28/09/2016 Politics Scotland

Hello and welcome to Politics Scotland.

Coming up on the programme this afternoon.

It's the final day of the Labour Party conference.

Is there any chance of unity in the party?

And as Scotland's tourist industry booms, whatever happened

a reaction to Jeremy Corbyn's speech. And who knows, there may

even be a true minute as well. -- a tune in it as well.

It's the final day of the Labour Party conference.

Jeremy Corbyn delivers his main speech later this afternoon

and brings the curtain down on the conference.

The word we've heard most often at this gathering -

perhaps more in hope than expectation - is unity.

After the shadow cabinet resignations and leadership

challenge - is there any chance the Labour family as they

like to call themselves, will put the knives back

Our Westminster correspondent David Porter is in Liverpool.

What is the mood like? Well, to use your analogy, they may have put

those lives back in the draw but they have not put the childproof

locks on. Lots of people here are not particularly keen on Jeremy

Corbyn as the Labour leader. What we have seen this week, I think, is

somebody being settled but not settled around. We know that Jeremy

Corbyn, because he was re-elected on Saturday, will be Labour's leader

until the next general election. But there are many in the party,

particularly the MPs, who feel that he is not the right person to lead

them. Frankly, everything that we have heard this week, and I suspect

what we will hear in the next hour or so, quite frankly I do not think

that will change those people's minds. It is difficult to get a

sense of this from outside. What are we dealing with here? Could Corbyn

says things in his speech that might bring some of his opponents around

or is that is not what we're talking about here? Are the divisions are so

deep that it frankly would not matter? What seemed to happen in his

speech when he was elected is that his opponents immediately said,

well, he said that but what he did was something different. Quite

frankly, all parties are broad churches and there are some who

think that Jeremy Corbyn is the wrong person. There are others who

think that he is absolutely fantastic. And there are others, I

think, frankly even if the Mersey was to freeze over today, would not

think he was right person to actually lead the party. So we have

grades of agreement and disagreement with him. As far as many MPs are

concerned, remember 80% of them are basically, just a few months ago,

they had a vote of no confidence in him. They recognise that he was

re-elected as Labour leader with a large majority, larger than when he

was first elected a year ago. As far as they are concerned, they know

he's the leader. If he could do something to get some them back, a

hint might be if he said in his speech that he was going to have

some kind of electoral process for the Shadow Cabinet. Perhaps not the

full Shadow Cabinet but if he was to hint that he wanted some kind of

rapprochement like that, that he would actually like MPs to be

elected, and that he would decide where and what portfolios they would

serve, I think that would go some way, as far as the MPs are

concerned, to them saying, OK, yes, we may not like the situation that

we are in but we recognise it is not a perfect situation and we are going

to make the best of it. That is something you hear at the moment.

Those who are, shall we put in, more hardline in their opposition to

Jeremy Corbyn, they are really quite down at the moment. They think that

the only scenario now is to have a general election. Some of them think

that will be sooner rather than later and frankly, I think they are

thinking to themselves, Labour needs a general election and it will have

to do very badly and then, in their view, and it is the view of the

opponents, the hardline opponents of Jeremy Corbyn, they think the party

would be so badly beaten that in their view actually someone else

would have to come in and take over, but they think it is actually going

to take Labour to go down to another defeat at a general election before

they could think of having another leader who is not Jeremy Corbyn. We

will return to David later. In the studio today

we have the former Labour MP Tom Harris and Severin Carrell,

the Scotland editor Is that you are feeling, that

Labour's best hope, Tom Harris, is to get hammered in a general

election? I think that is the view of some of Corbyn's opponents. It is

a policy not supported by the majority of his opponents, the

moderate members of the Parliamentary Labour Party, but I

noticed that Peter Mandelson was talking about are just today or

yesterday, and it is obviously a very practical wave... A lot of

these Labour MPs are banging their heads against the wall and they

cannot come up with any other solution to the leadership problem.

But for those who want an early election, just for that to happen,

it is a bit like turkeys voting for an early Christmas. Not least

because many of these MPs would be the very people who would lose their

seats. Absolutely. And what do you make of this? Can Jeremy Corbyn

appear today and do anything, do you think? I think the byword for both

sides is going to have to be pragmatism. Corbyn will have to be

pragmatic about where he stands because if he wants to lead the

Labour Party into a general election, he is going to have to do

it with as much immunity as he can muster. But at the same time, there

is this significant conflict between both wings of the party which is

not, as David has pointed out, it simply has not gone away. It is

probably going to get worse because there will be similar issues around

policy and individuals in the Corbyn team behaving in a way that the

moderates care not for. And the other way round as well. And also,

if we take this issue of the Shadow Cabinet, elections, if the MPs are

making that a precondition of going into the Cabinet, of showing

loyalty, it is almost like they are deliberately coming up with

something that he will find it difficult to accept because why

should he accept that MPs who voted no confidence in him should suddenly

be allowed to select the shadow, and Shadow Cabinet. -- selected the

Shadow Cabinet. There are rebels willing to rejoin the Shadow Cabinet

without a wrecking taking place and there are others like Iain Murray

that simply will not do that. -- without a reckoning. There are

points where there will be attempts to build a more cohesive, unified

front on various issues but the underlying crisis simply is not

going to go away. But there is one point from the Corbynistas. They say

that Corbyn is not the point. They say that he is simply the leader who

has managed to get the left into a position of control over the Labour

Party and that ultimately he may not even be the leader that leads them

to the 2020 general election, because by that time another leader

will have come through. What they are after is a more permanent,

realignment, a reshaping of the Labour Party. There are more

hardline, hard left union leaders, some MPs and people active in the

Corbyn group, but there are also all the millennials. There are young

left-wing activists who believe in the Corbyn message. They do not

necessarily care for the machine politics that goes with it but those

people think that what he offers is a rebirth and a renewal for Labour.

They think that is the way that Labour can win power, not this time

or next time but certainly in the future with a different leader. Yes.

But the problem with that is that people have run the numbers,

including the Fabian Society, and they say that the numbers do not add

up. Unless you can win over Tory voters and not just rely on

millennials and people who have not voted previously, even if they all

vote for you, Labour is still out in the cold. It has been the elephant

in the sitting room for Labour politics, for longer than he has

been leader. We all talk about the two party swing but among Labour

Party activists it is not polite to talk about which two parties we are

talking about but the fact of the matter is that no opposition party

in history has ever gone from opposition to government without

winning back the support of people who voted for the other side last

time. Labour's problem is that if it does not get conservative people,

people who voted for David Cameron in 2015, if they do not persuade

some of those people, a significant number to switch directly to the

Labour Party, they have no hope of winning office. Is there any

prospect of Corbyn doing that? None at all. We will be back with you

shortly at first. -- but first. The Scottish steel industry

is being revived today with the official reopening

of the Dalzell steel Today's event comes almost a year

after the news that the then owners Tata Steel were to close both

Dalzell and sister plant Five months on, the firm

Liberty House had bought the plants, intending

to continue their operations - and today is the first

step in achieving that. Our Business Editor Douglas

Fraser is in Motherwell. The ceremonial is over. The First

Minister has been and gone again. And this work has started once again

in the giant shed behind me. Rolling steel plate that has come from

Scunthorpe and Russia. It is nearly a year since it was announced that

this was to be mothballed by Tata Steel, which used to own it. This at

a time of real difficulty for the steel industry globally.

Straightaway the Scottish Government has set about trying to broker a

deal that would move it on to new owners and they were successful. It

is liberty steel, also based in India, which has taken it over

within five months. They got it from being mothballed to being in

production once more. They have taken over 120 staff, some of them

apprentices who have lost their jobs and have brought back, three of them

even worked for Ravenscraig, the steel baking plant near here which

closed 24 years ago. What they do here is the role steel arm of the

slabs brought from elsewhere for use in fabrication in the construction

industry and heavy vehicles. They hope to build up, depending on the

market, to more than 200 people and to open up the Clydebridge plant at

Cambuslang, perhaps for the building of wind towers for offshore energy.

The hope is that they can develop new markets by being much more

innovative about finding new customers. Politically, this has

been absolutely vital for the Scottish Government at the start of

this year to get to a deal, to get the plant reopened in Lanarkshire

where it is of such symbolic importance that steel processing

continues. They managed that before they broke for the Holyrood

elections and so it has been very important for Nicola Sturgeon as the

First Minister to come back here and reopen the plant, to say this is

symbolic both for Lanarkshire steel-making but also for the modern

manufacturing hopes she has for the economy.

