Howard and Blair clash on Labour’s record
At Prime Minister’s Question Time this lunchtime, the two main leaders clashed on Labour’s record in power.
In an aggressive performance, the Conservative Leader Michael Howard claimed variously that under Labour the “justice gap” – between the number of crimes reported and criminals caught – has increased, the rate of MRSA infection is spiraling, and incapacity benefit is “out of control”.
In a dig at this afternoon’s debate on the banning of hunting with dogs, Mr Howard demanded: “When he is going to get to grips with the problems that people really care about?”
Mounting a strong defence of his record in power, Tony Blair argued that: “This country is stronger, fairer and more prosperous than it was seven years ago”
On crime, Mr Blair argued that there are record numbers of police and crime as recorded under the British Crime Survey has gone down, declaiming that “this party has a better record on crime in government”.
In the first of a number of jibes, Mr Howard accused Tony Blair of failing to answer the question posed.
Mr Blair hit back at the Conservative Leader’s allegations about incapacity benefit, saying that there has been a 30 per cent drop in the number of people joining the benefit system each year. Saying that he refused to take lectures on the issue from Mr Howard, the Prime Minister claimed that the previous Tory government used incapacity benefit to shunt people off the unemployment figures.
Using the opportunity to highlight Labour’s economic record, Mr Blair emphasised the high levels of employment, low inflation and interest rates.
He admitted that the rate of the MRSA superbug is a problem – one he said the Government is investing extra money to tackle – but that the answer is not to abolish targets (as Mr Howard demanded). Instead, he argued it is important to measure that there are “outputs” from Labour’s record investment.
The Liberal Democrat Leader, Charles Kennedy, chose to focus on his campaign to grant those Gurkhas who desire it to be entitled to British citizenship after they have completed their period of service. Mr Kennedy has been backing the campaign by a number retired Gurkhas to obtain British citizenship for a number of months.
Responding, the Prime Minister said that the issue was being considered seriously, and he hoped to make an announcement in a few weeks. In a hint that there may be Government movement on the issue, Mr Blair said that the problem “is not the Gurkhas themselves” but that the Government had to look into what other consequences there may be to granting the Gurkhas request.
