I'd actually like to start by something very simple. Thank you. Thank to you, our party, our members, supporters, the people who week in, out do the work, take the but don't often get the credit. you, the Labour party for giving the extraordinary privilege of leading you past 12 years.
I know I a lot older. That's what being of the Labour party does to . Actually, looking round some of you a lot older. That's what having as leader of the Labour party to you. Nobody knows that better, course, than John Prescott, my deputy last twelve years, author of "traditional in a modern setting".
I may taken New Labour to the country; was you that helped me take to the party, so thank you. something I don't say often enough - you to my family.
It's of course after you thank the , you thank your agent and yes do want to thank my agent Burton and through him the wonderful of Sedgefield. When I went to to seek the nomination, just before 1983 election, I was a kind refugee from the London-based politics of time. And I remember I knocked John Burton's door. He said "come ; but shut up for half an , we're watching Aberdeen in the Cup ' Cup final". And I sat in company of the most normal people had met in the Labour party. they taught me that most of isn't about politics, in the sense meetings, and resolutions, speeches or even sometimes. It starts with people.
It's friendship, and art, and culture, and . It's about being a fully paid member of the human race before a fully paid up member of Labour party.
But above all else, want to thank the British people. just for the honour of being minister but for the journey of that we have travelled together. Leaders but in the end it's the who deliver.
In the last few I've seen new hospitals like University in London, the new Queen Elizabeth planned in Birmingham or Whiston Hospital Knowsley, where I laid the foundation . But without the talents and dedication the National Health Service staff, they be just empty shells.
It is efforts which have cut waiting, improved , transform and save tens of thousands lives every day. Thank you.
And in government of course can help in place the new academy in or the ground-breaking Education Village in which I have visited recently.
But 's the commitment and love of learning their teachers and their pupils, and support of parents, which have given country the best educated children in history. To them, too, thank you.
what about this wonderful city of ? A city transformed. A city that what a confident, open, and proud with a great Labour council can for themselves. So thank you ....
1994, I stood before you for first time and I shared with the country's anger at crumbling school , patients languishing, sometimes dying in pain, for operations, of crime doubled, of repossessed, of pensioners living in poverty; I told you of our dismay four election defeats and how it not us who should feel betrayed the British people.
That such a seems so dated today is not the passage of time but through .
In 1997, we faced daunting challenges. and bust economics. Chronic under-investment in public services. Social division, with millions in poverty, including over 3 million at that time. And more than this, a country culturally, socially behind. black ministers and never a black minister. Parliament, supposedly the forum of people, with only one in 10 MPs. Gay people denied equal rights. unionists able to be sacked for a trade union. Workers on £1.20 hour, legally. London the only major city in the world without city . Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland all run Whitehall. Inner cities depleted, a refuge the dispossessed.
This was a country for change. And now, for all remains to be done, just for moment dwell on what has been . The longest period of sustained economic in British history. Mortgage repossession, like unemployment, terms we have to be of. The last NHS winter crisis - years ago. Heart patients wait average less than three months. Cancer - down by 43,000. Today you more likely to see a new building than a crumbling one. There virtually no long- term unemployed.
Today ask: can we meet our ambitious on child poverty when, before 1997, idea of a child poverty target have been laughable? We have black and the first woman and then first black woman leader of the . Not enough women MPs but twice there were. A London mayor, thankfully again. Devolution in Scotland and Wales. not just this. Free museum entry has seen a 50% rise in . Banning things that should never have allowed: handguns, cosmetic testing on animals; farming, blacklisting of trade unionists and summer next year, smoking in public . And allowing things that should never been banned: the right to roam; right to request flexible working; civil for gay people. And in 2012 is London that will host the games.
Of course, the daily coverage politics focuses on the negative. But a step back and be proud: is a changed country. Above all, is progressive ideas which define its . That is the real result of third term victory.
And there’s the having to pretend they love it . Bank of England independence, they never in 18 years, the minimum wage, told us would cost a million . Help for the world's poor that cut. Now t hey fall over saying how much they agree with .
Don't lose heart from that; take from it. We have changed the of political debate. This Labour government been unique. First time ever two terms; now three. So why? And ? Because we faced out to the , not in on ourselves. We put party at the service of the . Their reality became our reality. Their , our worries.
