Economy  

Labour must focus on infrastructure and social care to 'fix Britain'

Labour must focus on infrastructure and social care to 'fix Britain'
FT Adviser's Financial Advice Forum focused on the key issues facing advisers and their clients. (Carmen Reichman/FT Adviser)

Infrastructure and social care must be priorities for the Labour government in order to fix 'Broken Britain', advisers have said.

During the FT Adviser Financial Advice Forum, held in London this week (September 24), attendees were invited to take part in a series of interactive polls. 

As the Forum coincided with the Labour Party conference, which was being held in Liverpool, one of the questions asked was 'What should the government rethink as part of its fiscal strategy?'

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More than half of all attendees believed that investing more in infrastructure would help the UK economy, with 54 per cent of poll respondents choosing this option. 

A further 41 per cent of the audience wanted the Labour party to reverse its decision to step back from making changes to social care. 

Only 9 per cent wanted to bring back proposals for the British Isa, which is likely to be scrapped.

FT Adviser readers want Labour to focus on infrastructure

The British Isa had been proposed by former chancellor Jeremy Hunt in the March Budget as a means to encourage retail investors to back British industries, but the idea is expected to be ditched by new chancellor Rachel Reeves after Labour won the July election.

She has already scrapped plans to introduce the social care cap, as well as announcing big cuts to hospital and road projects.

The hard decision was part of plans to plug the £22bn hole in public spending that, she claimed in a July statement, was “covered up” by the Conservative government.

As reported by FT Adviser at the time, she justified the cuts by telling parliament: “If we cannot afford it, we cannot do it.”