There might be more optimism in the economy post Brexit than some

According to a survey of 450 businesses,

carried out by the Fraser of Allander Institute

for the Royal Bank of Scotland, business confidence has risen,

with a modest growth in output in the second half of this year.

Tourism appears to have fared particularly well with more

than half of those involved in the industry saying it's been

Joining me now from Edinburgh is the director

of the Fraser of Allander Institute, Professor Graeme Roy.

Does this tell us anything, given we are still in the European Union and

nothing much has changed, apart from a fall in the pound which one could

have predicted might help the tourism industry? What the survey to

date does is it basically finds that across the Scottish economy, around

a third of companies are saying output has increased over the past

three months. One third of companies say that it has broadly stay the

same and a third say that output has fallen. In the immediate aftermath

of Brexit, there were two key concerns about how bright it would

impact the economy. Firstly, structural challenges in the

long-term. We do not know how that will play out until Article is

triggered and until the economy goes through structural adjustments. But

there was another concern about what might happen to a potential threats

to confidence in the short term with the uncertainty of not knowing what

Brexit would mean and the followed from what happened in the UK

Government. That was a risk that it could actually take the economy into

negative territory, or it could actually make the economy slowed

down relative to what it would have been. Today's survey finds that the

Scottish economy has pretty much decided to wait and see and on

balance, it is pretty much flat growth or a small, modest increase.

An production, they are forecasting that it will rise. Is there any

evidence that is the export industries more than domestic

industries? One of the interesting things from the survey is that while

we have had a boost tourism that we can probably estimate to have come

from the depreciation installing helping making Scottish tourism more

attractive, more generally in terms of exports, that is performing

slightly worse over the last few months, so on balance, nearly 40% of

firms are saying that exports have fallen over the period rather than

increased. It is a bit of a mixed bag in terms of what might have been

happening to the economy particularly on the export side of

things. Do you have any exhalation for that? Because in the abstract

you would have expected that the pound falls and that gives a one-off

boost to exports. I think you have to be careful about what a fall in

the pound actually means for the economy because on the one hand,

yes, it makes your products cheaper when you enter the international

market but the other thing we find in the survey is that it actually --

actually the costs have risen so for a lot of companies involved in the

supply chain, they might have been relying on imports but even if they

go on to exports to other markets, again we find that a large number of

companies are importing significant increases in import costs, costs

overall, and potentially that is related to a rise in import prices.

Mark Carney has said over the past 24 hours that he sees no end to the

slump in the oil industry. Is there any evidence in your survey that the

problems caused by that art using up in any way? As we know, over the

last 18 months or so a big driver of the relatively weak Scottish economy

performance has been what has happened in the oil and gas sector

in the north-east. The survey today continues to suggest that that is

still an issue, with over 40% of firms saying that actually the last

three months, business output and volume has fallen again. There is

nothing in this survey to offer much encouragement at this stage that the

industry has bottomed out or is growing again. What should we look

for, Graham Roy, in terms of the impact of Brexit on the real

economy? When does that Kim? Is going to be when Article 50 is

triggered or will nothing actually happened until we leave the European

Union? It is difficult to pinpoint exactly when you will start to see

the effects of this. We have to remember what we're talking about.

We're not about Brexit meaning immediately that we will have

substantial falls in output or the economy going into recession.

Essentially the challenges in Brexit are more structural. It is more

about potentially having slower growth because the exports are

slightly less competitive. It is much more likely to be that these

effects are gradual and happen over a period of time and then only

actually after a number of years can we pinpoint what have been the

long-term impacts of Brexit. Thank you very much indeed.

At the Scottish parliament today the Education secretary John Swinney

is taking portfolio questions from MSPs,

most of which are focusing on the education attainment gap -

It is important that we assess the overall impact of the programme and

its success. As part of this we will obviously be looking at potential

impact on Brexit of student ability in Europe but the members should be

reassured that we will continue to want Scottish students to play their

full part in the European Union to study and to seek benefit from that

were ever that particular programme will be. So he can at least be

assured that this government will continue to want the Scottish

students to play a full part across the European Union. In assuring that

question, can I encourage the Minister to address the issue of

college students who will be needed more in apprentice skills, because

of Brexit happens in the way in which we believe it may happen, the

number of apprentices we need in the construction industry is going to

become more so. Will she undertake to look into that with respected

colleges to ensure that the growth of apprentices continues to happen

to meet these skills needs? Tavish Scott raises an important point

about the locations for Brexit and the requirements for the economy.

The construction sector is one of those parts. Apprenticeships have

been playing a very important part in the Scottish Government's and to

its offerings for young people and we have of course made commitment to

increase the number of apprentice chips. I take the points that Tavish

Scott made today. -- apprenticeships. Can I have the

Scottish Government what action it takes to ensure that there is

quality than the magic quality in admittance of university places for

people who meet the entry requirements? Universities are

ultimately responsible for their own admissions procedures and decisions.

That said, we invest more than ?51 million every year to support around

7000 places targeted at disadvantaged learners and those

progressing from college. We have also welcomed the final report of

the commission on widening access which commented extensively on how

admissions could be made clearer. We will continue to work closely with

the university sector on how best to take forward the implementation of

the committee's recommendations. I understand there is little or no

centralised detail showing where the unsuccessful applicants come from

who actually meet the entrance requirements for courses like

medicine, law and dentistry. Is that something the government seeks to

address as it takes for the attainment agenda to ensure equality

of access is achieved? Although data on entrance to university by social

background is available, the widening access commission

recognises the need for enhanced data. My officials are working with

the Scottish funding Council to deliver the commission's

recommendations with better monitoring of their access at key

stages of the journey including applications, offers and the

acceptances to university. We're working with the private sector.

Now let's speak to some MSPs at Holyrood on today's stories.

For the SNP, we have James Dornan, Liam Kerr from the Conservatives.

From Labour, it's James Kelly and Andy Wightman joins us

Andy Wightman, let's start with your views on education. The SNP have put

their credibility on the line, saying they want to reduce the

attainment gap which can be measured in many different ways and they want

to close it. Andy Wightman. Do you think the objectives are write and

do you see any signs that they are doing things that might actually

achieve those objectives. It has been a challenge for a long time and

we support the government in trying to close that. It will not happen

quickly and we think this will be a 15 year programme of work. The other

clear thing is it is not going to happen just within schools. The

attainment gap as a consequence of poverty and inequality, those issues

need to be tackled outside the schools. There needs to be not just

a cross-party effort but a cross sector effort to close this

attainment gap. The work being done in schools is good but it needs to

be improved. We do not support the weight that the government intends

to fund total tax receipts. Do you have any specific proposals, as the

greens, for what the Scottish Government should be doing, that is

any different to what they suggest? We're focusing on reducing

inequality and we have put for proposals on housing and the tax

regime that would reduces the amount of wealth inequality in Scotland.

That is where the source of disadvantage comes from and that is

where the source of low attainment levels comes from. That is why this

needs to be tackled as an economic problem is much as an education one.

What the SNP have to say on this sounds exactly like what I would

expect a Labour government to say. Do you criticise it? I think there

is a lot of agreement across the parties about closing the attainment

gap and ensuring that pupils from all communities have proper access

to education. Both so they can achieve more and so that they can

contribute to better qualified people. The real issue is how you

fund this. The reality is that Labour have put for different

proposals from the SNP at the election. We support progressive

taxation to protect public services and we support action to tackle the

attainment gap above the SNP would simply implement the Tories'

austerity agenda. Liam carer, there are signs of the SNP government does

not think that James Kelly -- as James Kelly suggests, that this is

all about money. They have been looking at ideas from around the UK,

from around the world. Do you see signs of a greater openness on the

half of the Scottish Government to look at different ways of doing

things, rather than saying it is all about the money? There is a degree

of openness in the sense that what we have basically seen is the

Nationalist attempting to adopt a policy that we have been pushing for

a large number of years, to devolve power, to devolve control down to

the local level, to local schools and headteachers. I think that has

to be encouraged. What we need to be careful of is that this idea of

regionalisation is not some kind of Trojan horse centralisation in

common with many of the other agendas that the SNP push. Is it? It

is not entirely clear how these regional educational boards, if that

is what they are called, whether they will replace local authorities.