We abandoned the ridiculous, -imposed dilemma between principle and power. We back to first principles, our values, real values, those that are timeless, separated them from doctrine and dogma had been ravaged by time. In so, we freed Britain at long from the reactionary choice that dominated politics for so long: between individual and a caring society. We proved economic efficiency and social justice are opposites but partners in progress. We conventional political wisdom and thereby we it. Around that we built a political coalition.
The USP of New is aspiration and compassion reconciled. We out not just to those in or need but those who are well but want to do better; on the way up, ambitious for and their families. These are our too. Not to be tolerated for reasons. But embraced out of political . The core vote of this party is not the heartlands, the inner , not any sectional interest or lobby.
core vote is the country. It they who made us change. The of the Labour party of 2006 be recognisable to the members of . And they are. Full employment; strong services; tackling poverty; international solidarity. The shouldn't. The trouble was for a time they were.
In the 1960s, -reading the cabinet debates of In Place Strife, everyone was telling Harold Wilson to push it. They said it divisive, unnecessary, alienated core support. In end he gave up but so the public on Labour.
Even in , the Labour government spent two years shipbuilding and the public spent two wondering why.
In the 1980s, council sales had first been suggested by people. It was shelved. Too difficult. divisive. We lost a generation of working class people on the back it.
In the 1980s we should been the party transforming Britain. We 't. The lesson is always the same. unrelated to modern reality are not electorally hopeless, the values themselves become . They have no purchase on the world.
We won in the end because we surrendered our values but we finally had the courage to true to them.
Our courage in gave the British people the courage change. That's how we won. 10 after, government takes its toll. It . It's in the nature of the .
In the harsh climate of the /7 media, in which gossip and controversy so much more newsworthy than real , people forget.
I spoke to a the other day, a part-time worker, about the amount of her tax . I said: hold on a minute: 1997, there were no tax credits for working families not for any ; child benefit was frozen; maternity pay what it is; maternity leave likewise, leave didn't exist at all. And minimum wage, no full time rights part time workers, in fact nothing. " what?", she said "that's why we you. Now go and sort out tax credit." And, of course, she's .
In government you carry each hope; disillusion. And in politics it's always the next challenge. The truth is, can't go on forever. That's why is right that this is my conference as Leader. Of course it hard to let go. But it also right to let go. For country, and for you, the party.
the coming months, I will take the changes I have worked on hard these past years. And I try to help build a unified with a strong platform for the legacy that has ever mattered to - a fourth term election victory allows us to keep on changing for the better. And I want heal. There has been a lot talk of lies and truths these few weeks. In any relationship at top of any walk of life isn’t always easy, least of all politics which matters so much and is conducted in such a piercing .
But I know New Labour would have happened, and 3 election victories never have been secured, without Gordon . He is a remarkable man. A servant to this country. And that the truth. So now, 10 years , this party faces together the real of leadership: not about what we've in the past; but what we achieve for Britain's future.
Not just do we win again; but how Britain carry on winning? I won't leading you in the next election. I've sat in the hot seat 10 years. Here's my advice.
The of the challenges now dwarf what faced in 1997. They are different, , bigger, hammered out on the anvil forces, global this time in nature, the world.
In 1997 the challenges faced were essentially British. Today they essentially global.
The world today is vast reservoir of potential opportunity. New in things like environmental technology, the industries, financial services. Cheap goods and . The internet. Extraordinary advances in science technology.
In 10 years we will nothing of school-leavers going off to anywhere in the world.
But with opportunities comes huge insecurity. In 1997 barely mentioned China. Not any more. year China and India produced more than all of Europe put together. years ago, energy wasn't on the . The environment an also-ran. 10 years , if we talked pensions we meant . Immigration was hardly raised. Terrorism meant IRA.
Not any more. We used feel we could shut our front on the problems and conflicts of wider world. Not any more. Not globalisation. Not with climate change. Not organised crime. Not when suicide bombers and bred in Britain bring carnage the streets of London in the of religion. And when a speech the Pope to an academic seminar Bavaria leads to protests in Britain. question today is different to the we faced in 1997. It is we reconcile openness to the possibilities globalisation, with security in the face its threats. How to be open yet secure.
And again, there is third way. Some want a fortress - job protection, pull up the , get out of international engagement. Others no option but to submit to forces and let the strongest survive.
answer has to be very clear. is, once again, to help people a changing world by using collective to advance opportunity and provide security all.
To reconcile openness and security once we reconciled aspiration and compassion, as enemies but as partners in .
