David Cameron's speech

David Cameron: Vote Conservative for guaranteed change on Friday

Now some people think that this election, there’s just this evening and then there’s tomorrow and then there’s polling day.

Well that’s not the way it’s going to work for us. I urge you to campaign every minute and every hour that you’ve got left until polling day.

And I can tell you what I’m doing. I’m starting in Scotland then I’m going to be in Cumbria, then in Lancashire, then in Yorkshire, then in Nottinghamshire, then in to Wales, then back to Shropshire then to Bristol. We’re going at it all night, all day, all day next day, all the way through to polling day, that’s how we’re going to win this election.

Oh I missed out the Black Country as well, I’m sorry about that. But we’re going to be where people are working baking the bread, landing the fish, running the emergency services we’re going to be campaigning all night because this election is so important to our country. Just think if the mess that our country is in today. We have got the problems of debt and deficit. We’ve had the longest recession and the deepest recession since the War. When it comes to our society we’ve got more people growing up in homes where nobody works than anywhere else in Europe. And we have the mess, the complete mess of our politics with the shame of the expenses scandal and the fact that so many people are switched off and disillusioned with politics.
So as we go round the country in these last few hours, these last few days we have a very simple message; if you want to wake up on Friday morning with a new Government that has rolled up its sleeves, that is starting to clean up the mess then you have to vote Conservative. Any other vote and you could be stuck with what you’ve got now. Vote Labour and you’re definitely stuck with another five years of Gordon Brown, is that going to solve our problems? If you vote Liberal well what are you going to get? Who knows, Labour someone said, who knows what you’re going to get. One minute they said they would support Gordon Brown then they said well may be they’d support another Labour leader so vote Liberal and may be you get five years of Harriet Harman. May be, may be you get five years of Ed Balls, perhaps you’d even get five years of David Miliband. You might get a Prime Minister who wasn’t even in those television debates, if that is democracy, that’s people power I’m a banana. We’re not having that.

If you vote Conservative you get a new Government on Friday starting to clean up the mess. And let’s just look back at the campaigns we’ve seen from the other parties. What have we had from Labour, what have we had from Gordon Brown apart from the most negative campaign anyone has fought in the history of modern British politics? All he has ever said is talking about cuts this, cuts that and he has made up untruth after untruth. If this is the son of a preacher man I don’t know what we’re hearing. I was told he had a moral compass, I’ve seen the leaflets, they say we’re going to abolish Child Tax Credits, that’s not true. I’ve seen the leaflets saying we’re going to take away from pensioners their Winter Fuel Allowance or their free TV licence, that’s not true. He says these things knowing they are not true.
I was told he had a moral compass, where’s this moral compass been for the last four weeks? I reckon when he finds it will be spinning round so fast he could put it on the roof and it could be a ceiling fan. That’s the sort of moral compass our Prime Minister has got, it’s been the most disgraceful campaign. And I want to say to British people clearly and frankly this; if you are elderly, if you are frail, if you are poor, if you are needy a Conservative Government will always look after you. On the journey we need to take this country on no one will be left behind. And let me say very clearly to pensioners if you have a Conservative Government your Winter Fuel Allowance, your bus pass, your Pension Credit, your free TV licence all these things are safe. You can read my lips, that is a promise from my heart. Don’t believe the lies you’re being told by the Labour Party just because they’ve got nothing positive to say.

And then, and then there’s been the Liberal campaign. Well we’ve learnt a few things about Liberal policy that we didn’t know before, I’m not sure they knew all their policies before. But is it progress to say you’re going to put VAT on new homes and you’re going to take them out of the reach of young people desperate to buy a house? That’s not progress. Is it progress to say no more prison sentences under six months, is that progress? You’re going to say to the burglar and the mugger and the robber you don’t go to prison at all, is that progress? And is it progress when we don’t have control of immigration today to say you’ll give, give an amnesty to the nine hundred thousand people who are here illegally that they can all have a passport, access to benefits, access to council housing and able to bring their relatives here too, is that progress? A vote for the Liberal Democrats is not a vote for the change for the better it is a vote for change for the worse.

