Miliband: I fear for my children
Monday, 23 May 2011 5:21 PM
By politics.co.uk staff
Ed Miliband used his family life to highlight the repercussions of David Cameron's economic programme today, in a decidedly personal keynote speech today.
With both party leaders laying out their policy agenda in competing speeches this morning, Mr Miliband highlighted his wedding this Friday to warn of the future prospects for young people in Britain.
"For us, our boys, Daniel and Sam, will be the most important people at our wedding and I'd like to speak today, not just about them, but about the prospect of their whole generation," he said.
"I am worried - and every parent should be worried - about what will happen to our children in the coming decades. About what the future holds for us, our children and our country, about what sort of place Britain will become."
He added: "It's not enough just to deal with the deficit. Our country will be stronger only if we act to restore the promise of Britain for the next and future generations."
In an extended word play that might make music aficionados wince the Labour leader said that the 'Jam generation' of politicians - those who grew up listening to the band in the 1980's - were in danger of creating a "jilted generation".
"His [the prime minister's] claim to be protecting the next generation by making this his only priority is blown apart because they are bearing so much of the burden for his decisions: from cuts to sure start to the end of educational maintenance allowances to the trebling of tuition fees," he continued.
"The average age of first time buyers was 30 in the mid-1980s. Today, it stands at 37. Our generation of politicians must act soon or people will be waiting until their forties before they buy their first home."
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