And it is not entirely clear what they are going to do that is new and

original. They are clearly not going to be replacing local authorities.

The whole idea is that education is rolled out to -- education is

devolve down to the lowest levels. That is what the cluster programme

is all about. My colleagues seem to be paranoid, where they think that

everything the SNP does has some sort of nasty back story behind it.

James makes a ridiculous statement... They have all been

congratulating you for coming up with new ideas and you are still

unhappy. And then there is a kick at the end. Jim talks about are

replicating Tory austerity. James party abstained when it was getting

voted for in Westminster. If they wanted to fight it, they had a

chance at Westminster. Now, they should be helping us fight what has

happened after they decided not to vote. Clearly, there is an element

of centralisation here because John Swinney said only a couple of weeks

ago that it was perfectly conceivable that tranches of money

that went to schools through local authorities would in future go

direct to schools. One way of looking at that is that it increases

the autonomy of schools. Another way is that it decreases the amount of

money going to local authorities. I suggest that it sends the money

directly to win it needs to go, where it is best needed. I think we

all agree here that nobody knows education better than people on the

front line, teachers and headteachers are the people that

know what their school needs best. And not necessarily local

authorities. I do not see that that is centralisation. If anything it is

taking devolution to its logical conclusion. James Kelly, what is

wrong with perverting money straight to schools in principle, if the

schools can make better use of it? It is about how this money is raised

and it is a democratic point about how decisions have been taken. The

SNP are expecting local councils to put up the council tax and then take

the proceeds from that centrally. They will then decide how that money

is going to be allocated. That is not fair on local councils and local

areas. But hang on a second, the Labour Party in England were past

masters at funding schools directly. Labour in England shut down the

local education authority because they were not performing. This is

about how we are operating in Scotland and it is about

scrutinising what the SNP are doing here. It is a typical SNP agenda. If

you really want to take responsibility, follow the proposals

we have been putting forward in this budget. It is progressive taxation

that protects public services. Quickly, on the economy, various

reports out of this weekend about oil and gas, the Fraser of Allander

report today. Andy Wightman, the point that comes out of it is that

no one is suggesting there may not be bad effects from Brexit at some

point for the economy but it is pretty difficult to find any at the

moment. To find bad effects? Yes, because it has not happened yet. And

there is a huge amount of uncertainty. In this period, people

are trying to tread water. The key to this will be whether we retain

access to the single market, whether we retain freedom of movement across

Europe. Those are the crunch decisions that will then impact on

businesses and others to take a decision about investment and where

to locate businesses. It is only when we have made those decisions

clear that we will get to see the impacts. James Kelly, again, we know

it is early but there is some evidence, these surveys tend to

suggest that certainly the short-term effects of Brexit were

overact. If you remember George Osborne was threatening to hold an

emergency budget to put taxes up because it would have such a major

impact but it is not happening. The first thing to remember is that it

is a survey. In the immediate aftermath of Brexit, there was real

doom and gloom but perhaps what some of the surveys are doing is

reflecting a bit of course correction. But even if you look at

Fraser of Allander Institute's report on finance and the economy,

they clearly forecast a negative Brexit impact there, which could

result in ?1.6 billion of cuts to the Scottish budget. I think there

is a lot to happen yet and I am certainly very anxious about it.

Liam carer, were you in favour of Brexit remaining? I voted remain. --

Liam Kerr. But like business, I think we are where we are, and the

UK voted to leave. And so we have to get on with it and do the best we

can. There are a lot of opportunities out there and

businesses seeing that opportunity. We are seeing that opportunity and

talking about it in the chamber. The best thing the Scottish Government

can be doing at this stage is backing our businesses so that it is

not more expensive to do business in Scotland than in the rest of the UK.

We need to get back and start doing the day job to take a second, to

take the independence referendum of the table. But it was Tories in the

Remain campaign who said it was going to be an absolute catastrophe,

and he would have to have an emergency budget and it was all

going to be terrible. Don't you feel some sense of having overrides of

the pudding and got this completely wrong? -- over egged the pudding. I

see a sense of opportunity. The UK people took a decision, 70 million

people took a decision on the way they want this country to go in the

future. Thus far, what they are seeing, what businesses seeing is

that there is a lot of opportunity there. As I say, the best thing the

government can do is start backing our businesses and backing our

economy. James, it is not happening, the

things that the Conservative, SNP, Labour, those who voted remain, it

is not happening yet. Brexit has not really kicked in. Article 50 hasn't

been sent, but when that starts you will see uncertainty and the

long-term impact of Brexit, when it starts to kick in, because let's be

honest, the mood music from the rest of Europe, this is going to be a

hard Brexit and I laughed when I hear people like Liam, who

campaigned for a main, he now says all he sees is opportunities, so why

did he not see them beforehand? -- campaign for Remain. He is ignoring

the 62% of Scots who voted to Remain. Thanks for joining us.

Tom Harris and Severin Carrell are still with me.

You led the Brexit campaign, Tom? You are still happy you did that?

Yes, no regrets. Like Liam, and I said this on the night of the

referendum, the most important thing was, whatever the decision, the most

important thing is the country united behind the decision. That

hasn't happened because it was a decision most people did not expect,

but there is nothing to be gained from constantly griping and opposing

Brexit, it is going to happen. It is up to the SNP government to get

involved in those negotiations and campaign for what they actually

want. We are leaving the EU, that is settled. Presumably it is of some

concern to you that the government in London doesn't seem to know what

Brexit means? It is a concern that we have a Conservative government,

but it is absurd to think that ministers are going to go to the

House of Commons every day and update the world on what the

position is. I would have no confidence in Theresa May if she

started saying these are the starting points, and these are the

best lines, and issued them publicly before they go into negotiations.

That is not the way you conduct them. Severin, what you make of

this? It is a bit of a phoney war, if not a war, it is a phoney

situation, we voted to leave. George Osborne might have been overdoing it

when he spoke about the emergency budget because nothing in the wheel

world has actually changed. That will not go on forever. We are

treading water. The most interesting thing about the Leave campaign as it

unfolded, unlike in the Scottish referendum, there was no White

Paper, there was no actual agreed blueprint for the Leave campaign to

say that this is what they would expect to happen and what they would

want to happen. The structure they would like to introduce will stop

the obvious difference, they could not do that, the SNP government were

a government, but the Leave campaign was not a government and the British

government wanted to remain. Yes, but the structure was so varied and

imprecise, UK Government is now having to do is to start from

scratch, there are various options and ideas which are knocking around.

The Tory party itself is also responsible for the inertia that we

are experiencing because the Tory party was completely split. It now

has to work out how it reconfigures itself and brings the Brexit is and

Remain together, but clearly that is not happening, they have got

ministers speaking off script, saying one thing one day and then

being slapped down by Theresa May the next day. The inertia will

continue for some time. Tom is correct, behind the scenes there are

very smart people in Whitehall who will have a clear idea about where

they want to see things go. It will take a bit longer before this

unfold. What is your view, Tom? Would you like to see Britain stay

in the single market? Even people in the so-called moderate wing of the

Labour Party campaigned for Remain, have said, freedom of movement is a

red line, even if it means coming out of the single market, which is

surprising that someone like Chuka Umunna the campaign for the

remainder. There will be some controls on immigration, that's a

realistic possibility that that will leave us outside the single market

-- for the remain campaign. From MSP is there was the focus on the access

to the single market and there are only a couple of countries who don't

have access to the single market, Somalia and North Korea, and even if

we are outside the run did in a formal sense, we will be having

access to it. -- outside the single market. We have distinctions. Being

part of a customs union with the European Union where you don't have

the bureaucracy of customs forms and in return you accept free movement

of Labour, that is the difference and that is what I'm asking you,

whether you think we should stay in. My guess is that the government will

try to negotiate Britain staying within the customs union with some

concessions to freedom of movement, changing it so you can only move to

Britain if you have a job offer. That might be something the EU

rejects and it could mean that we end up outside the customs union. We

just don't know what the negotiating position of the EU negotiators is,

but my view, if the only way we can stop freedom of movement and return

control of immigration policy to the UK Government, if the only way to

get control of that is by coming out of the customs union and out of the

single market, we would have to do that. There's presumably room for

movement on the European side, as well, Severin? There is a feeling

some of the countries would like some more control over immigration,

as well. There is a potential deal. It is possible, and there is the

other question about what the commission thinks as an institution.

