Ed Miliband has opened his election campaign with a promise to try to cut through the cynicism around politics by campaigning door-to-door on the voters’ issues of living standards, the future of the NHS and a new economy that works for everyday people.
Adopting an optimistic tone, and promising hope not falsehoods, the Labour leader promised his party would hold 4m conversations with voters on the doorstep, and tried to contrast this with a Tory campaign based around posters, big business funding and Westminster.
He began his first rally in Salford with the life stories of five endorsers, including a successful music businessman, a recruitment agency chief, a working mum, a GP and a third-year student from Leeds who gave a stinging attack on the effect of tuition fees.
Miliband promised: “We will win this election, not by buying up thousands of poster sites, but by having millions of conversations. I am going to be leading those conversations in village halls, community centres, workplaces right across the country, starting this very week and every week from now until the election.”
He said he was fighting not just for his party but for a Britain that works for everyday people, in which everyone plays by the rules and the NHS is not shredded.
Miliband, facing Tory accusations that Labour plans to spend £20bn more for the first year, said the Tory attack was false. He also said: “The deficit is still here for a very simple reason: because it turns out if you depress wages and lack any real economic plan other than tax cuts for the wealthy, it doesn’t just fail working people, it fails to balance the books.”
Speaking with the benefit of an autocue, he said: “This Tory experiment has been tried and the verdict is in.
“By the measures of household budgets, prospects for our children, preserving the most vital public services and dealing with our nation’s debts, the Tory experiment has failed.
“Theirs is not a record to run on. Theirs is a record to run from.”
He promised: “Ours is a plan to cut the deficit every year and balance the books as soon as possible in the next parliament. And until that happens it does mean, outside protected areas, spending will be falling, not rising, department by department. With no proposals in our manifesto funded by additional borrowing. Not a single one.”
He said the Tories were promising more of the same – a road to ruin: “They were telling voters the British economy will keep driving along the road to nowhere, but press down on the accelerator.”
Yet, for the first time since the 1920s, workers were worse off at the end of the parliament than at the beginning. He said Britain had become a country of food banks and bankers’ bonuses, yet the Tories called this a success.
He promised he was on the side of business, but he would not tolerate broken markets or an economy in which the energy companies and the banks did not face true competition.
He made no commitment to tax rises but said those with the broadest shoulders would face the biggest burden.
He urged voters: “Imagine what another five years would mean for you and your family. The Tories telling you about the good economic news. But you and your family not having enough to pay the bills at the end of each month.
“The Tories telling you that there has never been more opportunity for young people. But your son or daughter can’t afford to go to university and the only other option is a zero-hours job.
He said: “The Labour plan is one that says that all those who go out to work are as important and valuable to our country as those who get the six-figure bonuses.
“That means raising the minimum wage to over £8 an hour and dealing with the scandal of zero-hours contracts.
“It means supporting the wealth creating businesses of the future, in green industries, that create those good jobs that reward hard work.
“In an era of hard choices, it means putting cuts in business rates for small firms that will create most of the jobs of the future, ahead of further tax cuts for large corporations.
“Ours is a plan also that says there is nothing more important for our country than the opportunities for the young. We are told by this government that they are pro-business.
“Yet we know that our country is hundreds of thousands short of the number of engineers businesses demand. And we see this problem throughout our economy: good paying jobs, gone wanting, for people who have the necessary education and training to fill them.”
He also tried to build bridges with business by saying: “Make no mistake: exit from the EU would be a dramatic mistake for our country and our economy. Whatever the politics, I will not join those who cynically offer exit as a realistic plan for our future or the future of Britain’s working families. The true chaos would be a re-elected Tory party riven apart on Europe.”
Miliband said he would not shirk the hard truths, including the challenge of immigration.
He said: “I am the son of immigrants who came here with nothing. They benefited from the opportunities that Britain had to offer and built a life for our family.
“My parent’s story is not unique. For generations, hard-working immigrants, eager to make their way, have helped build our country, and they do so today.”
He added: “But this party will never again dismiss people’s concerns about immigration. Britain should not – cannot – close ourselves off from those who can contribute to our economy and our country. People do want to know that there are fair rules. Fair rules so that benefits should be earned, so people must contribute before they claim, and fair rules to prevent businesses from recruiting at slave wages, exploiting migrant labour to undercut pay and condition.”
