I’d like to wish every reader a Happy New Year and I hope that you had a restful time over the Christmas and New Year period.
I’d particularly like to thank everyone who was working over the festive period to provide vital services, including everyone working in health and social care, our police and fire fighters who sacrifice time with their families to keep us safe.
The key focus for the government at the start of this new year is tackling the cost of living. The government has already taken some important steps to reduce the cost of living that will start to have an impact this year, such as taking £150 off energy bills in April and increasing the National Living Wage by £900 a year for millions of the lowest paid workers. The Government has also frozen prescription charges from April and increased the state pension by up to an additional £575 a year.
The government is also acting to reduce the cost of living for families by expanding funded childcare hours, opening free breakfast clubs in 500 more schools from April saving parents £450 a year, and ending the two-child benefit cap, which will lift 450,000 children out of poverty.
There is much more to do to turn our country around, but these measures should mean that many more local residents in Southwark and Lambeth and across Britain will start to feel the benefits of the change the Labour Government is bringing.
In addition to tackling the cost of living, the government is also acting to bring down NHS waiting lists and improve access to appointments, and the impacts of our new Renters’ Rights Act and Employment Rights Act will give new protections to private tenants and the Youth Guarantee, National Youth Strategy and rejoining Erasmus Plus so that young people can work, study or train in the EU will mean that there are many more opportunities available for young people, wherever you live in the country.
While the toughest problems we face won’t be solved overnight, many of the decisions the government has taken since coming to power will start having a real impact on people’s lives. I’ll keep working for the further change we need to see until all of the damage inflicted on this country by the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats is undone and our communities are truly thriving again.
