Miliband pledge to young generation

Sep 29 2012

Ed Miliband has pledged to deliver a brighter future for young people as he kicked off Labour's conference.

Lambasting the coalition Government for having "something against" the next generation, Mr Miliband said they were suffering high unemployment, huge housing costs and tuition fee hikes.

He hinted that his party could go further than its existing commitment to cut the maximum annual university fee from £9,000 to £6,000. He also called for more focus on vocational training and reiterated his desire to see the voting age brought down to 16.

The comments came in a question-and-answer session at the East Manchester Academy before the official opening of Labour's gathering in the city.

Although the party has been riding high in the opinion polls, the leader is under pressure to improve stubbornly poor personal ratings.

The Tories highlighted the problem by releasing Populus research which found that nearly two-thirds of Labour supporters would prefer Mr Miliband's brother David in charge. Some 73% of those questioned agreed that Mr Miliband did not have what it takes to be prime minister in tough economic times, and 72% that he was too weak for the job.