There is a third actor in this, and we hear about very hard language

coming out of the commission and people who are part of the EU, who

are understood to fear contagion, they fear that Brexit in the UK is

going to lead to the on picking of European principles about complete

freedom of movement. The key issue, presumably, is what the Germans do,

many analysts are wondering if the whole Brexit process is going to be

influenced by other things that happen in Europe. If in September in

the German Federal elections next, Angela Merkel's party loses power.

Or it is forced into power into a coalition with another party, who

would like to take Germany into a different route. There are conflicts

which could take place in Serbia with Bosnian Serbs, wanting to break

free. There are these different things which will have some kind of

influence on the way Europe behaves and that will influence how they

respond to what we want. Tom, if Severin is right, if you start

getting movement on the European side of this debate, you could end

up with a situation where it is a moot point whether Britain needs to

leave or has indeed left. Because of the state of the EU? If we start

saying we would like some control over immigration, and the European

Union says why don't we do a global deal. There is a dawning realisation

amongst EU leaders, that the general population, significant parts of the

political sphere, have not been happy with the direction of travel,

have not been happy with edicts from Brussels in terms of freedom of

movement and controls on businesses and there are voices not Justin

Britt on but throughout the EU saying, do we really want to go this

far? -- not just in Britain. If we want to maintain the rest of the

union of 27 countries, maybe they need to rethink and be more flexible

and give more power to nations, national parliaments. There was this

talk in the early 90s when Mastrick went through about seniority, and

the impression given, that was largely tall, that the whole thing

has been far too centralised -- largely talk. It is about the

pillars. It has changed the four pillars, it is now freedom of

movement. We have got to leave it there for the moment.

Jeremy Corbyn is addressing the conference now.

He has just appeared at the platform this moment. He is about to start.

About now. Thank you. Thank you so much for

that welcome. And that introduction. This whole is packed today in

Liverpool and we have even gotten overspill down the road. I want to

say thank you to everyone who is here today. APPLAUSE

Before I go into my speech I want to say a huge thank you to the staff at

this conference centre who have made us so welcome. I want to say thank

you to all of our Labour Party staff for the huge work they have put in

for this conference today and all the other days. And I want to say a

big thank you to my own staff in my own office in the constituency and

in Parliament for the work and support they give me and give our

party all the year round. I got to correct myself because I

did say the hall is completely packed. -- I've got. I had a message

from Virgin Trains on the way M. They have assured me there are 800

MP seats in the whole -- I had a message from Virgin Trains on the

way in. APPLAUSE Is away, it is a huge pleasure to be

holding the annual party conference at this fantastic city -- either

way. The city of Liverpool that shaped our country and our culture

and our music. Liverpool has always been central to the Labour Party and

our movement. I know some people say campaigns and protests don't change

things, but the Hillsborough families have shown just how wrong

that is. It has taken 27 years but those

families have shown with great courage and dignity, finally, that

you can get truth and justice for the 96 who died and I want to pay

tribute to all families and campaigners for their solidarity and

their commitment and their love. Thank you.

And as Andy Burnham put it a conference this morning, we must

learn from them, and we promise those campaigning for justice for

all grieve and Shrewsbury and the thousands of workers blacklisted for

being trade unions 's, we will support your battles for truth and

justice and when we return to government we will make sure you

have both. -- Orgreave. Because winning justice for all and

changing society for the benefit of all is the heart of what Labour is

about. Yes, our party is about campaigning and protest but most of

all it is about winning power, in local and national government, to

deliver the real change our country so desperately needs.

That is why the central task of the whole Labour Party, the whole Labour

Party, must be to rebuild trust and support to win the next general

election. APPLAUSE And form the next government, that

is the government are determined to lead to win power, to bring change

for the benefit of work power. -- I'm determined. Everyone us in this

hall knows that we will only get there if we work together and I

think it is fair to say after what we have been through these past few

months, it hasn't always been exactly the case. Those months have

been a testing time for the whole party, first, the irreverent murder

of Jo Cox -- the horrific murder of Jo Cox, the referendum results, and

then the leadership contest which ended last Saturday. Jo Cox's

killing was a hate filled attack on democracy. It shocked the whole

country. Jo Cox did not just believe in loving her neighbour, she

believed in loving her neighbour's neighbour and that every life

counted. As she said in her maiden speech as an MP, we have far more in

common with each other than things which divide us, let that essential

truth guide us as we come together again to challenge the Tory

government and its shaky grip on power.

In her memory, thanks very thing she did and thanks to her family and her

close friends for all they've been through and the solidarity they have

shown together, so we may all learn from her life. APPLAUSE

We have also lost good MPs like MIchael Meacher and Harry Harpham,

both good friends of mine. They were Labour through and through, passion

campaigners for a better world. Let me also pay tribute to those

parliamentary colleagues who stepped forward in the summer to fill the

gaps in the Shadow Cabinet. CHEERING And make sure that Labour could

function as an effective opposition in Parliament. They actually didn't

seek office but they stepped up when their party and the country needed

them to serve, and they all deserve the respect and gratitude of our

party in the movement and this conference should thank them today,

they are our future. We've just had our second leadership

election in a year and it had its fraught moments, of course, but only

for Owen Smith and make as I hope we don't make a habit of it. -- and

myself. There have been upsides, over 150,000 new members have joined

our party. Young rising stars have shone on the front bench and we have

found the party is more united on policy than we would ever have

guessed. I'm honoured, deeply honoured, to have been re-elected by

our party a second time, with an even bigger mandate. CHEERING

That we all have lessons to learn and responsibility to do things

better and to work together more effectively. I will lead in learning

those lessons and I would like to thank Owen Smith for the campaign

and his work as Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary. APPLAUSE

And also to the Labour Party staff and our own teams and the brilliant

teams who support all of our members of Parliament and our party around

the country. One lesson is that there is a responsibility on all of

us to take care with our rhetoric. Respect democratic decisions,

respect our differences and respect each other. We know that robust

debate has at times spilled over into abuse and hate around our

country including the Sochi and anti-Semitism, especially on social

media -- including misogyny. That is absolutely not acceptable. APPLAUSE

Our party must be a safe and welcoming space for everyone. We

will continue to take firm action against abuse and intimidation. Let

me be absolutely clear, anti-Semitism is an evil and led to

the worst crimes of the 20th century and every one of us as a

responsibility to make sure that it is never allowed to fester in our

society again, this party... APPLAUSE

This party always has and always will fight against prejudice and

hatred of Jewish people with every breath in our body.

We meet this year as the largest political party in Western Europe,

with over half a million members, campaigning in every community in

Britain. More people have joined our party in the last 20 months than in

the previous 20 years. APPLAUSE We have more of our fellow citizens

in our party than all the other political parties in Britain put

together. Some may see this as a threat, but I see this as a vast

democratic resource. Our hugely increased membership is part of a

movement that can take Labour's message into every community and win

support for the election of a Labour government.

Each and every one of these new members is welcome in our party. And

after a 10-year absence we welcome back the fire Brigades union into

our party and the conference. CHEERING

We are reuniting the Labour family but I want to also say thank you to

the firefighters and indeed all of the public sector workers who work

so hard to save people during the floods last winter. Thank you for

everything you did. Over the past year we've shown what Labour can do

when the party stands together. That conference year ago I launched our

campaign against cuts to tax credits and we succeeded in knocking this

government back. This year 3 million families are over thousand pounds

better off because Labour stood together. In the budget the

government tried to take away billions from disabled people but we

defeated them on that. And we won all four Parliamentary by-elections

and I welcome our new colleagues into Parliament and the great

victories they achieved and in the mail actions we overtook the Tories

to become the largest party nastily -- in the May elections we overtook

the Tories to become the largest party in the country. We'll so won

the London mayor campaign with Sadiq Khan, the first Muslim mayor in

Europe -- we also won. We also won the Bristol mayor campaign, with the

first black mayor. And we also were victorious in Salford and here in

Liverpool. Congratulations. That is the road of advance we have to

return to if we are going to return to power and return the growth of

the Labour Party into electoral support right across Britain.

