24/09/2007

Brown Delivers Speech To Labour Party Conference

Gordon Brown has delivered his first speech to the annual Labour Party conference as Prime Minister, as speculation continues over whether he will call a snap election in the autumn.

Mr Brown's speech at the Bournemouth conference focused on being tough on crime, improving the health service and education and dealing with immigration.

The Prime Minister stressed that he was a "conviction politician" who stood for a "Britain where we all have obligations to each other and by fulfilling them, everyone has a chance to make the most of themselves".

Mr Brown said that he would be concentrating on improving the NHS, as well as creating world-class schools.

He pledged that there would be a 'deep-clean' of hospitals over Christmas and New Year in a bid to wipe out the MRSA bug.

He said that he wanted one-to-one tuition for 600,000 school pupils in English and maths and stressed that there would be free education for all children up to the age of 18.

On crime, Mr Brown stressed that the government was committed to ridding Britain's streets of illegal guns in order to crack down on violent crime.

Mr Brown also pledged that the government would build 240,000 new homes every year in order to help people onto the property ladder.

Speculation has been rife over whether or not Mr Brown will call a snap election.

However, speaking in an interview with the BBC ahead of his speech, Mr Brown said that he was implementing Labour's manifesto from 2005 and added that he did not need to call an election to do so.

(KMcA)

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