Revealed: Full draft policy platform that could form 2024 Labour manifesto

Labour has drafted its most comprehensive policy programme yet for a Keir Starmer government, drawing up a provisional but wide-ranging blueprint likely to shape the next general election manifesto.

The 86-page policy handbook, seen by LabourList and summarised below, builds on submissions from Labour groups and beyond, six NPF policy documents consulted on earlier this year, past consultations and pledges announced by the shadow cabinet in recent years.

While there are few new proposals, it shows the policies included are now one step closer to making it into Labour’s final offer to voters.

How draft policies will shape the 2024 Labour manifesto 

The document will “inform Labour’s policy proposals ahead of the next general election”, and the six areas will “support the delivery of Keir Starmer’s five national missions”. There are a further three key hurdles before such policies reach the manifesto, however, with the document described as an “initial draft – subject to amendment”.

Policies will first be “debated, amended and agreed” by those involved in the NPF, with NPF members able to file amendments until June and a key meeting in late July. These are then “subject to approval” at Labour’s annual conference, to decide the “party programme”. Then ahead of an election, representatives will hold a further “Clause V meeting” to decide which parts of the programme reach the manifesto.

The document says the policy platform draws on the “vast experience from across the labour movement and beyond”, from local parties, trade unions and socialist societies to “many businesses, charities and civil society groups”. 

Click to jump to the report’s six sections: a green and digital future, better jobs and better work, safe and secure communities, public services that work from the start,  a future where families come first, and Britain in the world.

1. A green and digital future

Deliver a Green Prosperity Plan

• Invest £28bn of public capital a year into the green economy, alongside an active industrial strategy, with strategic public investment attracting private sector investment
• Support the creation of over a million good jobs for people of all regions, ages, genders and socioeconomic groups
• Cut energy bills for good, saving each UK household hundreds of pounds a year
• Invest in both mitigating the climate crisis but also in adapting to the effects of a warming world, for example by rapidly improving flood defences, the resilience of our national infrastructure to extreme weather and other measures
• Deliver clean electricity by 2030 
• More than double onshore wind capacity, triple solar capacity and quadruple offshore wind capacity
• Set ambitious targets on delivering hydrogen and nuclear power
• Ensure the long-term security of nuclear power, extending the lifetime of existing plants and backing new nuclear plants and Small Modular Reactors
• Support the development of new energy technologies such as floating offshore wind, carbon capture and storage, marine power and hydrogen
• Tackle planning barriers to renewable energy projects, getting planning decision timelines down from years to just months, and remove the obstacles that are currently preventing businesses from investing in the UK
• Commit to stopping the issue of new licences for oil and gas, while managing existing oil and gas wells sustainably over the coming decades
• Make sure that there are clean energy alternatives to coal
• Set out a clear roadmap for decarbonisation
• Ensure a just transition that addresses regional imbalances and ensures that no workers or communities are left behind
• Return what is due back to miners after the Conservative government’s refusal to act on its promise on the Mineworkers’ Pension Scheme
• Oppose fracking and committing to banning in England
• Examine the best way to prevent environmental harms and human rights abuses in supply chains

Reform the energy market 

• Fundamentally reform our system of energy supply, generation and transmission and distribution so that it delivers cheaper bills for consumers and businesses, clean energy and energy security.
• Create GB Energy: a new home-grown, publicly-owned national champion in clean power generation

Launch a National Wealth Fund

• Create a National Wealth Fund that will invest alongside the private sector in gigafactories, clean steel plants, renewable-ready ports, green hydrogen and carbon capture along with supporting service industries, as well as in at least four industrial clusters in Scotland, Wales and England. Labour would also invest in offshore wind clusters across the country
• Deliver a strategic long-term Plan for Green Steel – to achieve near zero emission steel production by 2035
• Match funding for both full and pilot-scale innovation activity and follow-up demonstration projects for the development of clean steelmaking

Deliver a National Warm Homes Plan

• Upgrade every home that needs it to EPC standard C within a decade by installing energy-saving measures such as loft insulation, going street by street in locally-delivered programmes
• Give devolved governments and local authorities the power and the resources to bring every home in their area up to standard within a decade

Improve green public transport

• Work with devolved governments and local authorities to deliver good public transport
• Ensure a rolling programme of electrification to improve services and decarbonise our transport system 
• Turbocharge the just transition to cheaper electric vehicles, making them affordable and accessible by helping families manage the higher up-front cost
• Accelerate the roll-out of charging points in areas currently being left behind

Support the environment and act on sewage

• Improve people’s access to both urban and rural green space 
• Consider expanding national parks and creating new ones and ensure the public have the right to experience, enjoy and explore nature 
• Ensure that there are sufficient responsibilities and protections to manage and conserve our natural environment for all
• Pass a Clean Air Act, establish a legal right to breathe clean air and place new duties on ministers to ensure air quality guidelines are met.
• Use regulatory powers to keep consumer bills down and ensure that water companies – rather than the public – pay for their failures
• Set mandatory targets to halve water leaks…Strike off company directors who continually breach and ignore their responsibilities
• Ensure illegal activity is punished and ensure payments of dividends are linked to key performance metrics
• Introduce mandatory monitoring of sewage outlets and automatic fines for sewage discharges, with a penalty for outlets that do not have monitoring in place.
• Set ambitious targets to cut sewage outflows

