DAVID Cameron has made a bold pitch for five more years in power with a proposed tax cut for 30 million Britons, including three million Scots, as he set out a vision to make Britain "a country everyone can be proud to live in".
The Prime Minister sought to match the Liberal Democrats on raising the personal allowance to remove all those on the minimum wage from paying income tax altogether and Labour on scrapping exclusive zero-hours contracts.
He promised to abolish youth unemployment, get more first-time buyers on the housing ladder and ensure the UK's corporate taxes were the lowest in the G20.
The Tory leader also pledged to claw back powers from Brussels, curb immigration from Eastern Europe and abolish the Human Rights Act to win back those traditional Conservatives considering a switch to Ukip. He stressed how come May 7 there was "only one real choice: the Conservatives or Labour; me in Downing Street or Ed Miliband in Downing Street".
In the most emotional part of his 52-minute conference speech, the last before the May General Election, Mr Cameron brought his wife Samantha to tears with a passionate defence of the NHS, which cared for their late son Ivan, attacking Labour for peddling "complete and utter lies" about his party's plans for the health service.
Recalling how he went to hospital night after night with his sick son in his arms, who was cared for lovingly by dedicated NHS staff, he declared how this issue was personal, saying: "How dare they suggest I would ever put that at risk for other people's children? How dare they frighten those who rely on our National Health Service?"
The PM drew on the spirit of the Normandy beaches as he said Britain represented "freedom, justice, standing up for what is right" and warned anyone who left these shores to fight for the "pure and simple" evil of the Islamic State: "You are an enemy of the UK and you should expect to be treated as such."
Following what many observers regarded as a lacklustre speech by the Labour leader at his party conference last week, the Tory leader seemed determined to seize the political initiative with a clear bid to win the votes of low and middle earners on tax.
He announced if re-elected to government the tax-free personal allowance would be raised from a planned £10,500 next April to £12,500, lifting a further one million people - 100,000 Scots - out of tax altogether.
Also the pay threshold when people start paying the higher 40 per cent rate of income tax would be raised from the current £41,865 to £50,000, lifting around 800,000 people - 80,000 Scots - out of the higher tax band.
"So with us," Mr Cameron told the conference, "if you work 30 hours a week on the minimum wage, you will pay no income tax at all. Nothing, zero, zilch. Lower taxes for our hardworking people; that's what I call a Britain that everyone is proud to call home."
He pointed out how the 40 per cent tax band was never meant to include teachers and police officers and so would be raised to £50,000.
It is calculated that by April 2020 the tax-cutting measures will mean a basic-rate taxpayer would be £500 better off and someone earning between £50,000 and £100,000 would be £1,313 better off.
The combined cost of the two measures would be £7.2 billion but there were no details on how this would be paid for and the precise times when the proposals will be introduced are not known; the promise is simply that they will be introduced by the end of the next UK Parliament in April 2020.
In response, Danny Alexander for the Lib Dems accused Mr Cameron of a "shameless attempt" to copy his party's tax policy, while Ed Balls for Labour branded the proposed tax cuts as "pie in the sky promises".
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