From economy to healthcare & immigration, next British PM Keir Starmer has task cut out for him – Firstpost
Sir Keir Starmer, the leader of the Labour Party, is expected to be the next British Prime Minister. (Photo: AP)
From economy to healthcare and immigration, Sir Keir Starmer of the Labour Party, the next Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, has task cut out for him.
Starmer is set to inherit an economy that has barely come out of recession and also faces the task of rebuilding the British healthcare apparatus that was stressed by the Covid-19 pandemic. The voters have high hopes — as is shown in the Labour’s mandate.
The Labour is headed to a landslide victory in the UK general elections as exit polls show it winning 410 of 650 seats. The Conservatives of Rishi Sunak are set to be reduced to 131 seats. This is the stark reversal from the previous elections in 2019 when the Conservatives dealt the Labour its worst defeat in nearly 90 years and reduced it to 203 and won 365.
Starmer has promised “decade of national renewal” ahead after ending 14 years of Conservative rule. Here is how Starmer is expected to go about delivering such a decade.
Starmer’s vision for economy
Despite accusations from the Conservatives that the Labour would hike taxes, Starmer has ruled out any hikes in income tax, national insurance welfare contributions, and value added tax (VAT). The AFP has, however, reported that senior party leaders have not ruled out hiking other tax which would be rather limited in scope but needed to boost public spending.
Starmer intends to bring windfall revenues from the elimination of tax breaks for non-domiciled UK residents, reducing tax avoidance, and the imposition of VAT on private school fees, according to the agency.
The Labour government is also expected to impose taxes on energy companies that would be used to fund green energy agenda.
Starmer’s course-correction for National Health Service
Once famed the world over, the British National Health Service (NHS) has been buckling in recent years amid strikes, budget crunch, and personnel shortages. The condition is such the waiting list of patients is more than 7 million.
The Labour has promised it would pay extra to staff to work in the evenings and on weekends and would use the spare capacity in private healthcare facilities to deliver 2 million more NHS appointments a year to clear backlog, according to AFP.
Starmer’s Labour has also promised to double the MRI and CT scanners under the NHS.
Crackdown on human smuggling & quick processing of asylums
Starmer has said that he would appoint special prosecutors to crack down on human smuggling networks that drive illegal immigration, as per the AFP.
Starmer has also said that he would quickly process asylum claims and clear the backlog. As for the rejected applicants, he said he would get them to safe countries.
Starmer’s green agenda
Starmer has proposed a “Great British Energy” plan with the dual objectives of insulating the UK from international energy shocks as seen from the Ukraine War in the past two years and meeting the UK’s climate targets.
“A Labour government will invest in homegrown clean power, cut bills, create jobs, and give us independence from dictators like (Russian President Vladimir) Putin, paid for in part by a proper windfall tax on oil and gas giants,” says the Labour Party.
Starmer has further set 2030 as the target from decarbonising the British electricity grid, as per AFP.
Starmer has also said that the Labour government would not clear any new oil or gas project in the North Sea.
Starmer to rework wages
Starmer has said he would rework the process of calculating the minimum wages by factoring in the cost-of-living.
The Labour government under Starmer will further make flexible working “the default” and ban “zero-hour contracts” under which employers are not obliged to provide any minimum working hours and the worker is not obliged to accept any work offered, as per the AFP.
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