There's no doubt that my election as Labour leader one year ago

re-election this month grew out of a thirst for a new kind of politics

and the conviction that the old way of running the economy and the

country isn't delivering for more and more people. It's not about me,

of course, or unique to Britain, but across Europe and North America and

elsewhere, people are fed up with the so-called free market system,

that has produced grotesque inequality, stagnating living

standards and many calamitous foreign wars without end. And a

political stitch up which leaves the vast majority of people shut out of

power. Since the crash of 2008 the demand for alternative and an end to

counter-productive austerity has led to the rise of new movements and

parties, in one country after another. But in Britain it has

happened in a different way. In the heart of an additional politics in

the Labour Party. Which is something we should be streaming proud of --

in the heart of traditional politics. It is exactly what Labour

was founded four, to be the voice of the many, for social justice,

progressive change from the bottom up. APPLAUSE

But it also means it is no good harking back to the tired old

economic and political fixes of 20 and 30 years ago. Because they won't

work any more. The old model is broken, we are in a new era and that

demands a politics and economics which meets the needs of our own

time. Actually, even Theresa May gets it, sort of. That people want

change for top that is what she stood on the steps of Downing Street

and spoke about the inequalities and burning injustice of today's

Britain. Well, she said it. In fact she promised a country that works

not for a privileged few but for every one of us. But even if she

manages to talk the talk, there are problems about walking the walk.

This isn't a new government. This is David Cameron's government

repackaged with progressive slogans but with a new harsh right-wing

edge, taking the country backwards and dithering before the historic

challenges of Brexit. Who is seriously believed that the

Tories could ever stand up to the privileged few? They are the party

of the privileged few. Funded by the privileged few, for

the benefit of the privileged few. There's is a party after all that

now wants to force through an undemocratic boundary review based

on out of date version of the electoral register with nearly 2

million voters missing. They have dressed it up as a bid to cut the

cost of politics, by abolishing 50 constituencies, but the 12 million

savings are dwarfed by the expense of the 260 peers David Cameron are

pointed at a cost of ?34 million year. -- appointed.

It is nothing more than a cynical attempt to gerrymander the next

election. APPLAUSE And this is from a Prime Minister

who was elevated to her job without a single vote being cast after a

pantomime farce which saw one leading Tory after another falling

on their swords. When I meet Theresa May across the dispatch box I know

that only one of us has been elected to the office they hold, by the

votes of a third of a million people.

In any case the Tories are simply incapable of responding to the

breakdown of the old economic model. Because that failed model is

absolutely in their political DNA and it is what they deliver every

time they are in government, Tory governments deregulate and

outsource, privatise, and they stand by as inequality grows, they have

cut taxes for the privileged few, sold off our national assets, always

on the cheap, and turned a blind eye to their chronic tax avoidance. They

are so committed to the interests of the very richest, they have

recruited Sir Philip Green into government, is something called the

efficiencies are, and I don't know what that does, but I would simply

say this, government might be a bit more efficient if the super-rich

like Sir Philip Green actually paid their taxes.

APPLAUSE When government steps back there are

consequences for every of us, look what has happened to housing under

the Tories. House-building has fallen to the lowest level since the

nine seen 20s, nearly a century ago. -- 1920s. Home ownership is falling

as more people are priced out of the market, evictions and disgracefully

homelessness and rough sleeping increase month after month year

after year. Council homes are being sold off without being replaced.

Another consequence of that, we are paying over ?9 billion a year to

private landlords in housing benefit to pay the rent. Instead of spending

public money on building Council housing, we are subsidising private

landlords, that is wasteful, inefficient and frankly poor

government. So Labour well, as trees appears

says, build a million new homes, and we will control private rents so

that we can give every British family that basic human rights,

decent home. It is the same in the jobs market. Without proper

employment regulation, there has been an explosion of temporary,

insecure jobs. Nearly 1 million people on zero hours contracts, not

knowing what their earnings are going to be. There are now 6 million

working people earning less than a living wage and the poverty amongst

those in work is amongst record levels. That did not happen by

accident. The Tories have torn up employment rights and deliberately

tried to weaken the organisations that get people justice at work, the

trade unions. Of course trade unions are not taking this lying down. Look

at the great campaign Unite has waged that sport direct to get

justice for exploited workers. -- at Sports Direct. They are holding Mike

Ashley to account. That is why Labour will repeal of the trade

union act and set unions free to do their jobs defending and supporting

members and their rights at work. And we will raise the minimum wage

to a real living wage that brings working people out of poverty and

will ban zero hours contracts. As John McDonnell... John McDonnell,

our Shadow Chancellor, said this out very clearly at conference this

week. And then there is the scandal of the privatised railways. More

public subsidy than under the days of British Rail. All going to

private firms and more delays, more cancellations and on top of that,

the highest figures in Europe. That is why the great majority of British

people back Labour's plan must set out so well by Andy McDonnell this

week, to take the railways back into public ownership.

But if you want the most spectacular example of what happens when

government steps back, the global banking crash is an object lesson. A

deregulated industry of out of control, greed and speculation, that

crashed economies across the globe and required the biggest ever

government intervention and public bailout in history. Millions of

ordinary families paid the price of that failure. I pledge that Labour

will never let a fewer reckless bankers wreck our economy again.

Labour is offering solutions. During the campaign, I set out ten pledges

that I believe can be the platform for our party's programme at the

next election. They will be put to conference yesterday. They lay out

the scope of the change we need to see. For full employment a homes

guarantee, security at work, a strong public national health

service and social care. A national education service for all. Action on

climate change. Public ownership and control of our services, a cut in

inequality of income and wealth, action to secure an equal society

and peace and justice at the heart of our foreign policy. Don't worry,

conference, they are not the Ten Commandments. I haven't come down

from the mountain with them. They are here already and they will now

of course go to the national policy forum and the party needs to build

on them. All our brilliant members have ideas, imagination and

inspiration and we want to hear them, the ones who help refining

these policies. And above all, take them out to the people of this

country, take them out so that we get support on them. But those ten

pledges, the core of the platform which I was re-elected on, will now

form the framework of what Labour will campaign for and what a Labour

government will do. Together, they show the direction of change we are

determined to take and outline a programme to rebuild and transform

Britain. They are rooted in traditional Labour values and

objectives but they are shaped to meet the challenges of the 21st

century. They are values that Labour is united on. They reflect the views

and aspirations of the majority of our people. And they are values that

our country can and will support as soon as they are given the chance to

do it. These pledges are not just words. Already across the country

Labour councils are putting Labour values into action in a way that

makes a real difference to millions of people, despite cynical

government funding cuts that have hit Labour councils, often

representing the poorest part of the country, five times as hard as Tory

run areas. Good examples like Nottingham City Council setting up

the not for profit Robin Hood energy company to provide affordable

energy. Or Cardiff bus company taking 100,000 passengers every day,

publicly owned with a passenger panel to hold its directors to

account. Or Preston council working to favourite local procurement and

keep money in the town. Or Newcastle Council providing free Wi-Fi in 69

public buildings across the city. Or Croydon Council setting up a company

to build 1000 new homes, and as their councillor says, we can no

longer afford to sit back and let the market to take its course.

Glasgow, that has established a high quality, flexible workplaces. For

start-up, high-growth companies in dynamic new sectors. Or right here

in Liverpool, set to be at the global forefront of a new wave of

technology, the home of Census city, in business hub aiming to create 300

start-up businesses and 1000 jobs over the next decade. And there are

many other examples. It is a proud labour record. Each and every Labour

councillor deserves our heartfelt thanks for the work they do and the

difficult bits they endure in doing it. But I want to go further. I want

to put public enterprise back into the heart of our economy and

services to meet the needs of local communities. Municipal socialism for

the 21st century, as an engine of local growth and development. That

is why I am announcing that Labour will remove the artificial borrowing

cap and allowed councils to borrow against housing stock. That single

measure alone the... APPLAUSE. That single measure alone will allow them

to build an extra 12,000 council homes a year. Labour councils

increasingly have a policy of in-house as the preferred provider.

