LONDON: The leader of Britain's Labour opposition on Sunday warned the party to keep its feet on the ground as it eyes a return to power after more than a decade out of office.
Keir Starmer's words of caution came as deputy leader Angela Rayner kicked off what could be the party's last annual conference before the next general election, with a raft of pledges to strengthen workers' rights.
She said Labour would put legislation before parliament to give workers a better deal including abolishing fire and rehire policies by employers, which often see staff taken back on worse terms.
"Our movement has never been so unified, so focussed around one aim -- to give Britain its future back," Rayner told the conference.
Labour has enjoyed double-digit poll leads for months and has been buoyed by a big local election win in Scotland on Thursday.
But Starmer said the party would not be taking anything for granted.
The conference comes as Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's government has been battling stubbornly high inflation, a cost of living crisis and strikes across the economy including the state-run National Health Service.
Starmer announced a £1.5 billion plan to tackle NHS waiting lists that have ballooned due to the impact of the strikes on top of a huge Covid pandemic backlog.
The plan, which Starmer outlined in an interview with The Sunday Mirror, would create an estimated 2.2 million NHS appointments a year.
Starmer, 61, will be looking to come out of the four-day event in Liverpool with the party's poll lead intact, even strengthened, after last week's Conservative party conference was overshadowed by infighting and the downgrading of a high-speed rail project.
"We're the party of change in Britain. We're the party of change right across the whole country," Starmer said after Sunak's claim that only the Tories offer change -- despite being in power for 13 years.
Labour last held the keys to 10 Downing Street in 2010, when Gordon Brown was prime minister, and is readying itself to govern again following a general election that must be held by January 2025 at the latest.
Labour's elder statesman Peter Mandelson praised Starmer for making Labour electable once more.
He said he had brought the Labour Party "across the line from being weird to being normal again". — AFP
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