Support sustainable UK farming and animal welfare

• Deliver a land-use framework in England that supports sustainable farming, enables the country to reach our climate goals, and improves our national biodiversity
• Ensure more home-grown sustainable food is bought, made and sold, through public procurement targets
• Ensure that 50% of all food purchased by the public sector is locally produced or certified to higher environmental production standards 
• Protect British standards in trade deals, rather than watering them down
• Close loopholes in the fox hunting ban, outlaw trophy hunting (including imports from overseas) and ensure animals are treated with respect

Harness technology to boost the economy

• Modernise and build the capacity of the state to be a more active, capable and reliable partner
• Work with businesses, workers, and universities to grow the high-tech, competitive industries of the future
• Work with emerging businesses and start-ups to nurture their talents. Unlock the supply of patient capital for fast-growing digital businesses
• Reform the British Business Bank, and give it a more ambitious remit, as well as the ability to attract additional external funds
• Ensure the UK capitalises on its world-leading universities and research base to grow the number of spinouts
• Turbocharge gigabit broadband and develop UK supply chains in 5G technology
• Ensure our world-class researchers and businesses have the data and computing infrastructure they need to compete internationally
• Ensure our intellectual property system is fit for the digital age
• Introduce robust regulation that opens up data while enshrining consumer rights
• Maintain Britain’s data adequacy status meaning our data protection rules are deemed equivalent to those in the EU
• Make it easier for public services to adopt innovative technologies by removing barriers to data-sharing and smart procurement
• Use new capabilities in data analysis and AI to deliver better public services, built on frameworks and institutions that build public trust and uphold the privacy and security rights of UK citizens, including in the workplace
• Ensure we have cyber-resilience and security against rogue states and other hostile actors
• Look at ways to close the digital divide. Improve digital education in schools and upskill the workforce
• Direct Ofcom to strengthen consumer protections in the broadband market and ensure there is an industry-wide social tariff for low-income families
• Ensure there is robust regulation that protects people from online harms and holding social media and technology companies accountable for them.
• Harness the potential of AI for public good, ensuring the UK is the best place in the world for safe and responsible AI
• Ensure that workers have new rights, protections and access to training to keep pace with the changing nature of work and technological advancements

Protect Royal Mail

• Commit to the Universal Service Obligation (USO) as the company’s central mission…[and] guarantee that the USO is secure for the future and will continue to be provided by Royal Mail in a way that is affordable and accessible to all users and financially sustainable for the long term
• Stand against the break-up of Royal Mail and oppose any attempt through a takeover to turn the service into a “gig economy” employer
• Work with Royal Mail and unions to explore the expansion of the role of postal workers, adding social value to our communities and innovative products and services

2. Better jobs and better work

Ensure economic stability

• Have iron-clad fiscal rules
• Reaffirm the role of independent institutions like the OBR and Bank of England and establish an Office for Value for Money

Introduce an industrial strategy and support firms

• Introduce an industrial strategy based on a genuine partnership with businesses, workers, unions and universities, with four central goals: delivering clean power by 2030, caring for the future, harnessing data for the public good and building a resilient economy
• Establish a new Industrial Strategy Council and place it on a statutory footing, bringing together industry, unions and other experts to inform policy-making
• Aim for at least 3% of GDP across the public and private sectors to be invested in research and development
• Ensure the funding system can act with the agility, speed and predictability required to win the race for the industries of the future
• Increase access to start-up and scale-up finance…Reform the British Business Bank….Ensure the UK capitalises on its world-leading universities and research base to grow the number of spinouts
• Leverage more institutional and patient capital into the high-growth enterprises and scale-ups which will provide new opportunities and high-quality jobs in emerging sectors
• Legislate to tighten the rules on late payments and tackle the late payments crisis which is particularly acute for small businesses
• Aim to double the size of the co-operative sector in the UK

Reform competition and corporate governance regimes

• Ensure our competition regime remains robust and fit for the modern economy, promoting innovation while protecting consumers
• Ensure corporate governance frameworks embed long-termism, enable investment and ensure businesses act in the interests of their workers, customers and the environment

Protect and improve UK finance

• Protect the UK’s competitiveness and status as a global financial centre, through a commitment to high standards 
• Give financial services the certainty they need to invest in the jobs and businesses
• Bring forward long overdue consumer protection regulation in areas like buy-now-pay-later
• Encourage private finance to align its investments with the goals of the Paris agreement
• Ensure the UK Infrastructure Bank operates to new criteria so that recipients of public money through the bank must be committed to creating good jobs with decent and enforceable conditions. Ensure the bank includes workers’ representatives on its board, publishes an annual report on the geographical spread and impact of its investments and is given an additional objective to support supply chain resilience and our industrial strategy

Reform the UK tax system

• End tax breaks for private equity bosses
• Remove the non-domiciled tax loophole, putting in place a system for genuinely temporary residents
• Remove the tax loopholes that private schools enjoy
• Crack down on tax evasion and tax avoidance
• Scrap and replace the current system of business rates in England and Wales with a fully-costed and funded system of business property taxation

