Political parties – there are very BIG differences in their policies.

What LABOUR Achieved whilst in Government:

1. Longest period of sustained low inflation since the 60s.
2. Low mortgage rates.
3. Introduced the National Minimum Wage and raised it to £5.52 per hour.
4. Over 14,000 more police in England and Wales.
5. Cut overall crime by 32 per cent.
6. Record levels of literacy and numeracy in schools.
7. Young people achieving some of the best ever results at 14, 16, and 18.
8. Funding for every pupil in England has doubled.
9. Employment is at its highest level ever.
10. 3,700 rebuilt and significantly refurbished schools; including new and improved classrooms, laboratories and kitchens.
11. 85,000 more nurses.
12. 32,000 more doctors.
13. Brought back matrons to hospital wards.
14. Devolved power to the Scottish Parliament.
15. Devolved power to the Welsh Assembly.
16. Dads now get paternity leave of 2 weeks for the first time.
17. NHS Direct offering free convenient patient advice.
18. Gift aid was worth £828 million to charities last year.
19. Restored city-wide government to London.
20. Record number of students in higher education.
21. Child benefit up 26 per cent since 1997.
22. Delivered 2,200 Sure Start Children’s Centres.
23. Introduced the Equality and Human Rights Commission.
24.  £200 winter fuel payment to pensioners & up to  £300 for over-80s.
25. On course to exceed our Kyoto target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
26. Restored devolved government to Northern Ireland.
27. Over 36,000 more teachers in England and 274,000 more support staff and teaching assistants.
28. All full time workers now have a right to 24 days paid holiday.
29. A million pensioners lifted out of poverty.
30. 600,000 children lifted out of relative poverty.
31. Introduced child tax credit giving more money to parents.
32. Scrapped Section 28 and introduced Civil Partnerships.
33. Brought over 1 million social homes up to standard.
34. Inpatient waiting lists down by over half a million since 1997: the shortest waiting times since NHS records began.
35. Banned fox hunting.
36. Cleanest rivers, beaches, drinking water and air since before the industrial revolution.
37. Free TV licences for over-75s.
38. Banned fur farming and the testing of cosmetics on animals.
39. Free breast cancer screening for all women aged between 50-70.
40. Free off peak local bus travel for over-60s.
41. New Deal – helped over 1.8 million people into work.
42. Over 3 million child trust funds have been started.
43. Free eye test for over 60s.
44. More than doubled the number of apprenticeships.
45. Free entry to national museums and galleries.
46. Overseas aid budget more than doubled.
47. Heart disease deaths down by 150,000 and cancer deaths down by 50,000.
48. Cut long-term youth unemployment by 75 per cent.
49. Free nursery places for every three and four-year-olds.
50. Free fruit for most four to six-year-olds at school.
51. Gender Recognition Act 2004/5
52. Good Friday Agreement in Northern Ireland. That ended 30 years of the troubles in which 3000 people were killed.
53. Flagship walk- in Health Centres and GP out of hours Service.
54. Campaigned tirelessly for, and then brought about  the universal provision of digital hearing aids, through the NHS.
55. Children’s Act 2004, 2008 – Every Child Matters. Flagship policy aimed at effectively safeguarding all children and young people, and meeting their needs, regardless of background.
56. Introduced Smoke – Free legislation, 2007, which led to a significant decrease in hospital admissions for children with asthma. The decrease in childhood asthma symptoms happened immediately that the smoking ban was introduced, and have continued to decrease since.
57. Introduced the Retail Distribution Review (RDR) which is aimed at improving the quality of advice provided to customers and the transparency around the charges for that advice. Ended commission for advisers to address the imbalance of interest between customers and companies selling financial products.
58. Introduced legislation to make blacklisting unlawful in 2009 – 2010.
59. The Equality Act.
60. Established the Disability Rights Commission.
61. The Human Rights Act.
62  Signed the European Social Chapter, introduced measures including: a right to parental leave; extended maternity leave; a new right to request flexible working; and the same protection for part-time workers as full time workers.