Many councils have brought bin collections, cleaners and IT

services back in-house. In sourcing privatised contracts to save money

for council taxpayers and ensure good terms and conditions for their

staff. I have said that Labour will put security at worst and employment

-- at work and employment rights they won centrestage. One in six

workers in Britain are a self employed. They are right to buy knew

their independence but for too many it comes with insecurity and a

woeful lack of rights. So we will review arrangements for self implied

people including Social Security that self-employed people pay for in

their taxes, yet are not fully covered by it. We will ensure that

successful innovators have access to the finance necessary to take their

ideas to the next level, grow their businesses and generating plant. So

as part of our workplace 2020 review, we will make sure that our

tax and social security arrangements are fit for the 21st century,

consulting with self implied workers and the Federation of Small

Businesses. -- self-employed workers. If the Tories are the party

of cups and short termism, Labour is the party of investing for the

future. -- the party of cups. With the same level of investment as

other major economies, we could be so much more. We could unlock so

much skill, ingenuity and wealth. That is why we will establish a

national investment bank at the heart of our plan to rebuild and

transform this country. And we will borrow to invest. At historically

low interest rates, to generate far greater returns. It would be foolish

not to because that investment is expanding the economy and the income

it generates for us all in the process. Even this government, after

years of austerity and savage cuts, is starting to change its tune. I am

not content with accepting second class broadband. Not content with

creaking railways, not content with seeing the United States and Germany

investing in cutting-edge green technologies while we lag behind.

Last year, for example, the Prime Minister promised a universal

service obligation for 10 megabytes broadband. But since then, the

government has done nothing, letting down entrepreneurs, businesses and

families, especially those in rural areas that want to grow their

economy. That is why we have set out proposals for a national investment

bank with ?500 billion of investment to bring our broadband, housing and

energy infrastructure up to scratch. A country that does not invest is a

country that has given up, that has taken the path of managed decline. A

Labour government will never accept second best for this country. Our

country's history is based on individual ingenuity and collective

endeavour. We are the country of Ada Lovelace, Alan Turing, Tim

Berners-Lee, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Sarah Guppy, George

Stephenson, Eric Laithwaite, brilliant people that made so much

and developed so much. But the Tories have turned their back on

this proud British tradition. They put privatisation and cutting

spending first. Britain now spends less on research as a share of

national income than France, Germany, the US and China. A Labour

government will bring research and development up to 3% of GDP.

Yesterday Rebecca long Bailey set out the terms of our industrial

strategy review. We need an economy that works for every part of this

country so that no community is left behind. And today, I am asking

everyone, businesses, academics, workers, trade unions, and anyone

who cares about our future prosperity, to have a say in that

review. We are a wealthy country and not just in terms of money. We are

rich in talent, potential. That is why we proposed a conference of

national education service. At the heart of our programme for

government, to deliver high quality education for all throughout our

lives. Education has always been a core

Labour value. From the time of Alan Wilkinson, later the Education

Minister, and before that. And a national education service will mean

delay might be an essential part of the 21st welfare state. In a rapidly

changing economy, people need to retrain or upgrade their skills.

Britain already lags behind others in productivity. That is partly

about investing in technology and infrastructure. And partly it is

about investing in people and their skills. How can we build and expand

the sectors of the future without a skilled workforce? This Conservative

government has slashed adult education budgets, taking away

opportunities for people to develop skills, and leaving businesses

struggling to find the skilled workforce that they need to succeed.

So today I am offering business a new settlement. A new deal to

rebuild Britain. Under Labour, we will provide the investment to

rebuild Britain's infra structure. We will fund that investment because

it will lead to a more productive economy. Providing the basis on

which our economy and businesses can thrive. Helping to provide over 1

million good jobs and opportunities. But investment in capital must also

include investment in human capital, the skilled workers needed to make

our economy a success. So this is the deal Labour will offer to

business. Do not pay for a national education service, will ask you to

pay a little more in tax. We have already started to set out some of

this pledging to raise corporation tax by less than 1.5% to give an

education maintenance allowance to college students, grants to

university students, so that every young learner can afford to support

themselves as they develop skills and get qualifications.

Business shares in economic success and it must contribute to it, too. I

recognise that good businesses deserve a level playing field. I

also pledged to good businesses that we will clamp down on those that

dodge taxes. You should not be undercut by those that do not play

by the rules. There is nothing more unpatriotic than not paying your

taxes. Frank way, it is an act of vandalism, damaging our National

Health Service, damaging older people's social care, damaging

younger people's education. So a Labour government will make the

shabby tax avoidance a thing of the past.

Our national education service is going to be every bit as vital as

our National Health Service has become. So we recognise that

education is not simply about preparing for the workplace. It is

also about exploration of knowledge and unlocking the creativity that is

they are in every human being. So all school pupils should have a

chance to learn an instrument, take part in drama and dance, have

regular access to a theatre, gallery, museum in their local area.

So that is why we will introduce an arts pupil premium to every ordinary

school in England and Wales and consult on the design and national

roll-out to extend this premium to all secondary schools. This will be

?160 million to boost schools to invest in projects that will support

cultural activities for schools over the longer term. It could hardly be

more different from the Tory approach to education. Their only

plan is the return of grammar schools, segregation and

second-class schooling for the majority. And what a great job

Angela Rayner is doing in opposing them in this.

So this Saturday, the first of the club, I want you to take this

message into your community. That Labour is standing up for education.

-- October one. Standing up for education for all.

Grammar schools are not the only way the Tories are bringing division

back into our society. They are also using the tried and tested tricks of

demonising and scapegoating to distract from their fingers. Whether

it is single mothers, unemployed people, disabled people or migrants,

Tory failure is always someone else's fault. And those smears have

consequences, from children being bullied in school to attacks on the

street such as the rise in disability hate crime. I am so proud

of this party. In the last year we have stood up to the government on

cuts to disabled people's benefits and cuts to Working Families Tax

Credits. And on Monday our Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, Debbie

Abrahams, announced we would be scrapping the punitive sanctions

regime and the degrading work capability assessment.

As politicians and citizens, we have zero tolerance towards those who

whip out division. Stand together against racism, Islamophobia and

anti-Semitism. And we defend those being demonised. It's been shaming

to our multicultural society that assaults on migrants have increased

sharply since the referendum campaign. A campaign that peddled

myths and would top division. It isn't migrants that drive down

wages, it's exploitative employers. And the politicians who deregulate

the labour market and rip up trade union rights. It isn't migrants who

put a strain on our National Health Service. It only keep going because

of the migrant nurses and doctors who come here, filling the gaps left

by politicians who failed to invest in training. It isn't migrants that

have caused the housing crisis, it is a Tory government that has failed

to build homes. Immigration can certainly put extra pressure on

services. That is why under Gordon Brown Labour set up the migrant

impact fund. To provide extra funding to communities that have the

largest rises in population. A good plan. Very effective. What did the

Tories do? They abolished it. Then they demonise migrants for putting

pressure on services. A Labour government will not offer false

promises on immigration as the Tories have done. We will not sow

division by fanning the flames of fear, we will tackle the real issues

of immigration instead. Whatever the eventual outcome operated

negotiations, we will make the changes that are needed. We will act

decisively to end of the undercutting of workers pay and

conditions through the exploitation of migrant labour and agency

working, which would reduce the number of migrant workers in the

process. And we will ease the pressure on hard-pressed public

services struggling to absorb Tory austerity cuts in communities

absorbing new publications. Labour will reinstate the Migrant Impact

Fund and give extra support to areas of high migration using a Visa levy

for its intended purpose. And we will add a citizenship application

fee to boost the fund. That is the labour way to tackle social tension.

Investment and assistance, not racism and division.

This party campaigned hard to remain in the European Union. But although

most Labour voters backed us, we did not convince millions of natural

labour voters, especially in those parts of the country left behind by

years of neglect under investment and deindustrialisation. Now we have

to face the future together. They are not helped by patronising or

lecturing those who voted to leave. We have to hear their concerns about

jobs, public services, wages and immigration. We have to respect

their votes and the decision of the British people. Of course that does

not mean giving it like to Theresa May and her three like a team of

fractures Brexiteers. -- three legged it. But unfortunately, they

have a distraction from that because they have to squabble about whose

turn it is to go to the country retreat each weekend. We have made

it clear that we will resist a Brexit at the expense of workers'

rights and social justice. We will also be pressing our own

Brexit agenda, including the freedom to intervene in our own industries

like steel, without the obligation to liberalise or privatise public

services. And building a new relationship with Europe based on

cooperation and international is. And as Europe places the impact of a

-- face of the impact of a refugee crisis fuelled by wards in the

Middle East, we have to face the role that repeated military

intervention by British and other governments have played in that

crisis. The Chilcot Inquiry made absolutely clear the lessons to be

learned from the disastrous invasion and occupation of Iraq. Just as this

month the Foreign Affairs Select Committee report into the war in

Libya demonstrated, those lessons have still to be learned a decade

later. The impact of those wars has been a spread of terrorism and

violence across an arc of conflict that has displaced millions of

people, forcing them from the countries. That is why I believe it

was right to apologise on behalf of the party for the Iraq war. It was

right to say that we learnt the lessons.