In-source public services

• Bring about the biggest wave of insourcing of public services in a generation
• Ensure all outsourced services are transparent, accountable for delivery and subject to the Freedom of Information Act
• Examine public services that have been outsourced as part of a drive to improve quality. In most cases, the best time to achieve value for money for publicly-run provision will be when existing contracts expire or are broken through a failure to deliver
• Reinstate and strengthen the last Labour government’s two-tier code to end unfair two-tiered workforces

Overhaul government contracts

• Use government procurement to support local businesses, cutting red tape and streamlining the bidding process to level the playing field for small businesses
• Labour’s plan to buy, make and sell more in Britain is a commitment to use strategic procurement for industrial strategy
• Help British businesses win more government contracts, using stretching social, environmental and labour clauses in contract design
• Ensure that the economic and security benefits of British ownership are adequately reflected by regulatory structures, starting with our commitment to strengthen the public interest test for takeover
• Set up a supply chain taskforce to review potential supply chain needs across critical sectors
• A new National Procurement Plan will ensure social value is mandatory in contract design
• Introduce new Fair Work Standard will ensure the best employers get the recognition they deserve when contracts are awarded
• Ensure that government contracts support our national ambition to boost Britain’s skills and create new apprenticeship and learning opportunities

Provide a New Deal for Working People

• Introduce a range of measures to help improve the world of work and tackle job insecurity, stagnant pay and the growth of in-work poverty…Bring forward legislation to implement it, including an employment rights bill, within 100 days of entering office
• Plan to start [Fair Pay Agreements] by establishing a new FPA in the adult social care sector…consult widely on the design of the agreement and monitor the implementation and publish a full and transparent review, assessing how and to what extent FPAs could benefit other sectors
• Look to support and build on existing arrangements in other sectors where labour markets are operating effectively or where existing collective arrangements at employer or sector level are already working well
• Introduce basic individual rights from day one for all workers
• Move towards a single status of worker and transition towards a simpler two-part framework for employment status
• Consult on a simpler framework that differentiates between workers and the genuinely self-employed and evaluate the way flexibility of ‘worker’ status is used and understood across the workforce 
• Consider measures to provide accessible and authoritative information for people on their employment status and what rights they are owed
• End ‘one sided’ flexibility and ensure all jobs provide a baseline level of security and predictability, banning exploitative zero-hours contracts and ensuring anyone working regular hours for 12 weeks or more has the right to a regular contract
• Ensure all workers get reasonable notice of any change in shifts or working time, with compensation for any shifts cancelled without appropriate notice
• Strengthen the law to ensure hospitality workers receive their tips in full and workers decide how tips are allocated
• Tackle the gender pay gap: large firms will be required to develop and publish action plans, as well as plans detailing how they are supporting their female workers experiencing menopausal symptoms.
• Introduce rules to permit equal pay comparisons across employers
• Tackle discrimination in the workplace, introducing ethnicity and disability pay gap reporting for large employers
• Make flexible working the default from day one for all workers, except where it is not reasonably feasible
• End ‘fire and rehire’ and ‘fire and replace’, establish a single enforcement body and strengthen the law to enforce workplace rights. Improve and strengthen enforcement via employment tribunals to provide quicker and more effective resolutions
• Change the Low Pay Commission’s remit so that alongside median wages and economic conditions, the minimum wage will for the first time reflect the need for pay to take into account the cost of living

Support trade unions

• Strengthen and update the rights of working people and empowering workers to organise collectively through trade unions
• Repeal the Trade Union Act 2016, the Minimum Service Levels (Strikes) Bill and the Conduct of Employment Agencies and Employment Businesses (Amendment) Regulations 2022
• Update trade union legislation, so it is fit for a modern economy, removing unnecessary restrictions on trade union activity and ensuring industrial relations are based around good faith negotiation and bargaining
• Allow trade unions to use modern, secure, electronic balloting
• Simplify the process of union recognition and ensure reasonable access within workplaces
• Strengthen rights for trade unions to organise, represent and negotiate
• Ensure workers in precarious and gig-economy sectors have a realistic and meaningful right to organise through trade unions
• Create new rights and protections for trade unions reps to undertake their work, strengthening protections for trade union representatives against unfair dismissal and union members from intimidation, harassment, threats and blacklisting
• Ensure there is sufficient facilities time for all trade union reps so that they have capacity to represent and defend workers, negotiate with employers and train as well as create fairer workplaces and tackle gender pay gaps

Expand economic devolution

• Oversee a significant expansion of economic devolution in England by the end of first term…Introduce a Take Back Control Act in first King’s Speech
• Give English towns and cities the tools they need to develop credible, long-term growth plans
• Establish clear frameworks for local leaders to request and take on powers over economic policy-making, establishing a presumption towards moving power out of Westminster
• Force central government to respond to requests, with an inbuilt assumption that local areas know what powers they need…If ministers are unable to agree the devolution of some powers, they will have to set out the conditions that would need to be met to do so.
• Work with leaders to build up local analytic and operational capacity in areas covered by the Take Back Control Act, exploring the potential to move existing civil service capacity outside of Whitehall
• Establish new structures for decision-making, accountability, evaluation and implementation, with a phased handover of powers after initial periods of intensive oversight and support
• Bring an end to competitive pots of funding and ensure long-term stability in funding settlements for local government
• Over the medium term, local leaders that can demonstrate consistent and exemplary capacities and accountability frameworks for managing public money will be able to bid for longer-term, integrated departmental-style funding settlements