63. Launched £1.5 billion Housing Pledge of new affordable housing, largest program of council house building for twenty years.
64. The Autism Act 2009, which was the first ever disability-specific law in England.
65. New Deal for Communities regeneration programme, which successfully addressed deprivation and social exclusion.
66. All prescriptions  free for people being treated for cancer or the effects of cancer.
67. Introduced vaccination to be offered to teenage girls to protect  against cervical cancer.
68. Rough sleeping dropped by two thirds
69. Homelessness at its lowest level since the early 1980s.
70. Increased Britain’s offshore wind capacity than any country in the world, to provide enough electricity to power 2 million homes .
71. Led the campaign to win the 2012 Olympics for London.
72. Introduced the first ever British Armed Forces and Veterans Day to honour past and present achievements of our armed forces.
73. Created a new right of pedestrian access, so that every family has equal opportunity to access  the national coastline.
74. Led the campaign to agree a new international convention banning all cluster munitions.
75.  Launched the Swimming Challenge Fund to support free swimming for over 60s and under 16s.
76. Created community safety partnerships.
77. Set up a dedicated Department for International Development.
78. Cancelled approximately 100 per cent of debt for the world’s poorest countries.
79. Helped lift 3 million people out of poverty each year, globally.
80. Helped to get some 40 million more children into school, through  Labour’s campaign for international development.
81. Polio is on the verge of being eradicated globally.
82. 3 million people are now able to access life-preserving drugs for HIV and AIDS.
83. Improved water or sanitation services for over 1.5 million people.
84. Launched a Governance and Transparency Fund, providing resources to local civil society groups to improve governance and increase accountability in poor countries – for example, by helping citizens, media and parliaments hold governments to account.
85. The Neighbourhood Renewal programme – introduced funding for neighbourhood improvements.
86. The Extending Schools Program – included Breakfast & Homework clubs to improved levels of educational achievement and the longer term life chances of disadvantaged children.
87. Launched the Connexions Service – provided valuable careers advice and support to young people seeking employment.
88. Working Family Tax credits to support low paid parents in work and to pay for childcare.
89. The Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA)
90. Established The Future Jobs Fund to provide all young people access to a job, training or education.
91. Introduced Warm Front – helped 2.3 million vulnerable households, those in fuel poverty with energy efficiency improvements.
92. Guaranteed paid holidays – introduced a law to ensure that everyone who works is entitled to a minimum paid holiday of 5.6 weeks,
93. The right to request flexible working.
94. Improved work hours – introduced a law so employers cannot force employees to work more than 48 hours a week.
95. Protection against unfair dismissal – introduced protections for workers and increased the maximum compensation from £12,000 to around £63,000.
96. Introduced Rights for Part-time workers – the right to equal pay rates, pension rights, pro-rata holidays and sick pay.
97. Introduced the Right to breaks at work
98. Introduced the Right to representation – every worker can be a member of a trade union and be represented in grievance and disciplinary hearings.
99. Rights for parents and carers – introduced the right to time off to deal with unexpected problems for their dependants, such as illness.
100. Introduced literacy and numeracy hours in schools and extended diversity to the curriculum.
101. Reduced class sizes to 30 for 5-7 year old children.
102. Introduced a public interest test, allowing governments to block international business takeovers on three specific grounds: media plurality, national security or financial stability.
103. Introduced the Bribery criminal Act
104. Established the Standards Board for England under Labour’s Local Government Act 2000 for promoting and ensuring high ethical standards and code of conduct in local government.
105. Climate Change Act 2008.

