Brown begins his battle to stay in power in earnest

Nov 19 2009 The Journal

GORDON Brown yesterday fired the starter’s gun on the general election campaign with pledges to expand free care for the elderly and to give children the legal right to a good education.

With the election expected next May, the Prime Minister unveiled populist measures in a Queen's Speech that lasted just under seven minutes.

A £670m package to ensure free personal care for around 400,000 elderly and disabled people was unveiled.

But funding concerns immediately emerged with councils already facing a cash squeeze having to foot £250m of the cost – with the rest coming from central Government.

There were also new guarantees for parents on schooling, a crackdown on “risky” bank bonuses and a law committing the Government to halve its deficit over the next four years.

And an Energy Bill would boost the development of “clean coal” as Mr Brown tried up to open up “dividing lines” with the Tories.

In a further move, the Prime Minister announced all new graduates still out of work after six months would have access to a “high-quality” internship, training or help to become self-employed.

During the Commons debate on the Queen’s Speech, he said thousands of young people unemployed for less than a year would benefit from a guaranteed job or training.

A September guarantee for young people had funded 55,000 extra places this year and a learning place would be guaranteed for all unemployed 16 and 17-year-olds in January.

But few of the 15 Bills in the Queen’s Speech are expected to become law before the general election, with Parliamentary time running out.

Conservative leader David Cameron claimed the Prime Minister was incompetent as he hit out at his failure to legislate on the NHS and MPs’ expenses.

And the Prime Minister was accused of trying to legislate a whole series of ideas “saying virtue is good and then try and dare his opponents to vote against them”.