Deliver landmark shift in skills provision

• Deliver a landmark shift in skills provision and give people the tools they need in the workplaces of the future
• Devolve adult education and skills budgets to metro mayors and combined authorities
• Reform the Conservatives’ apprenticeships levy into a ‘growth and skills levy’ that works across all nations and region
• Explore lessons learned from Welsh Labour’s responsive skills and employability initiatives
• Establish a new expert body – Skills England – to oversee the English national skills effort of the coming decade, which will pull together the expertise of trade associations, employers from large and small companies, representatives of trade unions, central and local government and further and higher education

Support people into work

• Reform employment support, including by devolving powers down to local leaders. Boost locally delivered partnerships, giving them the freedom to decide how best to design schemes
• Allow self-referrals to employment services and enable GPs, housing associations and community groups in England to direct people more easily to employment support
• Reform Jobcentre Plus to ensure it becomes more responsive to local economic needs and more actively engaged with the needs of people looking for work
• Commit to providing tailored support in every local area for harder to help groups, such as people with mental ill health or addiction. Build on targeted programmes to provide better specialist support and break the link between inactivity and ill health
• Fix the access to work scheme, with improved targets for assessment waiting times and by giving people who are looking for work ‘in principle’ indicative awards.
• Work in cross-departmental collaboration to provide targeted help for the over-50s and offer all those who have previously worked but recently left the labour market back-to-work support and guidance
• Ensure people nearing retirement are better able to make informed decisions for themselves about work, savings and retirement through access to quality mid-life MOTs
• Provide a reliable safety net for people who lose their jobs or who cannot work due to ill health or disability and help people on their journey back into work by allowing people to try paid work without reassessments if it does not work out
• Replace the current system of work capability assessments with a system that supports people to live with security

Back a points-based immigration system

• • Have no return to freedom of movement
  • Sort out the points-based immigration system so that it ensures the economy has the skills it needs and that prolonged vacancies do not hold back growth in key sectors…
  • Any movement in the points-based migration system will come alongside new conditions to boost skills and more training, provide better pay and conditions and invest in new technology. When a sector is already heavily reliant on immigration, It will be required to develop these plans through dialogue and negotiation involving employers and trade unions
  • Reform and strengthen the Migration Advisory Committee so that it can review shortages more often and inform training decisions as well as work with the new Skills England body to project the workforce needs of the future
  • Ensure that all employers able to sponsor visas are meeting decent standards of pay and conditions
  • If the Conservative Home Office continues to fail the Windrush generation, the next Labour government will be willing to overhaul the Windrush Compensation Scheme and put it outside of Home Office control

3. Safe and secure communities

Tackle crime

• Within the decade we will halve the level of violence against women and girls, halve incidents of knife crime, raise confidence in every police force to its highest levels and reverse the collapse in the proportion of crimes solved
• Put 13,000 more neighbourhood police officers and PCSOs back on Britain’s streets – paid for with the clear and tangible savings that can be delivered from a shared procurement and efficiencies plan for all police forces
• Introduce Respect Orders: a new criminal offence to target persistent adult repeat offenders who are ruining lives with their anti–social behaviour
• Take tough action against drug dealing with powers for police to shut down premises used by drug dealers, and data–driven hotspot policing targeted at common drug dealing sites, complemented by local neighbourhood police patrols of town centres
• Set up Community and Victim Payback Boards to strengthen community sentences, with victims able to choose the unpaid work to be done by the perpetrators
• Introduce tougher penalties for fly–tippers, establishing clean–up squads so that offenders have to clear up litter and fly–tipped rubbish, and clean up vandalism
• Extend the use of Parenting Orders, requiring parents whose children repeatedly engage in anti–social behaviour to attend parental classes
• Consider a trauma–informed approach within the criminal justice system to strengthen diversionary practices and end the cycle of reoffending
• Be tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime. This means taking a prevention–first approach, including access to mental health support workers in schools and providing mentors for children who are excluded or sent to Pupil Referral Units to help them get back on track
• Put youth workers into A&Es and custody suites to reach young people already involved in gangs
• Tackle websites selling knives through tougher online regulation
•  Introduce a new child exploitation register, for those convicted of modern slavery offences linked to county lines drug dealing
• Get tough on fraud by making it easier to convict corporate fraudsters and overhauling Companies House
• Update the Counter–Extremism Strategy

Tackle violence against women

• Put domestic abuse specialists in the control rooms of every police force
• We will ensure there is a specialist rape unit in every police force,
• Prevent algorithms from promoting harmful content online
• Make tackling misogyny a key part of school accountability,
• Make misogyny a hate crime 
• Introduce a new Domestic Abuse Register to track offenders and help protect victims
• Introduce a minimum seven–year custodial sentence for rape and whole–life orders for any adult offender found guilty of rape, abduction and murder of a stranger