1-50 taken from here.

Some more sources here

Where Labour policies are cited, I have researched and verified them, to ensure that the list is accurate.

Labour’s animal welfare policies

What the TORIES/LIBERAL DEMOCRATS have “Achieved” whilst in Government:

1. Introduced unpaid, unlimited workfare for those deemed too sick or disabled to work by their doctor.
2. Scrapped crisis loans and community care grants for the most vulnerable.
3. Severely reduced Legal Aid so that equal, fair access to justice is no longer preserved.
4. Increased VAT ensuring the poorest pay proportionately more in tax. Cut top tax rate to 45% giving millionaires a £40000 pa tax windfall.
5. Legalised state surveillance of all personal internet traffic.
6. Planning to curtail human rights, guaranteed by membership of the EU. That is written in their Program for Government, and has been planned from the very start.
7. Introduced charges for Child Support Agency, so that vulnerable single parents have to pay to get maintanance from absent fathers, for their children.
8. Introduced the Council Tax Bill, with the same unfair principles as the Poll tax Bill, sneaked in via the Localism Bill. The poorest will pay the most.
9. Sold off the publicly owned and publicly funded NHS to their sponsors and donors, and to Companies that many of them have financial interests in. Despite promises not to.
10. Sold off most of the Council housing stock. The numbers of homes built under the Tories are at levels lower than any time since the Second World War.
11. Rationed access to Health Services, to the detriment of patients, Closed A and E’s and the out of hours and walk in surgeries set up by Labour.
12. Halved Support for disabled children
Scrapped the “Youth Premium” for the most profoundly disabled children
13. Closed 250 Sure start centres, 124 of those closed in the first year of the Coalition.
14. Cut housing support for disabled people
15. Reduced contributions based ESA eligibility to just one year. This means many people living in households with other income lose their benefit
16. Cut Council budgets so they can no longer provide social care for some of the most vulnerable people
17. Introduced PIP to replace DLA, with the aim of cutting 500,000 vulnerable people from the figures before any assessments have happened.
18. Removed basic rate ESA for sick and disabled people for those wishing to appeal their ESA decisions from October 2013, whilst they await a mandatory review. From April 2013 for JSA.
19. Persistently lied to the public about Work Capability Assessments and failed to address the fact they are unfit for purpose while disabled people suffer and die.
20. Introduced targets – 7 out of 8 ESA claimants to lose their ESA, regardless of their significant illness and disabilities, which has meant even cancer patients have had to go to the job centre to look for work
21. Encouraged hate crime by using the “scrounger” and Nazi “burden on the State” style propaganda in speeches and in the media about the sick and disabled, and the unemployed, fed politicised press releases to the Media. Yet £66 billion goes unclaimed every Parliament in benefits.
22. Introduced authoritarian “monitoring” of the BBC, and other media , for “left wing bias”
23. Lied about benefit fraud rates, and failed to apologise when they were rumbled.
24. Closing Remploy factories, throwing over 1500 working disabled people on the scrapheap
25. Fostering a divisive nation by using ideology of hate – low paid workers are set against benefit claimants, for example, in the speech about “making work pay”, which was simply a front for cutting welfare provision.
26. Cut respite care.
27. Suggesting in the PIP regulations that a sick or disabled person can “bathe” if they can wash above the waist only.
28. Re-classified paraplegics as “fully mobile” if they use their wheelchairs too well.
29. Lying about Workfare repeatedly to the press. The Tory Work Programme has delivered less than a 2% success rate, after they ignored NAO warnings it was a waste of money.
30. Falsifying internet documents and issuing press releases to make workfare look successful when it’s a corrupt sham.
31. Reduced employment, workers pay, and workers rights.
32. Fostered a Nation that prioritises profits over basic human needs
33. Generated more wealth for the very wealthy, and forced many others into destitution, bleak poverty and 60% of those using food banks are in work.
34. Given away a billion pounds of our assets in the form of schools, gifted to private corporations, in the name of academies, with the associated half a billion in legal costs paid out of our taxes. Sold off school playing fields.
35. Deliberately sabotaged the economy to profit a few, whilst inflicting austerity, misery and poverty on many, many others, because of a Tory ideological drive to dismantle welfare, and any other form of State support. And to support only the wealthy
36. Gap between wealthy and poor has widened, and many now living in absolute poverty as a result of policies that cut social security to below subsistence levels (JRF)
37. Are responsible for an average of  73 deaths per week  of sick and disabled people as a consequence of “reform”, despite denial that is so, the Government have nonetheless refused to monitor and account for the deaths of those Atos has declared for to work, and those awaiting appeal.
38. Introduced the grossly unfair Bedroom Tax.
39. Made squatting illegal, and at a time when their own policies have led to a rise in homelessness.
40. Significantly reduced access to the provision of digital hearing aids through the NHS (again, the same  rationing happened under the Thatcher Government).