The British people today are reluctant citizens. I want them to be ones. The danger in all of , for us, as a party, is ditching New Labour. The danger is to understand that New Labour in won't be New Labour in 1997.
years ago I would have described -linking the basic state pension with earnings "Old Labour". Our aim is by , but by the end of the parliament at the latest, to do . Has Rodney Bickerstaffe has become New ? Or have I become Old Labour?
years ago, if you had asked to put environmental obligations on business, would have been horrified. Now I'm it.
I would have baulked at on advertising junk food to children. I say unless a voluntary code , we will legislate for it.
10 ago I parked the issue of power. Today, frankly, I believe without , we are going to face an crisis and we can't let that .
Over the next year we are every aspect of our economic policy, because we were wrong in the , but because whether in tax and , regulation, planning, enterprise, the question is about our competitiveness in the last years, but in the next 10.
financial services and the City of ; the creative industries and modern manufacturing. to be the world's number one for bio-science - if America does want stem-cell research - we do. welcome it here.
And how to transport through road-pricing.
Or skills. A challenge for the nation. I say business: you have a responsibility to your workforce. To trade unions: here the chance to be the learning for the workforce of the next . Take that chance.
Global warming is greatest long-term threat to our planet's . Scarce energy resources mean rising prices will threaten our country's economy.
Do know in 15 years we will from 80% self-sufficient in oil and to 80% of it imported.
We therefore the most radical overhaul of policy since the war.
We will the amount of energy from renewable fivefold; we will ensure every major in the country has a responsibility greenhouse gas emission reduction; we will investment in clean technology, including clean ; and we will make sure that new home is at least 40% energy efficient.
We will meet our targets. In fact we will meet by double the amount; and we take the necessary measures, step by by step, to meet one of most ambitious targets on the environment anywhere in the world - a % reduction in emissions by the year .
And again in the future, as live longer, we can't afford good and help for disabled people who 't work, with 4 million people on , many of whom could work. Almost million less than there were. But too many.
That is why we more radical welfare reform, that’s why need to get more disabled people, lone parents, more on unemployment benefit, work. And the reason for it not to destroy the welfare state, to preserve it.
And why is so important in public services? Look the past 10 years Britain has more in our public services than comparable nation in the world. We near the bottom in Europe, we’re at the average and we got in a decade.
300,000 more workers, the money going in, 25% more in real terms and the largest hospital programme; that is an NHS re-built not privatised.
Refurbishing and rebuilding state secondary school in the country. ,000 more classroom assistants, 36,000 more teachers, also up 17% in real terms. isn't about privatising state education; it's producing the best school results ever our country’s future needs..
But what ? Expectations rise. People today want power their own hands. Two thirds of country has access today to the . Millions of people are ordering flights books or other goods on-line, talk their friends on-line, download music, all it when they want to, not the shop or the office is . This Google generation has moved beyond idea of 9-5, closed on weekends bank holidays. Today's technology is profoundly .
Of course public services are different. values are different. But today people 't accept a service handed down from high. They want to shape it their needs, and the reality of lives.
The same global forces that changing business are at work in services too. New ways of treating. ways of teaching. New technologies.
There be no selective trust schools or academies. But if, as at the I visited in Lewisham, good GCSE are doubled in a year, and school once under-subscribed, now five times -subscribed, how is that a denial of service values? Surely it is the vivid affirmation of them.
And if old age pensioner who used to 2 years for her cataract operation gets it on the NHS in independent treatment centre, in 3 months, at the point of use, that not damaging the values of National Service; it is fulfilling its purpose.
advice: at the next election, the will not only be who is to invest in our public services, though that will be. It will who comes first. And our answer to be: The patient; the parent.
the 18 weeks maximum for waiting the NHS with an average of weeks from the door of the to the door of the operating . Booked appointments. That is the end waiting in the NHS. Historic.
Transforming schools in the way we have for our primary schools. Schools with quarters of children getting good results norm. That would be historic. Both within reach.
Do this and we have earned the right to be of our public services for the generation. If we fail, and without we will, then believe me: change still be done; but in a way by a Conservative Party. I change true to progressive values, done a fourth term Labour Government.
I said the Home Office was the job in government. It hasn't got . We should get a few facts . Under this government, crime has fallen risen. We are the only government the war to do it. Asylum are dealt with faster, removals are , the system infinitely better than the we inherited in 1997.