And right to say that such a catastrophe must never be allowed to

happen again. We need a foreign policy based on peace, justice and

human rights. I tell you this today, what great news it is to hear a

peace treaty has been agreed in Colombia after 50 years of

devastating war. And we need to honour our international treaty

obligations on nuclear disarmament as much as we do on human rights and

other things, and encourage others to do the same. But we are a long

way from that humanitarian vision. Britain continues to sell arms to

Saudi Arabia, a country the United Nations says is committing repeated

violations of international humanitarian law, war crimes in

Yemen. And on Sunday it was good to stand alongside the Yemeni community

here in Liverpool, who endorsed our call to end arms sales to Saudi

Arabia. Just as the war crimes that are going on in other places, such

as Syria. There has to be a political solution to the conflicts.

Today, I make it clear that under a Labour government, when there are

credible reports of human rights abuses, or war crimes being

committed, British arms sales will be suspended, starting with Saudi

Arabia. Last year the votes we needed to win

power went many different ways in all parts of our country, web

millions of our potential voters stayed at home -- where millions.

Many did not believe we offered an alternative, and it is too there is

an electoral mountain to climb, but if we focus everything on the needs

and aspirations of middle and lower income families, ordinary families

-- it is true. If we demonstrate we have a viable alternative to the

other man's failed policies I'm convinced we can build the electoral

support that can be the Tories -- to the government's failed policies.

This means... APPLAUSE This means being the voice of women,

young people, pensioners, middle and lower income workers, the employed,

unemployed, self-employed, everyone struggling to get on and secure a

better life for themselves and their families and their communities.

Running like a golden thread through Labour's vision for today as

throughout our history is the struggle for equality. Rampant

inequality has become the great scandal of our time, sapping the

potential of our society, tearing at its fabric, Labour's goal is not

just greater equality of wealth and income, it is also about power. Our

aim is ambitious, we want a new settlement for the 21st century, in

politics, business, our committees, with the environment and in our

relationships with the rest of the world -- communities. Everyone in

the Labour Party is motivated by the gap of what our country is and what

it could be. APPLAUSE We know that in the sixth largest

economy in the world the food banks, stunted life chances and growing

poverty alongside wealth on and on dreamt of scale, are remarkably

shameful and totally unnecessary failure. -- are a mark of a

shameful. We know how great this country could be for all its people

with a new political and economic settlement. With new forms of

democratic public ownership, driven by investment in the technology and

industries of the future, with decent jobs, education and housing

for everyone, with local services run by and for people. Not

outsourced to faceless corporations. This is not backward looking, this

is very much the opposite. It is a socialism of the 21st-century.

CHEERING Our job is now to win over the

unconvinced of our vision, only that way can we secure the Labour

government we need. Let's be frank, no one will be convinced of a

promoted a divided party, we all agree on that. So I ask each and

everyone of you do except the decision of the members, and the

trench warfare, and work together to take on the Tories. -- to accept the

decision of the members. Conference, anything else is a

luxury that the millions of people who depend on Labour cannot afford.

We know there will be local elections next May in Scotland,

where we won three council by-elections in the summer, in

Wales, and thank you Labour Scotland, and in Wales and across

the counties in England and there will be mayor elections as well,

including right here on Merseyside. Where my good friend Steve will be

standing as the Labour candidate. CHEERING

Steve, best of luck. I will miss your comradeship and humour and your

criticism and your wonderful sport. -- support. APPLAUSE

And on the same day we will be electing Andy Burnham in Manchester

and John Simon in Birmingham. Three big Labour factories on the

same day, are we agreed on that? CHEERING

-- Victor Ruiz. -- three big Labour victories. But we could also face a

general election next year. Whatever the Prime Minister says about snap

elections, there is every chance Theresa May will cut and run for an

early election. So today we put ourselves on notice, Labour is

preparing for a general election in 2017.

And we hope and expect all our members to support our campaign, and

we will be ready for the challenge whenever it comes.

Let's do it. Let's do it and be ready for that challenge. Let's do

it in the spirit of the great Scots born Liverpool football manager Bill

Shankly. Sorry, Andy, I know you support Everton, but don't go. You

will like it, it's OK. The socialism I believe in is everybody working

for the same goal and everybody having a share in the rewards. That

is how I see football and that is how I see life.

We are not all Bill Shanklys and each of us comes to our socialism

from our own experiences. Mine was shaped by my mother and father, a

teacher and an engineer, both very committed socialists and peace

campaigners, my mother's inspiration was to encourage girls to believe

they could achieve anything in their lives. And I've met some of the

pupils she taught. She inspired so many girls to take up science and

engineering because of her example. In my experience working as a

volunteer teacher in Jamaica when I was a young man, it taught me so

much about the strength of communities living in adversity and

showing the most amazing solidarity to each other in poverty and in Rome

at communities and determined to achieve something collectively good

for the entire community -- and in remote communities. APPLAUSE

And later I spent years as a union organiser representing low paid

workers, fighting for the national minimum wage and fighting for decent

wages and conditions, unions make us strong, but also it is the

determination of people to be strong for themselves and above all strong

for each other which shakes my politics and my values. -- shapes.

As the great American poet Langston Hughes put it. I see, that's my own

hands can make, the world that's in my mind. Everyone here and everyone

of our hundreds of thousands of members has to contribute to our

cause and that is why we will unite, build on our policies and take our

vision out to a country is crying out for change. We are half a

million of us and there will be many more, working together to make our

country the place it could be, conference United, we can shape the

future, and build a fairer Britain in a peaceful world. Thank you.

STUDIO: That is Jeremy Corbyn, speaking for just about an hour,

setting out his vision for the future of the Labour Party. He

didn't dwell on the events which have been happening with the

leadership election apart from the beginning. He laid out a fairly

detailed set of proposals for what he would like from a future Labour

government, and he declared he was putting the Labour Party on a

general election footing and he expects it next year. Tom Harris,

what did you make of it? His delivery has improved, no mistakes.

Last year he came across an instruction from one of his speech

writers which he just read out, said strong message here, that did not

happen here, that would have been funny. He still has an odd way of

delivering some lines where he gets quite angry in the middle of a

sentence and it isn't really appropriate, but the overall message

that struck me, this is a message to the Labour Party, he was speaking to

the hall and the unions, the number of times he mentioned the growth of

membership of the party, the importance of unity, and there

wasn't much else for the masses be on the walls of Liverpool. --

beyond. Do you think that is fair, Severin? Tony Blair used to go on

for ages with his soaring flights of fancy, but he was speaking to the

country, arguably. Rather than the conference. That sounded as if it

was more spoken to Labour Party members. Indeed, and also mostly

English Labour Party members, the vast majority of policies were to do

with English policy, some to do with Wales, there wasn't much reflection

of devolution across the UK, and I also felt there was a lack of a big

idea. There was no actual energy, no emotional or political energy other

than reflecting a series of policy positions which we know he already

holds. I'm completely unclear as to why there should be a general

election next year, on what basis? The biggest challenge facing the UK

and the Tory party is organising Brexit and trying to get the

mechanism going. I think that is a dog whistle to the party. He is

trying to make the party feel they have something to get involved with,

but I'm not entirely sure that is a real proposition, I'm afraid. That

is maybe part of the strategy of unity, the one way of getting unity

in any party as riveting as the Labour Party is to get them to focus

on the common enemy and the best way of doing that... He was pretty

explicit about that. Yes, he said unite to get to a general election.