41. Local Authority budgets reduced, and Every Child Matters  – Labour’s comprehensive child protection and welfare policy  – demolished the day after the Coalition got in office. Preventative social work is no longer  funded effectively, only “crisis management” possible, and even that provision is now being rationed.
42. Introduced targets and financial incentives for euthanasia in hospitals, to “save health care costs”. This involves withdrawing food and fluids from “frail” patients, including sick babies.
43. Quietly removed key sections of the Equality Bill (Labour flagship policy) , rendering it much less protective of basic human rights.
44. Capped housing benefit, whilst private landlords are recouping a record amount of over £42 billion a year from tenants, rather than capping private rents.
45. Lost the Moody’s Investors Service triple A grade, despite pledges to keep it secure. Moody’s credit ratings represent a rank-ordering of creditworthiness, or expected loss.
46. Fitch credit rating downgraded due to increased borrowing.
47. Rail fare increased 20%
48. Public sector pensions decreased but contributions increased.
49. Reduced the consultation period for redundancies from 90 to 45 days
50. Removed the Severe Disability Premium from Income Support
51.  Scrapped  the Agricultural Wages Board. It was set up in 1948 to provide a fair wage and skills structure for agricultural workers
52. Tripled student fees, making higher education inaccessible to many
53. Set DWP targets to sanction benefit claimants unfairly, depriving them of a means of meeting their basic living needs.
54. Scrapped the Independent Living Fund.
55. Introduced Personal Independence Payments to replace Disability Living Allowance, with the aim of cutting benefit for more than 300,000 disabled people. Although Esther Mcvey said the Government has built ‘robust expectations of performance’ into PIP contracts with Atos Origin and Capita’, we know from that comment that this means inbuilt targets to reduce eligibility, since the anticipated saving was announced by Government PRIOR to any assessment.
56.There are now 600,000 less public sector workers than there were when the Tories came to Office.
57. The Universal Benefit Payment has forced families to move into squalid housing, typically defined as the lowest 33% of houses by rental value in an area. Given that 46% of private rental homes are deemed sub-standard, (ONS).
58. The UK Statistics Authority has rebuked David Cameron, Michael Gove and Iain Duncan Smith for their consistent misuse of government statistics. More than once
59. Failed to make permanent the Bankers’ Bonus Tax and profiteers in the City of London are still being rewarded, disproportionately, for taking unnecessary risks and they have also refused to cap bankers bonuses.
60. Refused to regulate the Fast Food industry. Instead, they asked their nudge unit to consider “fat taxes” on the poor. They even stopped obese people having access to some NHS operations. Unashamed of their deeds, one Tory MP said NHS Patients should pay for their medicines if they contract illnesses through “Lifestyle Choice”.
61. Guilty of blatantly sexist policies, the Tories have Tax Credits which impacts on women with children in particular that want to work,  and accused  feminists of holding back men.
62. The Tories have wasted more than £90 billion of taxpayers’ cash, on policy schemes that are doomed to failure.
63. The Tories have increasingly refused Freedom of Information Requests, and have changed the rules to make it easier for an FOI request to be refused.
64. The Tories have axed 5,000 Fire men & Fire women.
65. The Tories have axed 28,000 staff in Police Forces throughout the country.
66. The Tories have accepted £20 million of donations from people who have directly benefitted from their policies. The blame lies not with the donors, but the Tories for creating unnecessary conflicts of interest by accepting the cash.
67. The Tories scrapped the 50p rate of Tax, and in doing so have given a tax cut to millionaires.
68. Increased borrowing – admit they will now have to borrow well over a £150 billion extra this parliament because of their failed growth.
69. The numbers of workers  paid  LESS than the National Minimum Wage has grown under this government, with women being the worst affected.
70. The number of working households now relying on Housing Benefit to make their rent payments has doubled.
71. Deliberately underfunding and sabotaging the NHS, at the expense of patient welfare to justify full privatisation. Lying about funding.
71. Suicide rates have risen substantially, with links to austerity measures and government policy between 2010 and 2012 (Samaritans)
72. Cost of living has risen by 25% (a quarter) but benefits and wages have been frozen
73.  When Labour left office NHS Patient Satisfaction was the highest it had ever been (73%). It has since taken a record slump to (58%). Just over half of people are now happy with what the NHS has to offer.
74. Post code health care lottery – children’s access to expensive cancer drugs now vary from trust to trust.
75. NHS Treatments such as for cataracts, hip replacements, and physiotherapy are no longer available free of charge on the NHS in some parts of England for some patients. In total, 22 treatments are now restricted.
76. 8,000 Nurses have been axed under the Tories and thousands more have received redundancy notices.
77. Michael Gove scrapped EMA that the Institute of Fiscal Studies called Value for Money. His decision was not based upon the deficit since he first sought to scrap it in 2004.
