Theresa May declares austerity 'over' in conference speech

Theresa May has declared the end of austerity, saying voters "need to know that their hard work has paid off" after a decade of spending cuts.

The Prime Minister told the Conservative conference in Birmingham that next year's spending review will set out how the Government will increase public investment while also bringing down the national debt.

In what is being labelled a pitch for the political centre ground, May said the Conservatives must be on the side of hard-working people as she mounted a sustained attack on Jeremy Corbyn's leadership of the Labour party, which she described as "a national tragedy".

Following last year's calamitous conference speech, which saw a prankster hand her a mock P45 and the set begin to fall down around her, May produced an more confident performance which received a rousing ovation in the hall.

She even managed to poke fun at herself by coming on stage to Abba's 'Dancing Queen' - a reference to videos of her attempts at dancing during a recent trip to Africa.

Acknowledging that Labour's vow to end austerity has proved hugely popular with voters, May said the Tories "get it".

"We are not just a party to clean up a mess, we are the party to steer a course to a better future," she said. "Sound finances are essential, but they are not the limit of our ambition.

"Because you made sacrifices, there are better days ahead. So, when we’ve secured a good Brexit deal for Britain, at the spending review next year we will set out our approach for the future.

"Debt as a share of the economy will continue to go down, support for public services will go up.

"Because, a decade after the financial crash, people need to know that the austerity it led to is over and that their hard work has paid off."

Labour accused the Prime Minister of peddling a “complete con”.

Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said the Tories had made the promise before and have already foreshadowed “many more vicious cuts” over the coming years.

“May's claim that this is an end to austerity is a complete con. The Tories have promised this before - and it was a con then too," he said.

“The Government has already told us that spending for the next four years will be hit by many more vicious cuts. Nothing, sadly, has changed.”

Scottish Labour leader Richard Leonard said: “No one will believe Theresa May’s claims on austerity when we see overstretched public services, children in poverty and rough sleeping on the rise.

“Austerity is a political choice from the Tories to shrink the role of the welfare state in the United Kingdom. It is a failed attempt to balance the books on the back of the poor, and a choice driven purely by Tory ideology."

Other Labour figures blasted the PM for the personal attacks she made on Jeremy Corbyn in her hour-long conference address.

However May surprisingly gave favourable name checks to former Labour leaders Neil Kinnock and Clement Atlee, and condemned voilence and abuse against the late Jo Cox and shadow home secretary Diane Abbot, in what could be seen as an attempt to woo centrists. 

Ian Blackford MP, the SNP’s Westminster Leader, said: "The Prime Minister danced around the key issues – the disastrous impact of Tory austerity and a Tory hard Brexit.

“There is a massive gulf between her rhetoric and the reality of what is now facing the UK. If Theresa May genuinely believes that the UK’s best days lie ahead then she is being wilfully blind to that reality.

“We are just months away from a potentially disastrous hard Brexit – or the utter catastrophe of a no-deal outcome."

by Liz Bates and Tom Freeman

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Rejecting calls for another EU referendum, May said the Government was instead committed to delivering on the result of the first one.

She also insisted that, despite criticism of her approach by many Tory MPs, only her blueprint would protect the British economy while also keeping an open border in Ireland.