The Government has published ‘Building Britain's Future', a 126 page document which sets out Labour's action plan for the coming year and their future priorities. It is also a response to the recent MPs expenses scandal and the economic downturn.

The document sets out three priorities:
1. Cleaning up politics and reforming democracy
2. Taking Britain out of recession
3. Further reform of Britain's public services and modernising national infrastructure

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Cleaning up politics
In order to rebuild trust in our elected politicians after the exposure of irregularities with MPs allowances, the Government proposes to remove the rights of MPs to regulate their own allowances and to create an independent regulator for Parliamentary standards and a statutory Code of Conduct for all MPs.

In order to restore trust in Parliamentary democracy the Government proposes four measures to:
1. Reform the House of Lords by making it fully elected
2. Give stronger and clearer powers to local and city-regional governments
3. Consider whether we should have a written constitution
4. Develop new initiatives to improve public engagement in politics, especially among young people.

Responding to economic downturn
In response to the impact of the recession on youth employment, the Government proposes to guarantee a sixth form college or apprenticeship place to all school leavers. From next year every young person under 25 who has been unemployed for a year will be required to take up a guaranteed job, work experience or a training place. A £1 billion Future Jobs Fund will provide 100,000 jobs for young people and a further 50,000 new jobs in areas of high unemployment.

Adults who have been unemployed for six months or more will receive help to access to jobs (supported by incentives to employers), set up businesses and access training or volunteering opportunities.

The Government is adding an additional £1.5 billion to the £1.2 billion it has already committed to building new houses, to deliver 20,000 additional affordable homes to rent or buy. It is hoped that this housing investment package will also create 45,000 new jobs.

Modernising infrastructure
As a part of ensuring leadership in new industries and maintaining up to date modern infrastructure and technology, the Government aims to ensure broadband access for all by 2012. The document emphasises the importance of future industry being low-carbon with a particular focus on the following sectors: biotechnology, life sciences, digital technology, advanced manufacturing and financial services. To support this, a £150 million innovation fund will be established which it is hoped will lever in up to £1 billion of private sector funding.

Building on the reforms of the planning system for ‘nationally significant infrastructure' in the 2008 Planning Act, the Government plans to set up an advisory body, ‘Infrastructure UK', that will identify long term infrastructure needed over the next 5-50 years.

The Government also wants to provide incentives for the take-up of low carbon buses, support for electric vehicles, and to promote cycling through the development of a National Cycle Plan. The Government is also investing in energy efficiency and the next generation of renewables, nuclear and clean coal technology with the aim to make Britain a global leader in low carbon industries.

Public service reform
The document outlines proposals designed to make local services more tailored to meet local needs and to give greater power to citizens and local councils to hold these services to account. By giving greater power to individuals and councillors to hold public services to account, it is hoped that the quality of public services will improve whilst protecting core entitlements.

Future public service reform will see a shift away from the current system of targets and central direction to one where individuals have greater choice and control over the services they receive. This will include entitlements to:
1. Hospital treatment within 18 weeks
2. Access to a cancer-specialist within 2 weeks
3. Free NHS health-checks for people aged 40-74
4. A personal tutor for every pupil secondary school pupil who needs it
5. Qualifications that suit every child's strengths whether practical or academic.

The proposals also include measures to give local people more power to keep their neighbourhoods safe, including the right to hold the police to account at monthly ‘beat meetings', to have say on CCTV and other crime prevention measures, to have their views taken into account in prosecution decisions and to vote on how offenders ‘pay back the community'.

Social welfare
The paper sets out the Government's proposals to require people receiving benefit to access support in order to seek work or access training.

Significant reform of immigration policy is also proposed, with an expectation that people coming into the UK should ‘earn' their citizenship. The points based system for applications for citizenship will be extended with a new system of ‘probationary citizenship' being introduced along with compulsory ID cards for foreign nationals.

The Government wants to see a bigger role and more responsibility for local authorities to meet the housing needs of people in their area. The current rules for allocating council and other social housing are to be reformed to address perceived unfairness in allocations policies. Local authorities will be given more freedom to prioritise local people and those who have spent a long time on a waiting list. The Government also plans to launch a crackdown on social housing fraud, which they argue will free up more homes for people in housing need.

The paper sets out plans to take further action to tackle child poverty with the Child Poverty Bill to drive progress towards the Government's 2020 goals.

It announces that new Sure Start Children's Centres will be created and free early learning for two year olds will be extended. All children will be entitled to start school in the September after their fourth birthday, or be offered 25 hours of free early learning a week. The government is also extending the right to request flexible working to parents of children aged 16 and under.

In response to the ageing population the paper outlines plans to overhaul and modernise the social care system. It focuses on having a more preventive health and social care system for older people and disabled people.

Through the Equality Bill the Government plans to outlaw age discrimination in public services. The Government also wants to take measures to ensure that older people have flexibility over their working lives as they approach retirement. They want to restore the link between earnings and the basic state pension.

In order to support communities and build strong civic life the paper includes measures such as encouraging every teenager to volunteer for at least 50 hours in their community. And there will be new or refurbished youth centres, or other facilities, in every constituency to ensure that all young people have easy access to positive activities.

Britain in the international arena
Finally, the paper sets out the international priorities that the current Government wants to pursue over the coming years:
• Reforming international financial institutions and leading global action against poverty
• Securing global agreement on tackling climate change by the end of 2009
• Driving forward step change on the nuclear non-proliferation and multilateral disarmament agenda in 2010.

Next steps
A Building Britain's Future website has been set up and the public are being invited to respond to the proposals and a response will be published towards the end of 2009.
For more information or to respond to the proposals see: http://www.hmg.gov.uk/buildingbritainsfuture.aspx
or
http://www.hmg.gov.uk/media/27749/full_document.pdf

Elin Gudnadottir
August 2009