78. Michael Gove has closed more than 200 schools at a time when class sizes are rising.
79. Michael Gove halved the funding on school meals  decreasing the quality & nutrition and affecting childrens’ health. Increase in scurvy in children
80.  Cancelled Labour’s plan to roll out free school meals for middle-class families at a time when evidence shows more families are in desperate need of the meals.
81. Infant mortality rates have started to rise again after a long period of them failing.
82. Ian Duncan Smith is forcing public sector workers to accept a 3% tax hike in their pension contributions against their will or any consultation.
83. Half of England’s Ambulance Stations are being shut down and sold off. In total, 591 hectares of NHS land is up for sale.
84. Gove refused to discuss Ofqual’s letter of concerns about the E-Bacc in front of the Select Committee. The one-off 3 hour replacement of GCSE English has been labelled dangerous, unequal, unaccountable and unprecedented.
85. George Osborne signed a record number of PFI deals in his first year in power that will cost the Tax Payer £33bn.
86. George Osborne raised an extra £41bn in taxes in 2011 at a time when the economy was struggling but cut taxes for the rich.
87. Gas Prices are up 31% under the Tories & 40% of families are on the brink of fuel poverty.
88. Food Banks have grown every yearof this government and child poverty has also increased. The Tories have responded in various ways from trying to claim this as a success of the Big Society, saying that food bans provide “freebies” to denying poverty even exists in the UK
89.Female rates of redundancy are climbing at a faster rate than men. More than 80%+ of workers losing their job in the NHS are women. Huge wage differentials  exist between men and women.
90. Despite violence against women climbing, and domestic abuse jumping 20%, one Tory MP drew parallels between the allegations of sex crimes, and smoking a joint.
91.  Halved redunsancy notice from 90 to 45 days, the Tories persisted with blaming workers for their declining rights. One Tory MP cruelly judged that British Workers were among the ‘Worst idlers’ in the World.
92. David Cameron has now abolished Equality Impact Assessments meaning that we now have less equal services for disabled, elderly, LGBT citizens.
93. Michael Gove cancelled a plan to rebuild 715 crumbling schools thereby ensuring that all Labour’s great advancements in updating our school infrastructure were put on hold.
94. At least 570,000 more households (1.2 million people) were forced into fuel poverty in one single day when energy companies announced a massive price hike in the winter of 2012.
95. Andrew Lansley & David Cameron ignored a Tribunal Ruling to publish Risk Register.This Risk Register if published could have saved lives as it would have led to an improved mitigation response to the Tories new NHS impositions. It has yet to be published
96. The security arrangements for the Olympics, arranged by the Tories wasted taxpayers’ money, and payed a company £80 million+ for failure, a Tory MP had the audacity to mock the Olympic Ceremony as “Leftie Multi-Cultural Crap”. It has also come to light that the same security company G4 has been robbing the tax payer blind in what is now a police investigation.
97. 74% of GPs say that there has been a reduced entitlement on the NHS this year.
98. 600,000 people will go bankrupt under this government.
99. 2012 saw record high Clinical Negligence payouts totalling more than £1.2 billion. This is a £500 million increase than payouts under Labour. Each claim takes on average 1.3 years, so the 2012 payouts were for errors in 2010-11.
100. 25,000 businesses have already gone bust under this government.
101. 11,000 Hospital Beds have been axed in 2 years. We now have the lowest number of hospital beds in our NHS in living memory.
102. 10,000 students GCSE English Results were debated in a High Court as Michael Gove oversaw a belated altering of the grade boundaries that unduly punished some students by as much as 2 grades.
103. A benefit cap was brought in that will save just a 110 million a year while the Tory party still ignore the loss of 25 billion in tax avoidance.
104. Iain Duncan Smiths universal credit scheme has turned into a multi billion pound disaster with the software unable to cope on a national roll out.
105. The bedroom tax has not saved a penny and is now costing much more money, as those who are affected are now claiming for private rents, that is, if they are not homeless or living in caves around Stockport.
106. Introduced the Gagging Bill
107. Their policies have made the UK the first country to be investigated by the UN for serious breaches to the human rights of disabled people
108. The Coalition have breached the human rights of women and children.
109. Have borrowed more money in just 3 years than Labour, who were faced with the global banker’s crisis, did in 13.
110. Scrapped the Standards Board for England for promoting and ensuring high ethical standards and code of conduct in local government.
111. Have raised concerns regarding government corruption and lack of accountability at an international level (see the Transparency International report)
112. Have been officially rebuked on numerous occasions by the ONS and OBR for persistent lying and false presentation of statistics.

 

Further reading:

Tom Pride – 14 quotes that prove the nasty party is still just as nasty as ever

Guardian (Polly Toynbee) – Labour’s spending worked

Many thanks to Robert Livingstone for his valuable additions to the Labour list of achievements and for his outstanding art work.