But the is that the world is changing fast that the reality we are with - mass migration, organised crime, -social behaviour - is simply engulfing systems were designed for a time gone .
30 million people now come to every year. Visitors, tourists, workers, students. our economy needs them. 227 million through our airports. Yet we have means of checking who is here . The fundamental dilemma is this: how we reconcile liberty with security in new world?
Let me say something you: I don't want to live a police state, or a Big society or put any of our freedoms in jeopardy. But because our of liberty is not keeping pace change in reality, these freedoms are jeopardy.
When a crime go unpunished, is a breach of the victim's and human rights.
When you have crime gangs free to practice their , countless young people have their liberty often their lives damaged.
When anti-social goes unchecked, each and every member the community in which it happens their human rights broken.
When we 't deport foreign nationals even when inciting this country is at risk.
Immigration benefited Britain. But I know that we don't have rules that allow some control over who comes in, goes out, who has a right stay and who has not, then of a welcome, migrants find fear.
can only protect liberty by making relevant to the modern world.
That why Identity Cards using biometric technology not a breach of our basic , they are an essential part of to the reality of modern migration protecting us against identity fraud.
A example but an important one: I when I first introduced the DNA . On it go all those who arrested and come into contact with criminal justice system. We were told was a monstrous breach of liberty.
is now matching 3,000 offences a including last year several hundred murders, thousands of rapes and other violent .
Difficult reform, but leading to real in the fight against crime.
In next parliamentary session, the centre-piece will John Reid's immigration and law and reforms. I ask people of all to support them. Let liberty at stand up for the law-abiding citizen this country.
And of course, the anxiety is the global struggle against without mercy or limit.
This is struggle that I believe will last generation and more. But I also this passionately: we will not win we shake ourselves free of the capitulation to the propaganda of the that somehow we are the ones .
This terrorism isn't our fault. We 't cause it. It's not the consequence foreign policy. It's an attack on way of life. It's global. It an ideology. It killed nearly 3,000 including over 60 British on the of New York before the war Afghanistan or Iraq was even thought .
It has been decades growing. Its are in Egypt, Algeria, Indonesia, India, , Turkey. Over 30 nations in the . It preys on every conflict. It every grievance. And its victims are Muslim. This is not our war Islam.
This is a war fought extremists who pervert the true faith Islam. And all of us, Western Arab, Christian or Muslim, who put value of tolerance, respect and peaceful -existence above those of sectarian hatred, should together to defeat it.
It is British soldiers who are sending car into Baghdad or Kabul to slaughter innocent.
They are there along with of 30 other nations with, in case, a full United Nations mandate the specific request of the first democratically elected Governments of those countries order to protect the people against very ideology also seeking the deaths British people in planes across the .
If we retreat now, hand Iraq to Al Qaida and sectarian death and Afghanistan back to Al Qaida the Taleban, we won't be safer; will be committing a craven act surrender that will put our future in the deepest peril.
Of course 's tough. Not a day goes by an hour in the day when don't reflect on our troops with and thanks - the finest, the , the bravest, any nation could hope .
They are not fighting in vain. for this nation's future. But I this is not a conventional war. can't be won by force alone. 's not a clash of civilisations. It's civilisation, about the ideas that shape .
From 9/11 until now I have again and again. If we want values to be the ones that global change, we have to show they are fair, just and delivered an even hand.
From now until leave office I will dedicate myself, the same commitment I have given Northern Ireland, to advancing peace between and Palestine. I may not succeed. I will try because it is in itself and because peace in Middle East is a defeat for terrorism.
We must never again let become the battleground for a conflict neither Israeli or Lebanese people wanted it was they who paid the for it. Peace in Lebanon would a defeat for this terrorism.
Action Africa is a defeat for terrorism. is happening now in the Sudan stand. If this were in the of Europe we would act. Showing African life is worth as much a Western one - that would defeat terrorism too.
Yes it's hard to be America's strongest ally. Yes, can be a political headache for proud sovereign nation like Britain. But me there are no half-hearted allies America today and no semi-detached partners Europe.
And the truth is: nothing strive for, from the world trade to global warming, to terrorism and can be solved without America, or Europe.
At the moment I know only see the price of these . Give them up and the cost terms of power, weight and influence Britain would be infinitely greater. Distance country and you may find it's long way back.
