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Chris Leslie MP, Labour’s Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, in a speech to Labour’s Conference 2014 in Manchester, said:

Conference – there are just over seven months to go until the election – 225 days.

And when that election comes, there will be so much at stake for the millions of working people who have faced an unprecedented squeeze on their living standards under Cameron and Osborne.

It’s our job to prove that there is a real alternative. That we are up for the task of changing the way government works and standing up for a fairer Britain.

And it’s also our job to hold these Tories to account for the neglect they’ve shown and the distress they have caused, particularly to some of the poorest and most vulnerable in society.

Let’s not forget how appalling their record has been – where after you take account of prices, wages in real terms has fallen by an astonishing £1600 a year. And prices are continuing to rise.

Just take a look at how salaries and incomes have been worn down since the last general election.

Month after month, as prices have gone up, pay packets have failed to keep pace and that gap has just got wider and wider as time goes by.

That’s why for all the talk about GDP growth, for most people life is getting harder.

And these cost of living pressures have struck at the finances of ordinary households in every part of the country and in every region – the weekly shop; on energy bills; the price of the daily commute and the cost of keeping a roof overhead.

Now George Osborne likes to blame everyone else for this unprecedented squeeze on living standards. He’s blamed the weather. The Royal Wedding. He particularly likes to blame Europe.

But the truth is he’s presided over one of the worst records on income growth of any European country – and Britain is now lagging behind.

Only Portugal, Cyprus and Greece have seen real wages erode more severely than we have.

Yet when Osborne and Cameron talk about the economy, they think things are all fine – that everything’s recovering nicely.

In the world that the Prime Minister and the Chancellor inhabit, life is sweet. In fact, if you’re lucky enough to be in the richest one percent of society, your share of the nation’s income has grown considerably – helped along nicely by that cut in income tax for those earning above £150,000.

The problem is, trickle-down economics is just not working for the vast majority of the rest of the country.

For 90% of earners, their share of national income has actually fallen in the past year.

This is the real story.

This is the true record of this Government.

This is the cost of David Cameron.

And what are the prospects for future wages and the cost of living?
The Bank of England have just halved their forecast for wage growth for the rest of this year.

And just imagine how hard-pressed households will react if we get that premature rise in mortgage rates, fuelled by the shortage of affordable housing.

But conference, is it surprising that the Chancellor and the Prime Minister are not concerned?

We know they don’t have to worry about rising fuel bills, in the same way that millions do.

Or rents.

Or falling real wages.

These Tories just don’t understand.

And they never will understand.

Because how on earth could they?

That’s why it’s our duty to stand up for the majority of working people who’ve had enough of Tory trickle-down economics and the cost of Cameron.

And for all the statistics I could quote; for all those who think political parties are all the same – let me explain why this really matters.

It’s about households up and down the country being able to make ends meet.

It’s the difference between being able to afford to put food on the table and not having to rely on food banks.

We need a government that understands that fairness and treating people with dignity is integral to the strength of our economy and our country.

Because a fair society - where a fair day’s work is rewarded with a fair day’s pay - also makes good economic sense too.

And this is where the Tories just don’t get it.

A low wage, low skill economy is a low productivity economy – where working people are demoralised, shunted into zero hours contracts, and where ambition, enterprise and creativity is stifled.

The reason welfare costs and the deficit are still rising isn’t just the price of unemployment; it’s the subsidies that have to be paid in tax credits to top-up low pay endemic across our economy.

A fairer society where everyone can share in growth is in all our best interests.

And that’s why, as Ed has said, the defining challenge of our time is to reconnect the wealth of our country with the finances of individual and families.

The Tories are never going to prioritise those households that have no choice but to worry about the cost of living.

It is the purpose of our Party to stand up for the vast majority of working people and deliver our plan for Britain’s future.

To properly enforce a meaningful minimum wage.

To ban exploitative zero hours contracts.

To incentivise a living wage across the UK.

Conference, if we don’t make it our guiding mission to ensure working people can get a better deal, nobody else is going to do that for us.

On jobs, on wages, on income security and on housing – we either have five more years of Cameron and Osborne, or the chance to make real changes and rebuild a fairer society.

That’s the choice Britain faces in 225 days time.

Ends