But I think my friends we can be proud of our campaign. We have fought a strong and energetic, a positive campaign making the big arguments about the future of this country. The big argument about the future of our economy; here we are in a high end manufacturing business desperate for a Government that wants to help business, wants to get behind business, wants to get our economy growing. And we’re the ones who say cut the wasteful spending this year so we don’t put up the National Insurance and the jobs tax next year. That jobs tax would be an economy killer, a recovery killer a jobs killer. We’ve been wining the big argument on the economy and I believe we’ve been winning the big argument about how we build a stronger society in our country. Yes we need change, and change isn’t just the Government passing laws and issuing regulations and spending money, change is when we recognise we’re all in this together and we’ll only change our country for the better when we involve everyone. We say to the great social enterprises and charities help us to tackle drug abuse. We say to the private training companies come in and train those people who need to work who could work and yes when we say to those who could work who are offered a job and don’t work you cannot go on claiming benefits in Britain under the Conservatives. That’s the message that we should be taking.

But you know what? In the end this election isn’t about individual politicians it isn’t about even individual policies it’s about what you’re fighting for and we’re not really fighting Gordon Brown or Nick Clegg, we’re certainly not fighting Alex Salmond he’s not even standing in this election, that is a point to remember; the SNP are not standing to be in Government they’re standing to be in opposition. And we should say to everyone in Scotland fight to be in the Government of our country making positive decisions about our future.

But we’re not, we are not fighting these other parties what we are fighting is disadvantage, is poverty, is unfairness, is the fact that opportunity is blocked in our country. We’re fighting the fact that people who do the right thing, who work hard, who save, who play by the rules get hit by the system rather than hurt by the system. We in this election are fighting for people, we are fighting for the children growing up in homes where nobody works. We’re fighting for the couple that want to buy a home but can’t afford it. We want to help them. We’re fighting for the parents who want to find a good school for their child and are so frustrated the system won’t deliver it. We’re fighting for the businesses desperate to get their head above water to start making money and start employing people again. We are fighting for the doctor, for the nurse for the teacher covered in red tape who’ve got a great, great vocation and they want to do the job that they love. That’s who we’re fighting for, that’s who we’ve got to win it for.

And we are fighting for the pensioners who are worried to walk the streets, for the people who don’t want to have to sell their homes to pay for care, who’ve done the right thing all their lives and want a Government that backs them. That’s what we’re fighting for. We’re fighting for all of those people, people who are crying out for change after thirteen years of a Government that has wrecked so much of our country. Thirteen years of a Government that sold the gold, that wrecked the pension system, that complicated the tax system, that condemned people to a life on benefits, that doubled the national debt, that gave us record youth unemployment, that boasts that it knows how to run an economy but has brought our economy to its knees.

So as you go out in these last few hours remember who we’re fighting for; all those people who’ve been let down by Labour, all those people who want a Government that just believes in some simple principles. The principle of aspiration: that you should be able to make whatever you can of your talents in this country. The principle of responsibility; that we’re all in this together and we’ll never have a stronger society unless we live up to our own responsibilities. And the principle of giving people power and control over their lives; people in our country are fed up with being bossed and bullied and interfered with by such a top down Government, we say give people more power and control over their lives and they will respond by helping us to build a stronger society. That is what we are fighting for.

This election is not yet decided. There are millions of people up and down this country still making up their mind about which box to put their cross in and we’ve got to say to them if you want change that you know will work, if you want change that can be guaranteed. If you want to take this country in a different direction, if you want to wake up on Friday morning certain that you haven’t got another five years of Gordon Brown and certain you’ve got a new team, a new Prime Minister, a new bunch of leaders, people with the right values, with the right energy, with the right oomph to get our country going, people who can start to clean up the mess on day one on Friday then get out there and vote Conservative, vote for a better Britain, vote for the United Kingdom, vote to keep us together, vote Conservative and we can start the work of rebuilding our economy, our society and cleaning up our political system. Let’s get out there and do it.”