Improve policing

• Baroness Casey’s independent review into the standards of behaviour and internal culture of the Metropolitan Police Service revealed the extent of this challenge, and a Labour government will accept its findings in full
• Labour will raise standards in every police force in England and Wales. We will introduce mandatory national vetting, training and misconduct standards
• We will automatically ban any potential applicants to the police service who have a history of domestic abuse, indecent exposure or sexual assault, and mandate specialist training for every officer on countering racial bias and tackling violence against women and girls
• Labour will establish a requirement for stop and search data to be recorded
• Labour will work with the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) to ensure confidence data is gathered and regularly published, including breakdowns by gender and ethnicity
• It will also be a mandatory requirement for all police forces to implement the National Police Chiefs’ Council Race Action Plan
• Labour will look closely at the conclusions and recommendations of Sir John Mittings’ undercover policing inquiry and consider the best ways to ensure vulnerable people involved in undercover police operations are protected
• Labour has opposed the Public Order Bill and its measures which we believe will significantly undermine trust and confidence in the police. Labour will safeguard the right to peaceful protest and the right to picket in industrial disputes, which have won so many of our historic freedoms.
• We believe that the police already have the powers they need to deal with dangerous and disruptive protests. The next Labour government would give the police better training, guidance, and resources to deal with dangerous and disruptive protests
• Labour supports the need for the Prevent programme…But we want to see trust in the programme much higher and its work improved, updated and scrutinised

Improve the justice system

• Labour is committed to improving enforcement, ensuring victims’ rights are fully enshrined and that there are appropriate duties in place for agencies to work together and signpost victims to the service they need
• Labour will speed up the justice system, tackling the courts backlog. We will…allow more legal specialists to serve as Crown Prosecutors
• Introduce specialist rape courts to fast–track cases
• Commission a review into the effectiveness of current legislation and sentencing policy
• Drive down reoffending by cutting drug use and violence on the prison estate and rehabilitating prisoners through
  reforming education and employment opportunities
• Make prisons work and ensure ex–offenders are supported post–release to help reduce offending and keep the public safe
• Ensure that all those working in the justice system are safe at work
• Ensure that the probation service is run effectively
• [Address the fact] our criminal justice system remains deeply un-diverse…Work with the relevant trade unions and employers to address the barriers the workforce face…Ensure that our judiciary and prison service reflects the diversity of our nation and that fair outcomes are delivered for everyone
• Equalise the law on hate crime and extend the aggravated offences regime to all five protected characteristics recognised in law

Act over historic injustices

• Put a Hillsborough Law onto the statute book…[including] a duty of candour to ensure that public authorities and officials proactively cooperate with official investigations, as well as providing non–means tested legal aid for victims of disasters or state–related deaths… [and] an independent public advocate to act as a representative for bereaved families
• Support a full investigation into the events at Orgreave…release documents held by government relating to the historic Cammell Laird prosecutions and carry out a review into the jailing of striking workers
• Ensure that unlawful blacklisting of trade unionists is a practice never seen again
• Do right by the survivors of the Grenfell fire and give them the support they need, bring those culpable to justice, and end the deregulation of building and fire safety

Deliver 21st century transport

• Bring our railways into public ownership as contracts with existing operators expire, consistent with our fiscal rules, putting passengers at the heart of our railways and investing in a world–class network
• Deliver Northern Powerhouse Rail and High Speed 2 in full…Deliver a long–term strategy for rail…give communities a greater say in local rail services
• Reform our broken bus system…Give communities the ability to take on powers to franchise local bus services… lift the ban on municipal bus ownership
• Support the principle of Clean Air Zones…However, they must be phased in carefully…and should be accompanied with a just transition plan
• Encourage more people to walk and cycle wherever possible by supporting local authorities to provide safe, accessible walking routes and cycling infrastructure

Reform Westminster and devolve power 

• Devolve decision–making away from Westminster to those with the experience, knowledge and expertise, and putting power directly in the hands of the people of England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland…work towards long-term, integrated funding settlements for local leaders to provide  greater financial certainty for local areas, where they have the capacity and accountability to manage it
• Deliver a better, deeper devolution settlement for our devolved parliaments…restore the decision–making role for the Welsh Government on structural funds…extend this to the devolved governments in Scotland and Northern Ireland
• Establish a new independent Integrity and Ethics Commission, with the power to investigate misconduct and breaches of the ministerial code
• Ban second jobs for MPs, with only very limited exemptions for public service roles or to maintain professional qualifications…ban former ministers from lobbying, consultancy or any paid work related to their former job for at least five years…make it mandatory for former ministers to apply to the Integrity and Ethics Commission before accepting any job
• Abolish the House of Lords…establish a second chamber that is smaller, offers the taxpayer better value for money, and is reflective of the regions and nations with elected representatives rather than political appointees
• Introduce votes for 16– and 17–year–olds
• Stop Conservative plans to allow foreign money to pour into British politics and…create strict rules about donations from shell companies
• Not support a new referendum on Scottish independence. Instead our focus will be on a new vision for a new politics, constitutional reform and delivering for the people of Scotland
• Work with all parties in Northern Ireland to make the Windsor Framework work effectively

