Yvette Cooper MP, Labour's Chief Secretary to the Treasury, launching a Labour analysis of Cameron's do nothing approach to the global economic challenges, said today:

"David Cameron is making empty promises to hide the fact that the Conservatives would do nothing to help the British economy, and once again would turn their backs on the British people in difficult times.

"The cruelest of his empty promises is a loans scheme to business when he also rules out providing the money to fund it.

"The fact is every economy in the world will face real challenges in 2009. That's why it's so important to provide British families and businesses with real help to get through the downturn sooner and stronger.

"Labour is determined to provide real help - including the VAT cut which will save households on average £275 a year, and £60 for every pensioner this month -- all opposed by David Cameron.

"David Cameron talks about the 1970s. The truth is the Conservatives are returning to the worst of Thatcherism in the early eighties with no support for jobs or the economy and cuts in public services as well.

"The Conservatives are repeating their mistakes of the past: if a timely fiscal stimulus of similar scale had been applied at the beginning of the 1990s recession, around 300,000 fewer jobs might not have been lost."