity, airfields and army bases to accelerate training.

Ministers should be looking ahead at the next crisis. Years of economic mismanagement means more labour shortages coming down the line. This includes social care workers, bus drivers, food manufacturing, warehousing, courier services and bin collectors.

We need real investment in our everyday economy. This means more training for young people, better working conditions and pay. We need to buy, make and sell more in Britain.

We would also invest £28 billion per year capital investment in tackling climate change and ecological emergency, right now. Our current government is not treating this with the urgency it requires.

Properly addressing the climate crisis would help with the immediate squeeze on living costs.

For example, we should be retrofitting cold, damp, draughty and expensive to heat homes, responsible for 14% of our carbon emissions and a growing chunk of household budgets.

The reality of Boris Johnson’s failed Brexit deal is even worse than warnings he dismissed as ‘Project Fear’.

Labour will plug the gaps in this deal, e.g. by recognising professional qualifications from other countries and making a veterinary agreement to ease product checks.

Unfortunately the government is determined to ignore the problems and bluff and bluster their way through.

For families struggling to afford food, businesses that cannot get staff or key workers unable to get to work, this is not working.

British people deserve a government which can avert problems before they become full blown crises.

The rising cost of living, the crisis in NHS and social care and the climate emergency all demand a government able to plan for the future.

That's a Labour government. ENDS