4. Public services that work from the start

Tackle NHS staffing issues

• Double the number of medical school places to 15,000 a year
• Train 10,000 new nurses and midwives each year
• Double the number of district nurses qualifying every year
• Train 5,000 new health visitors a year
• Produce independent projections of staff numbers the UK needs to ensure our workforce is fit for a future 
• Work with health staff and their trade unions to review existing training pathways and explore new entry routes to a career in the NHS
• Recognise that the tax treatment of doctors’ pensions has discouraged some senior clinicians from continuing in the workforce [and] introduce a targeted scheme for senior doctors across the UK to address retention issues

Reform NHS services

• Use spare capacity in the independent sector to treat NHS patients and bring waiting lists down
• Support effective and sustainable delivery of general practice to improve access and continuity of care, and to cut health inequalities
• Bring back the family doctor by providing incentives for GP practices to improve their continuity of care offer 
• Improve routes for referral to specialist services in the community, such as allowing opticians to refer into hospitals and greater self-referral in areas where it is clinically appropriate such as physiotherapy
• Improve data-sharing and portability in health and care to join up services, while guaranteeing that people’s health data is safeguarded and always used ethically
• Have a strategy to ensure that women and girls around the country have access to safe, high-quality healthcare that supports their wellbeing and will address ongoing systemic failures to meet their health and care needs
• Act to end the Black maternal mortality gap
• Ensure government and the public sector focus on delivering better outcomes for those on lower incomes and make narrowing and eliminating inequality through the health system – and all our public services – a priority

Improve mental health services

• Treat mental health as seriously as physical health and ensure genuine parity of esteem
• Publish the first ever long-term, whole-government plan to improve mental health outcomes
• Provide treatment within a month of referral by recruiting thousands of new mental health professionals
• Work with the NHS to develop and implement new NHS targets for mental health services in England and ensure reporting standards improve
• Ensure patients’ and families’ voices are central to any national assessment of the safety of mental health services
• Put children at the heart of our mental health plan
• Give every young person access to a specialist mental health professional at school

Reform social care

• Deliver a long-term plan for reform of adult social care that will lead to a world-class National Care Service that makes people as proud as the NHS does
• Ensure consistent standards and transparent information in care
• Back national partnership working in social care, bringing together employers, unions, and government to replicate the benefits this model has brought to other services
• Establish a Fair Pay Agreement in adult social care to negotiate fair pay and conditions, terms and training
• Move towards professionalising the social care workforce, to give this vital group the recognition and professional standing that they so clearly deserve
• Require all care providers to demonstrate financial sustainability and responsible tax practices, to value their staff, and to deliver high quality care for service users.
• Address issues in the [children’s] social care workforce as well as supporting the vital contribution of kinship carers
• Ensure that there are the right kind of [children]s] care homes in the right places, including through strengthened regulation of standards, and will coordinate continued support for care leavers and care-experienced people
• Ensure the children’s social care system is inclusive and culturally sensitive

Reform schooling

• Roll out an ambitious school improvement plan that would see investment in a high-quality teaching and support staff workforce to deliver an excellent education for all
• Recruit thousands of new teachers to fill vacancies and skills gaps, ensuring that teachers are no longer asked to deliver unmanageable workloads
• Deliver ongoing teacher training, so each teacher has the skills to support every child to thrive
• Launch an expert review of the current school curriculum for England and make it compulsory for all state schools
• Implement a national strategy with clear targets to close the attainment gap
• Require all schools to cooperate with their local authority on admissions, SEND inclusion and place planning
• Work towards more children with SEND having their needs met and being educated in mainstream schools, including by ensuring teachers and support staff have the training they need and recognition they deserve, and providing better consistency in conditions for staff and support for students
• Ensure mainstream settings are better equipped and designed to enable these children to thrive, alongside their peers
• Introduce fully-funded free breakfast clubs in every primary school
• Reform citizenship education to include practical life skills such as managing personal finances, introduce two weeks’ worth of compulsory work experience for every young person, and provide professional careers advice in schools and colleges
• Ensure all teachers have qualified status
• Reform inspections to ensure Ofsted provides true quality assurance for the government and the public and supports positive, proactive school improvement
• End the system of headline grades, which creates unnecessarily high stress for staff and little helpful information for parents. Instead, Labour will consult parents, education staff and experts to introduce a report card that tells people, simply and clearly, how well their school or college community is performing
• Require Ofsted inspectors to be experts in the phase of education they are inspecting
• Consult on creating a new annual review of safeguarding, health and safety, attendance, and off-rolling
• Inspect multi-academy trusts

Give genuine choice of further and higher education

• Ensure all learners have a genuine choice of first class further and higher education
• Encourage a thriving college and independent training sector that can provide high quality vocational courses, including apprenticeships, fosters a love of learning, links students with exciting job opportunities through excellent careers advice, and works with businesses to meet local skills needs.
• Reform broken tuition fees system for university funding, ensuring that people from every background and all parts of our country have the opportunity to study at Britain’s world-class universities

5. A future where families come first

Reform childcare

• Reform childcare from the end of parental leave to the end of primary school
• Deliver free breakfast clubs in every primary school in England as a first step, funded through the ending of the non-domiciled tax status
• Remove the barriers that prevent local councils from opening more nurseries and childcare provision