He said the market system no longer works, as well, which is interesting

because he didn't come up with an alternative and he didn't say... I

was going to ask, we said he was going to need to appeal to people

who voted Tory in the last election, but in the list of polish -- policy

measures, is there anything which can win over people who voted Tory

at the last election? About 90% of it is fluff and vague with policy

speeches, it is not blood and soil socialism which we think is going to

come out, much of it is quite... We have got to make peace and justice

part of our foreign policy, no one can disagree with that. Plenty in

that that former Conservative voters might say, I don't have any

objection to getting rid of poverty and homelessness, but there were no

specifics that would take people's imagination and get their attention

to say this is a party worth supporting. We will be back to you

very shortly. Our westminster correspondent

David Porter was in That speech has just finished and it

went down very very well in the hall, and it went down very well,

pressing buttons that would appeal to the people at the conference, the

things about human rights and the plans to build more council houses

and also the immigration section, as well, where he said further

resources would be given to local authorities to look at bringing

people who come to this country and making sure that local authorities

have the right number of resources to deal with them. It went down very

well in the hall, but one thing that struck me, it was very hard to find

any reference to Scotland. The reference to Scotland included

praise for bars go City Council, for the work they've done, and quoting a

phrase from Bill Shankly -- Glasgow City Council. What I thought was

quite interesting from a Scottish perspective, no mention of Kezia

Dugdale and I think that is telling in its absence. Was it

inspirational, do you think? Or is the whole point about Jeremy Corbyn,

that he is deliberately not inspirational? He wants to get away

from the old politics. It is typical Jeremy Corbyn, he has his old

rhetorical style, not the set piece conference tie we have become used

to from Labour leaders and it was 1 million miles away from style

content and politics from one Tony Blair. But it was using images and

the language that Jeremy Corbyn feels confident with. I don't think

you could have repackaged him a different way, this was the kind of

conference speech he wanted to make and that was using the language that

he feels comfortable with, talking about the issues he feels

comfortable with. But towards the end he put his party on a general

election footing saying he thought there would be a general election in

2017 and he used that phrase about trench warfare, saying divided

parties did not win, so he was putting his party are on and -- on a

general election footing and he was also saying if there's a possibility

of that, may not like me but you have got to back me for that

campaign. We can go to the family, he led Jeremy Corbyn's campaign in

Scotland. -- we can go to Neil Findlay. What happened to Scotland?

There was maybe some talk that Jeremy Corbyn did not win the

election here. We do not have official figures from the party,

they never divided it down on that basis before and I don't know if

they are going to do that again, but our internal telephone canvassing

and work suggested he won by around 60 two 40 in Scotland, and if you

think about this logically, when I took part in a leadership election

in Scotland, membership was down to around 40,000 a couple years ago,

but membership is now around 25,000 -- was down to around 14,000. The

majority who joined in the last couple of years were Owen Smith

supporters, that idea, I think that is a bit wide of the mark. Clearly

and very publicly, the leadership of the Scottish Labour Party, Kezia

Dugdale in the ticket, is not very pro-Jeremy Corbyn -- Kezia Dugdale

in particular. You hoping that you can start a Jeremy Corbyn movement

in Scotland which can take the Labour Party? LAUGHTER

I'm Labour through and through and I want the Labour Party to go forward,

getting many more members, I think it is great that membership is

growing and that we are now increasing and have almost doubled

membership in Scotland in the last couple of years, that is a very good

thing. No takeovers and no division, moving forward, we are progressive,

democratic socialist agenda, that we can start to convince people that

they should be coming back to Labour in Scotland. It has been pointed out

there was very little in the speech that he made about Scotland. Many of

the detailed proposals were only applying to England. Would it be

your aspiration that Scottish Labour should have a programme that is more

like the programme Jeremy Corbyn has down south than it is at the moment?

If you look at the manifesto we had at the Scottish elections it was a

very progressive manifesto, that probably a few years ago would never

have been written, and I was very proud to stand on that manifesto.

The policies for the Scottish Labour Party, anti-austerity and anti-cuts,

we are delivering in Parliament, opposing the SNP's cuts to the NHS,

they are very much in line with what Jeremy Corbyn is saying to the UK.

You are happy for Kezia Dugdale to continue with the same ideas she has

at the moment? We can continue those ideas further, the manifesto was

good, Kezia Dugdale has said we will not be abandoning that manifesto,

and that is a good thing. And that we should develop it further and

develop our arguments further because the Scottish people will

need a strong Labour Party providing a progressive alternative to the

SNP's cuts agenda. One small problem, you were thumped in the

election. We did. If the manifesto was so brilliant, why did you get

thumped? The idea that we got thumped because of the manifesto

alone is fanciful, the Labour Party's problems in Scotland are

lengthy and have been around or in the making for very long time and I

don't think the manifesto was the cause of in Scotland. There are many

other factors. -- the cause of defeat in Scotland. Do you see any

way back for Labour in Scotland and what would they need to do to become

the sort of party that it was even 20 years ago? We have got to be

credible and we have got to present a credible team and a credible

manifesto of ideas that we take forward, and... You set the

manifesto did not matter, you were thumped out that was not because of

the manifesto. But we need that programme so that we can offer an

alternative to the SNP and the Tories, and arguing that message

through the media and social media, getting out there, in the last few

weeks we have been winning council by-elections and quite famously

defeating Nicola Sturgeon's father. These things are good for us, we

need to build on this and take this message forward. How would you reply

to critics of your wing of the party, who say despite these good

council elections victories, that Labour led by Jeremy Corbyn is, to

use the words of Kezia Dugdale, has little or no chance of being

elected? And that you have just voted for years of oblivion for a

party which you think can actually do something to change the country.

You have given the Tories the game, set and match, effectively. I reject

that absolutely outright. Politics across the western world is very

unpredictable at the moment and I've already seen newspaper columnists

saying that very thing. Alerting people to not be writing off the

Labour Party because the state of the economy and the state of

politics across Western Europe. I think it would be a very foolish

person to write us off. Thanks for joining us. A final word from Tom

and Severin, what would your replied -- replied the two Jeremy Corbyn

supporters, -- what would your replied the two Jeremy

look at what is happening to the Socialist party in France and in

Spain, they say that in Britain, the social Democratic party is the

biggest political party in your, and on the one hand people say they

can't be elected, but they are also keeping social democracy going which

is not happening in other places -- the biggest little party in Europe.

Because of this abrupt movement of the left, I think what we have come

to know as social democracy in Britain doesn't look much like

social democracy, social democracy is a except those of a mixed economy

and that you use the market and exploit the market for social ends

stashed -- accept. Jeremy, did not say anything which contradicted

that? It is his record. If he could erase everything he said over the

last 30 years he would be a much better leader and more credible, but

if you look at what he has said over the years, and I'm not even talking

about his support for the IRA, but his support for full-blown

socialism, high taxation, it is very old school. He would say, give me a

break. " I'm trying my best. I'm not denying I was a left winger, but

what being a socialist has changed and I have changed with it and he

would say he can't get anywhere if you keep dragging things up from the

past. The last election was only a year ago and in that general

election people voted for David Cameron's Conservatives and what we

are now being asked to believe by the Labour Party is that that

happened because those people who voted for David Cameron thought the

Labour Party wasn't left-wing enough and that if we were left-wing enough

they would vote for us instead of the David Cameron, it makes no

sense. The hard left of the Labour Party have been using this since the

1970s. Do you accept that? Or is there any sense that maybe something

is happening? Labour Party is now the biggest party in Western Europe.

The polls don't look very good for Jeremy Corbyn at the moment, but

they are just starting. Labour lost in 2015 because they also lost, red

hands of Lee in Scotland to the SNP, that the first thing. -- they also

lost comprehensively. They lost wholesale in Scotland to Nicola

Sturgeon. When the interesting point about that interview just now, when

he spoke about the bounce in support for the Labour Party under Jeremy

Corbyn, his bike about the increase in membership from 14,000 to 25,000

-- he spoke. That is a pretty modest number. Compared to Labour in

England. Quite. There are two Labour Party 's and two challenges, and the

questions that Jeremy Corbyn is addressing not the same questions

that Kezia Dugdale is going to have to address, and in that sense his

importance, what is significant about him, very subtle in Scotland.

He has got to rebuild the party and rebuild their confidence but he will

not make a huge impact on till he does that. We have got to leave it

there. Join us for First Minister's

Questions tomorrow on BBC2