This week the National Equality Panel published its groundbreaking report “An Anatomy of Inequality in the UK”. It showed that the trend of growing inequality - dating back to the days of Thatcher in the 1980's - has been halted and that, as a result of action taken by this Government, progress has been made to tackle poverty and make Britain fairer.

I commissioned The National Equality Panel Report in 2008 to give us an up to date analysis of the pattern of inequality in today society's in light of changing demographics, the changing role of men and women and globalisation and most importantly, to give us a solid evidence base for future action to tackle inequality.

We've made considerable progress in the last 13 years to level off the inequality that dates back to the days of the Tories. We've tackled poverty - especially helping children and pensioners; we've invested to give children the best possible start in life through Surestart children centres; we've improved our schools and helped more students from poorer backgrounds go to university; we've helped low paid workers with the national minimum wage and tax credits and we've narrowed the pay gap between men and women. 

We've done a lot to make Britain fairer but we know that we have to make more progress not only because it's a basic human right for people to be given the chance to make the most of their ability, but because the successful economies of the future will draw on the talents of all. This work is being taken forward across government including our response to Alan Milburn's report into fair access to the Professions and a major report on health inequalities that will be published soon too.
 
We are determined to continue to tackle inequality. We will base our actions on robust evidence and analysis and continue to make progress. The Tories deny the fact that income and wealth make a difference to people's chances in life. Ian Duncan Smith recently said “surprisingly, material wealth makes no difference to a child’s life chances provided he or she has love and stability at home.”  This is just not true as the National Equality Panel Report shows. Not only would they put the economy at risk, they would turn back the clock when it comes to fairness. Policies like the married man's tax allowance and the inheritance tax cut for the 3,000 wealthiest estates will make inequality worse and hold back social mobility.

Those of us on the left of politics have always been concerned about inequality, about social justice.  To a very great extent, that is what lay behind the formation of the Labour party and what brought most of us into the Labour Party.
 
So the choice at the election for people will be between a Tory party which denies inequality exists and Labour - which recognises the challenge of inequality and has the commitment, values and policies to tackle it.