Boost homeownership and housebuilding

• Set the target of a homeownership rate of 70 per cent 
• Help first-time buyers onto the ladder with a new, comprehensive mortgage guarantee scheme. Under this scheme, the state will act as guarantor for prospective homeowners who can afford mortgage repayments but struggle to save for a large deposit
• Give first-time buyers first dibs on new developments in their area
• Build more high-quality homes across the country and ensure more of these are genuinely affordabl
• Bring the present leasehold system to an end through fundamental reform of the tenure and to enacting legislation to that end as soon as possible
• Accompany support for first-time buyers with measures to redistribute demand away from those looking to purely speculate on house prices
• Raise stamp duty paid by foreign individuals, trusts and companies when they buy UK residential property
• Reform planning and arcane land purchase rules to get Britain building, while fixing the country’s development model
• Enable local authorities to acquire land at closer to existing use value
• Spur the creation of a new generation of development corporations, spearheaded by and accountable to communities. These new bodies will allow local leaders, working with trade unions, to play a more active role in development in their areas
• Allow local authorities, Metro Mayors, combined authorities or groups of local authorities to pioneer new models of strategic development for larger sites
• Seek to decrease the number of social homes being rapidly sold off through right to buy without like-for-like new social housing being built  to replace them
• Seek to repurpose and reform Homes England to better meet our emerging priorities

Support private renters

• Fundamentally reform the private rented sector, giving tenants greater security through a powerful new renters’ charter, which will include longer-term tenancies as standard, the right to reasonable alterations, ending Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions and introducing a national register of landlords
• Introduce a legally binding ‘Decent Homes Standard 2’ updated for the next decade that will apply to all buildings in the private rented sector
• Consult on how best to ensure tenancies are affordable and the effective implementation of no-fault evictions.

Improve the welfare safety net

• Provide a reliable safety net for people who lose their jobs, including through large scale redundancies and insolvency, or who cannot work due to ill health or disability
• Ensure that respect and dignity are once more at the heart of our social security system and that it works to tackle poverty and put an end to the soaring use of food banks
• Reform the social security system, starting with making Universal Credit work for all families who rely on it, to ensure that it makes work pay, supports people back to work, allows people to live their lives in dignity, tackles child poverty and offers a proper safety net
• Make every stage of the social security system supportive and accessible
• Ensure that older people have security in retirement and implement a strategy for ageing well, including covering those approaching pension age
• Build further partnership between employers and workers, based on shared responsibilities to make pensions contributions and plan for retirementBuild on the success of the auto-enrolment scheme brought in by the last Labour government

Enrich family life through culture, media, sport

• • Bolster the BBC’s independence and ensure that it can continue to be a universal, publicly-owned, publicly-funded public service broadcaster
  • Set up an independent review panel ahead of the next charter period, to inform how we will ensure the long-term security of the BBC and a fair deal for licence fee payers
  • Protect and promote British broadcasting and UK radio in the streaming age, to ensure British made and produced content is easily available and accessible
  • Introduce a statutory regulator for English football, with a strong voice for fans, financial regulation to prevent more clubs going bust, and distribution down the pyramid to support lower league clubs and communities
  • Update gambling regulation for the 21st century
  • Offer a ‘creative compact’ to deliver our mission on economic growth, while maintaining and enhancing the UK’s world-leading position as a global hub of creativity
  • Ensure the creative economy is open to everyone by breaking down barriers to opportunity and unlocking  talent through offering flexible skills and training opportunities

Make equality central to policymaking

• • Ensure that equality is at the heart of all our policymaking, including by implementing better ethnicity data and monitoring into the criminal justice system, introducing mandatory ethnicity and disability pay gap reporting, ensuring international development policy tackles deep-rooted gender inequality and equalising the treatment of all protected groups under hate crime legislation
  • Protect and uphold the Equality Act 2010 and seek to build on that achievement for all groups with protected characteristics
  • Enact the socioeconomic duty under section 1 of the Equality Act and a Labour government will take its responsibility to conduct equality impact assessments of major announcements seriously
  • Introduce a Race Equality Act
  • Ensure employers act to prevent sexual harassment, including of LGBT+ people
  • Introduce a full, trans-inclusive ban on conversion practices while protecting legitimate talking therapies, closing any consent loopholes that remain on the statute book
  • Build consensus and modernise the process of gender recognition to remove indignities for trans people, while upholding the Equality Act, its protected characteristics and its provision for single-sex exemptions.
  • Work with disabled people to create policies which remove barriers to equality and focus on their representation at all levels of government
  • Commit to using the language of the social model of disability, not the medical model

6. Britain in the world

Make national security the first priority

• Apply a ‘NATO test’ to major defence programmes in Government to ensure our NATO commitments are fulfilled in full
• Defend Article V as the cornerstone of our commitment to Britain’s security and ensure that the UK is the leading European nation in the alliance
• Never allow defence spending to fall below our NATO commitments
• Do more to lead efforts to secure strategic arms limitation and multilateral disarmament and reduce nuclear risk
• Guarantee continued long-term UK support for Ukraine and will work with allies to provide the assistance it needs to defend itself
• Continue to support the people of Ukraine in their efforts to defend their sovereign territory. This includes providing Ukrainian forces with the equipment and training they need to protect their homeland.
• Push for the international community to hold Vladimir Putin and his cronies to account. This includes the dictatorship in Belarus, where Labour will continue to support brave opposition leaders
• Pursue legal mechanisms in the UK to seize and repurpose frozen Russian assets so they can be used to pay for a fair reconstruction of Ukraine

