Yesterday the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, delivered a Labour budget. People have been asking for Labour’s purpose and values to be more clearly expressed. Through the choices made – a shift to a fairer tax system, targeting wealth to pay for tackling child poverty, good public services and the cost of living – we have clearly set out what we stand for.

That’s why Labour MPs cheered in the Commons, and it’s why we are up for the fights to come. And it’s why the cries from the right began immediately.

The central dividing line in British politics is once again on the economy. On the one side Labour, who want to change it so it benefits ordinary working people, and on the other, our political opponents, who support the status quo and the failed ideology of the past. We must now take on, and win, the argument.

The Tories had 14 years to fix things and instead, by any measure, they got much worse. Their ideological austerity and trickle-down economics – tax breaks for the wealthy, cutting off investment (leaving us with low productivity and wages), and failing to support young people post-Covid – didn’t work.

Living standards fell by the largest margin since records began, child poverty reached record levels, NHS waiting lists in England were the highest they’ve ever been, wages

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