Starmer’s ‘Plan For Change’: how we’re checking the government’s progress

The Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has detailed a series of commitments—or “milestones”—in a major speech today unveiling the government’s new “Plan for Change”.

The speech, which has been heavily trailed in recent days, included pledges on the economy, policing, education, housing, energy and the NHS. Some of the goals set out by Mr Starmer featured in Labour’s manifesto ahead of July’s general election, while others appear to be new commitments.

We’re already monitoring the government’s progress towards commitments made in its manifesto in our Government Tracker, which we launched last month. We will be updating this to reflect today’s announcements.

‘Raising living standards in every part of the United Kingdom’ 

As part of its Plan for Change, the government says that it will measure “headline progress” against this pledge through “higher Real Household Disposable Income per person and GDP per capita” by the end of the parliament, and that it will also track GDP per capita at a regional level.

Real Household Disposable Income (RHDI) per person is a commonly used measure of living standards—it has risen in every parliamentary term since records began in 1950, but saw the weakest overall growth during the previous parliament.

GDP per capita refers to the size of a country’s economy divided by its population.

The government has only specified that these measures must be higher at the end of the current parliament (set to be the 2029/2030 financial year)—it has not set out a minimum level of growth.

The Office for Budget Responsibility currently forecasts that RHDI per person will increase by an average of 0.5% a year between 2024/25 and 2029/30. It also forecasts that GDP per capita will increase over this period.

This appears to be a new pledge which wasn’t detailed in the manifesto, and we’ll be adding it to our Government Tracker in due course.

In its Plan for Change the government says it also remains committed to its goal of achieving “the highest sustained growth in the G7”. We’ve written about this pledge in detail in our Government Tracker, and have currently rated it as “Appears off track”.

‘Building 1.5 million homes in England and fast-tracking planning decisions’ 

The government has promised to build 1.5 million homes in England, and to fast-track planning decisions “on at least 150 major economic infrastructure projects”, which it said will be “more than the last 14 years combined”. 

In its manifesto, Labour promised to build 1.5 million homes. We’ve already looked at this pledge, and have currently rated it “Wait and see”, as we don’t yet have data on new homes built under Labour. 

Today’s commitment to deliver “at least 150 major economic infrastructure projects” didn’t feature in Labour’s manifesto, so we’ll take a look at it in our tracker. The government further clarified on its website that this is a promise for “150 planning decisions on major infrastructure projects by the end of this Parliament”. The government said these promises will be achieved by reforms to the planning system—including updates to the National Planning Policy Framework. It also listed other ways it believes these will be achieved, such as via the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, working “in partnership with local leaders, housebuilders and infrastructure developers” and investment into the Affordable Homes Programme. 

‘Ending hospital backlogs’ 

The Plan for Change includes a “milestone” to meet “the NHS standard that 92% of patients should wait no longer than 18 weeks from referral to start consultant-led treatment of non-urgent health conditions” by the end of this parliament. 

This is similar to a commitment in Labour’s manifesto, which we’ve covered in our Government Tracker and have currently rated as “in progress”. The details released today confirm that the government intends to meet the 92% target, already enshrined in the NHS Constitution, no later than 2029—the earlier manifesto commitment hadn’t put a timeframe on the pledge. 

We have said previously that the government faces a significant challenge to meet this standard in that time.

‘Putting police back on the beat’ 

The Plan for Change also reaffirms Labour’s manifesto commitment to introduce a Neighbourhood Policing Guarantee. This will be done by placing 13,000 additional police officers, Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) and special constables into neighbourhood policing roles across England and Wales.

The government says this will ensure police forces protect neighbourhood policing teams so that members are not pulled off duty to plug shortages elsewhere, and that it will also deliver a named, contactable officer for every neighbourhood and crack down on antisocial behaviour. 

Police officers will have new enforcement options, such as Respect Orders which were announced last month and are covered in our Government Tracker, to deal with persistent offenders. 

Although the headline figure is 13,000 additional officers, the home secretary Yvette Cooper said in 2023 that only 3,000 would be new and fully-warranted, with the remainder made up of 3,000 existing officers redeployed to neighbourhood teams, 4,000 newly recruited PCSOs and 3,000 new volunteer special constables. Speaking on Sky News this morning, Ms Cooper repeated this breakdown but said the government would “work with police forces” and implied the proportions might be subject to change. 

We will be looking at this pledge in more detail and will update our Government Tracker when we have done so. 

‘Giving children the best start in life’ 

The Plan for Change sets a target for “a record 75% of 5-year-olds in England ready to learn when they start school”. This promise didn’t feature in Labour’s manifesto, although it did say “too many children arrive at primary school not ready to learn”. 

The government said today that progress on this pledge will be measured “through 75% of 5-year-olds reaching a good level of development in the Early Years Foundation Stage assessment … by 2028”. 

This assessment is a measure of a child’s development at the end of the year in which they turn five (typically in reception year). Children are assessed against 17 goals, across areas of learning such as communication and language, social development, literacy and mathematics. 

In 2023/24, 67.7% of children had a ‘good level of development’—this is the measure the government has referenced in its Plan for Change. 

The government said its “first step for the opportunity milestone” to be achieved is recruiting 6,500 extra teachers. We’ve already looked at a similar manifesto pledge from Labour on this, though it has previously specifically promised these teachers would be “expert teachers in key subjects”. Today, the government said these would be “6,500 extra teachers focussing on subjects with shortages and areas with the biggest recruitment challenges”. 

It has also included expanded childcare support and offering “sustained professional development” among policies it said will help reach the development target. 

‘Securing home-grown energy’ 

The Plan for Change also includes a “milestone” to “secure our energy supply with home-grown, clean power”. It says the government will measure this “by being on track to achieving at least 95% of low carbon generation by 2030 in line with advice from the National Energy System Operator (NESO)”. 

Labour’s manifesto commitment for “clean power by 2030” referred to a “zero-carbon electricity system”, and some—including the Conservatives—have said the new pledge represents a watering down of that commitment. Asked about this after his speech however, Mr Starmer insisted the clean energy “mission” hadn’t changed. We’re currently looking into this further and will be examining both the original and new commitments, adding updates on the government’s progress to our tracker in due course.