Modernise and support our armed forces

• Conduct a Strategic Defence and Security Review to ensure that we fully understand the nature of these threats and align defence and security spending accordingly
• Ensure our armed forces and security services always have the capabilities necessary to defend the UK
• Commission a comprehensive audit of departmental waste at the Ministry of Defence
• Make it fundamental to direct British defence investment first to British business, with a higher bar set for any decisions to buy abroad.
• Ensure there is a strong voice – in parliament and outside Westminster – for our forces, veterans and their families
• Fully incorporate the Armed Forces Covenant into law, fulfilling the moral contract our society makes with those who serve
• Scrap visa fees for non-UK veterans and their dependents if they have served four years or more in British forces

Build EU ties

• Seek to improve the UK’s trade and investment relationship with Europe while maintaining its new role outside of the single market and customs union
• Seek to reduce trade barriers for British business and ensure better access for professionals providing services in EU markets
• Strengthen mutual recognition of professional standards and qualifications to unlock trade in services, as well as unblocking participation in the Horizon scheme to unleash research and development
• Begin to develop long-term structures to ensure cooperation between the UK and EU in key areas such as the

  green just transition, energy and food security, protecting supply chains and tackling cross border crime

• Seek to secure a veterinary agreement with the EU and mutual recognition of professional qualifications, as well as improving scientific collaboration through Horizon
• Push for an EU visa waiver for UK touring artists

Reconnect Britain through foreign policy

• Build multilateral alliances…[such as a] new Clean Power Alliance, a coalition of nations committed to achieving 100% clean power by 2030
• Push for climate action as a fourth pillar at the United Nations
• Champion international law and universal human rights at home and abroad, as well as the multilateral treaties that uphold them
• Deepen our relationship with countries in the Global South, building modern partnerships based on mutual respect
• Make best use of the unique framework of the Commonwealth to address shared challenges like climate change
• Take a strong, clear-eyed and consistent approach to China, standing firm in defence of national security, international law and human rights, while engaging on key areas of cooperation like climate change, trade and global health
• Carry out a complete audit of UK-China relations to ensure the relationship reflects Britain’s long-term interests and values
• Support and recognise UN resolutions on the rights of the Kashmiri people but maintain that a lasting settlement to end this conflict can only be achieved by India and Pakistan working together with the people of Kashmir
• Support the recognition of the state of Palestine alongside the state of Israel, as part of efforts to contribute to securing a negotiated two state solution
• Protect the role of the BBC World Service and the British Council

Make trade policy deliver for all parts of the UK

• Aim to strike trade deals that prioritise jobs, businesses and livelihoods while promoting Labour values around the world, including human rights, workers’ rights, trade union freedom, equality, protecting our environment and ensuring the highest standards for consumers
• Seek to boost exports from, and investment into, every region and nation of the UK
• Work closely with devolved governments, trade unions, and local authorities, and introduce new binding responsibilities for trade negotiators to deliver for the whole of the UK
• Establish structures that give business and trade unions guaranteed engagement with the government to inform our approach to future trade deals
• Ensure that trade negotiators work meaningfully with devolved governments to help promote their visions for economic growth
• Reform the Trade Remedies Authority, to safeguard industry from trade dumping practices and better take account of the UK regional impact of trade injuries and the impact on nationally important industries
• Use human rights protection clauses to tackle the use of modern slavery in supply chains
• Establish a new arms export regime that is truly transparent, free from arbitrary judgements and committed to upholding international law

Have a strong, humane asylum policy

• Take strong action to tackle channel crossings, reduce the asylum backlog and make sure Britain plays its part internationally through a fair and transparent asylum policy that does not discriminate
• Make processing more efficient, restore casework targets and introduce fast-track processing for safe countries where people can be returned
• Redesign existing resettlement schemes to provide a clearer process for refugees with family connections in the UK to be considered for resettlement
• Negotiate a replacement for the Dublin Agreement that includes safe returns of those who arrive in the UK and safe family reunions
• Crack down on the criminal gangs that are fuelling and facilitating small boat crossings
• Invest in the National Crime Agency, establishing a new cross-border police unit with officers based throughout Europe to tackle the gangs upstream
• Work with partners in the EU, Northern Africa, Europol and elsewhere to address crises leading people to flee their homes and provide the leadership needed to tackle criminal gangs and prevent boat crossings.

Restore UK leadership on international development

• Spend 0.7 per cent of GNI on development as soon as the fiscal situation allows
• Put in place a new model for international development, with the independence needed to meet the challenges of the 21st century
• Ensure international development policy tackles deep-rooted gender inequality and violence and harassment against women and girls globally
• Help prepare for future pandemics by strengthening global health systems
• Ensure climate is considered in every aspect of UK development policy and we will finally meet the UK’s existing international climate finance commitments

Note this article is a summary rather than the full NPF document, which has been shared this week with NPF members and Constituency Labour Party policy officers and secretaries but not been published.

Most text is published above as written by Labour, but some has been cropped or paraphrased by LabourList for space. Sub-heads within each of the six sections were added by LabourList.