So all these of a magnitude we never dreamt , sweeping the world, are calling for of equal magnitude and vision. All leadership. And here is something else I've learnt. The danger for us is not reversion to the politics the 1980s. It is retreat to sidelines. To the comfort zone. It unconsciously to lose the psychology of governing party. As I said in , courage is our friend. Caution, our .
A governing party has confidence, self-belief. sees the tough decision and thinks should be taking it. It reaches responsibility first. It serves by leading.
most common phrase uttered to me - not at rallies or public but in meetings of chance, quietly, not "I hate you" or "I you" but "I would not have job for all the world".
The people, sometimes, will forgive a wrong . But they won't forgive not deciding. know there’s not some fantasy government nothing difficult ever happens. They've got Lib Dems for that.
Government isn't protests or placards, shouting the odds stealing the scene. It's about the graft of achievement.
There are no -term ever popular governments. So don't ignore polls but don't be paralysed by either.
10 years on, our advantage time, our disadvantage time. Time gives experience. And our capacity to lead greater. Time gives the people fatigue; willingness to be led is less. they will lose faith in us if first we lose faith in .
Polls now are as relevant as year's weather forecast for tomorrow's weather. 's three years until an election. The rule of politics: there are no . You make your own luck. There's rule that says the Tories have to come back. David Cameron's Tories? advice: get after them.
His foreign . Pander to anti-Americanism by stepping back America . Pander to the Eurosceptics isolation in Europe. Sacrificing British influence party expediency is not a policy of a prime minister.
His immigration . Says he'll sort out illegal immigration, opposes identity cards, the one thing to do it.
His energy policy. power "but only as a last ". It's not a multiple choice quiz , Mr Cameron. We need to decide otherwise in 10 or 15 years we will be importing expensive fossil and Britain's economy will suffer.
He tax cuts and more spending, with same money. He wants a bill rights for Britain drafted by a of lawyers. Have you ever tried anything with a committee of lawyers?
of course, the policy for the lady terrorised by the young thug that she should put her arm him and give him a nice, hug. Built to last? They haven't laid the foundation stone. And if can't take this lot apart in next few years we shouldn't be the business of politics at all.
Tories haven't thought it through. They it is all about image. It's we changed our image. We created professional organisation. But I tell you else that’s true. If I'd stood 1997 on the policies of 1987 would have lost. And it's the now. You don’t mind enough talk hung parliaments. The next election won't about image unless we let it . It'll be about who has the , the judgment, the weight and ideas Britain's future in an uncertain world. we do, this party does.
And we show belief in ourselves, the people will feel that belief, they’ll it and they’ll be given confidence it
Something else I've learnt. Politics also about a party's character. And characters are the people in it. I'll give you two examples. Dennis . He’s watching from his sick bed. well soon, Dennis. Never agreed with policy I've done. Never once stopped knowing the difference between a Labour and a Tory one.
People like Anderson, George Howarth, Mike Hall. Good , but I asked them to make . And they did. Without a word bitterness. They never forgot their principles in office; and they never discovered when they left it.
This is party I am proud to lead. the day I was elected until day I leave, they will always and separate us. "He's not Labour." "'s a closet Tory."
In the 1980s things done were necessary for the . That's the truth. Saying it doesn't you a Tory. I'm a progressive.
true believer, the true progressive, believes social justice, in solidarity, in help those not able to help themselves. know the race can't just be the swift and survival for the . But they also know that these , gentle and compassionate as they are, to be applied in a harsh, world and that what makes the is not belief alone, but the courage to make it happen.
They I hate this party, and its . I don't. I love this party. 's only one tradition I hated: losing.
hated the 1980s not just for irrelevance but for our revelling in .
And I don't want to win winning's sake but for the sake the millions here that depend on to win, and throughout the world. day this government has been in , every day in Africa, children have who otherwise would have died because country led the way in cancelling and global poverty.
That's why winning . So keep on winning. And do with optimism. With hope in your . Politics is not a chore. It's great adventure of progress. And I 't want to be the Labour leader won three successive elections. I want be the first Labour leader to three successive elections.
So: it's up you. You take my advice. You 't take it. It’s your choice. Whatever do, I'm always with you. Head heart. You've given me all I ever achieved, and all that we've , together, for the country. Next year won't be making this speech. But, the years to come, wherever I , whatever I do. I'm with you. you well. And wanting you to . You're the future now. So make most of it.