Details emerging before Tory manifesto launch
The key planks of the Conservatives’ 2010 election platform are becoming clearer, one day before David Cameron publishes the party’s manifesto.
In the foreword to the document the Tory leader argues his party has “the energy, the ideas, the ambition to get Britain back on track”.
Among the main measures is expected to be a pledge to force GPs to remain open seven days a week from 08:00 to 20:00.
A ‘fuel duty stabiliser’ would be introduced to mitigate the impact of high oil prices, by using extra money levied from taxes on energy firms to temporarily lower fuel duty.
And plans to create 400,000 extra training places, including 200,000 apprenticeships, are also expected to be included.
“We offer a new approach: a change not just from one set of politicians to another; from one set of policies to another. It is a change from one political philosophy to another,” Mr Cameron writes in the manifesto’s foreword.
“From the idea that the role of the state is to strengthen society and make public services serve the people who use them. In a simple phrase, the change we offer is from big government to Big Society.”
Other measures which are reportedly in the document include making cheap shares available in state-owned banks and helping children of armed forces personnel get a ‘proper education’.
