Simon Lightwood MP: Labour will allow us to shape our own future.

Simon Lightwood MP writes: 2022 was a really difficult year for so many struggling through this Tory cost of living crisis.

Sadly, there’s more of the same heading our way, with a distinct lack of hope and optimism in the air, as this Conservative government limps towards the parliamentary finish line, bereft of ideas and the solutions we need.

In contrast, last week, Keir Starmer set out the Labour Party’s new national mission for renewal – for change, to give people hope again.

For too long our economy, our public services, and our communities in Wakefield and across the country have suffered from the sticking plaster politics that has epitomised the past 12 years of Conservative governments.

This short-term mind-set has infected all the institutions which try and fail to run our country from the centre.

Every day, I receive calls, emails and letters from Wakefield constituents which reflect the levels of deterioration in our public services and the level to which people are struggling.

After 12 years of Tory rule, our NHS is on the brink of collapse.

Despite the heroic efforts of its staff, our NHS is buckling under the weight of demand and the chronic mismanagement under the Tories.

People can't get an appointment to see their GP or dentist, and our hospitals are severely understaffed, not to mention exhausted. They are pushed beyond capacity, leaving patients to die without dignity in corridors.

Antisocial behaviour is continuing to blight our communities in Wakefield, with the number of arrests, charges and prosecutions collapsing, despite the determination of officers up and down the country.

Our bus and train services are a lifeline for many, connecting communities, enabling people to get to work and our children to school. But under the Conservatives, services have been decimated, and communities are being let down by unreliable and expensive services.

This cannot go on.

The Labour Party will deliver a new way of governing that will build a fairer, greener, more dynamic country with power closer to people. We will modernise central government, so it becomes dynamic, agile, strategic, and focused. It will listen to the needs of people in Wakefield.

A future Labour government will also introduce a Take Back Control Act in its first King’s speech, as the first step in our plans to oversee the biggest transfer of power from Westminster in our political history.

The Take Back Control Act give cities like Wakefield and towns across our District the tools and power they need to develop credible, long-term growth plans, to support local prosperity and growth.

No more Westminster hoarding power, no more holding back Wakefield’s potential. Labour will allow us to shape our own future.