Brown: A big choice election

By Alex Smith / @alexsmith1982

Gordon Brown speaks “with great intensity” about Labour’s manifesto, due to be unveiled on Monday morning in Birmingham, in an interview for the Guardian today.

Speaking of the next stages of reform after Labour’s “catch-up” investment in public services over the past thirteen years, necessary after the eighteen previous years of Tory rule, Brown says:

“The important thing now is we are giving people voice and choice. Voice and choice determines how that service will be more accountable to the public, with more rights for the individual citizen, with more guarantees for that individual person so that people will see the benefit of voice and choice in the years to come.”

And responding to David Cameorn’s plea to Guardian readers last week, Brown says:

“The Conservatives as usual are not the progressive party on all these issues…The biggest winners of a Conservative government, let’s be honest, are the very richest estates in this country. You get £3 for this married couple’s allowance that only goes to a fraction of married people anyway. But you get £300,000 if you’ve got a big estate and you get the Conservative cuts in inheritance tax.”

Read the Guardian’s full report of the interview here.