Image source, EPA

To huge applause and cheering, Keir Starmer's wife Victoria joins him on stage after his speech.

The pair share a kiss before smiling and waving at the crowd.

And now they walk out, leaving the audience standing and cheering. Some are embracing.

We're nearing the end of Starmer's speech now and he's getting animated talking about why people should choose Labour at the next election.

"Why Labour?" he asks loudly. "Because we serve your interests."

"Why Labour?" he repeats. "Because we will grow every corner of our country."

"Why Labour?" he says again. "Because we have a plan - to take back our streets, to switch on Great British energy, to get the NHS back on its feet, to tear down the barriers to opportunity and to get Britain building again."

Starmer concludes by saying this is a plan to ensure that "Britain can, Britain must and Britain will get its future back".

He smiles and gets a huge round of applause, with delegates - including his shadow cabinet - on their feet.

Starmer attacks the Tories again, saying that the party has "severed its relationship to the future" and is "prepared to scorch the earth just to get to us".

"Wherever you think the line is they've already got plans to cross it," he says. He adds: "We have to be disciplined, focused, and ready to fight back."

"We have come so far already. We dragged this party back to service and we can do the same for politics."

"I grew up working class. I've been fighting all my life, and I won't stop now."

Raising his voice to be heard over the applause, Starmer says: "Until your family can see the way out, I will fight for you. That's my mission, and we will do it. We will face down the age of insecurity together... and walk towards a decade of national renewal."

Back to Scotland, Starmer says Scotland "can lead the way to a Labour government". But, he immediately adds, "we must earn every vote".

"For the first time in a long time, we can see a tide that is turning," he tells the conference, saying the wounds are "finally" being healed after the division he says was caused by the SNP.

Starmer says the overriding message from the Rutherglen win is that "Labour serves working people across all these islands".

Starmer takes aim at Tory PMs past and presentpublished at 15:03 British Summer Time 10 October 2023

15:03 BST 10 October 2023

Henry Zeffman
Chief political correspondent, reporting from Liverpool

As we saw last week, Rishi Sunak was determined to present himself as a change candidate.

Labour, in turn, are determined to stop the prime minister from doing so.

That will certainly mean reminding voters of Liz Truss’s fleeting stint as prime minister – we’ve seen Labour adverts in recent weeks portraying Sunak in Truss’s pocket, and early in Starmer’s speech he made a quip about her defeating Sunak in the Conservative leadership election last year.

But it is noteworthy that Starmer has also made several digs at Boris Johnson in his speech, with multiple references to Downing Street parties and an insinuation that the former prime minister was a liar.

On investment and business now, he calls the current government "the never-ending cycle of Tory Party first, country second." "We have to turn the page on this," he says.

The government will create a national wealth fund which will be ready to invest in the critical industry that the country needs, such as battery factories.

And another pledge comes in clean British energy, which he argues is cheaper than fossil fuels.

"Speed ahead," he says, on plans for a company that will provide green British energy.

He says Great British Energy will be based in Scotland, which "has the skills" and the "ingenuity".

He calls out to Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar and the new MP for Rutherglen and Hamilton West, Michael Shanks.

The TV director gets a camera on shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves as Starmer tells the Labour conference his party will go for growth.

She appears to look on approvingly at his words. More from her big speech yesterday here.

Yesterday we heard that Labour plans to fight the next election on the economy - and Starmer brings it up again now.

He says Labour understands that "private enterprise is the only way this country pays its way in the world" - but says that at the same time it will end zero hours contracts.

"We will make work pay - with a real living wage. This is good for growth," he says, to continued enthusiastic applause.

"Fiscal responsiblity is non-negotiable," he continues. "If investment can kickstart growth and save money in the long run... then yes, we must get on and do it."

He says that businesses have told him that it's the "chopping and changing" that's been holding back investment in Britain - and that to counter this Labour will set up a national wealth fund, working "hand in glove with the private sector to rebuild this country".

"But as we share the risk, we must also share the reward. So we will make sure that the British people retain a stake in our investments," Starmer says, adding that under his plan there won't be state control or pure free markets "but a genuine public-private partnership".

Nick Eardley
Political correspondent at the Labour Party conference?

Is Keir Starmer bold enough? Labour strategists hate that question. They say people want stability after political turmoil.

But some here in Liverpool do want Starmer to offer voters more. He’s told the conference he wants “a decade of renewal”.

He’s pledging that ambition and bravery to deliver it.

Chas Geiger
Reporting from the Labour Party conference

Watching on the big screen outside the hall, the biggest applause from Labour members so far has been for Starmer's promise to build 1.5 million new homes.

It's a phrase the Labour leader has used before - several times - but the conference hall gives Starmer a standing ovation when he pledges to break the "class ceiling" so that working class people are not held back.

It goes down well with senior Labour figures, as well.

Starmer is now attacking a "modern-day Conservative PM" for saying 50% of children going to university is "a false dream" - in an apparent dig at Rishi Sunak.

He brandishes it as being part of the "Tory mindset - don't solve problems but use them to divide".

In a direct appeal to voters, the Labour leader says if "you are a Conservative fed up with the current government" then there is an alternative - before inviting those people to join "this Labour party".

There's big applause here as the camera cuts to some of Starmer's shadow cabinet ministers smiling, nodding and clapping.

More on Labour's new pledge - officially announced just now - to build a wave of new towns. The new, large scale housing settlements will be reminiscent of the so-called new towns built after World War Two under then-Labour PM Clement Attlee.

"Sometimes the old Labour ideas are right for new times," he says.

Those towns - which are now home to some three million people - include Stevenage in Hertfordshire and Crawley in West Sussex.

The party says this means it can ensure that new energy, water and transport infrastructure, schools, and doctors' surgeries that local people need are "hardwired into plans".

"And no, this doesn't mean we're tearing up the green belt," he says on stage, arguing that Labour protect the environment.

He wants to get rid of "useless" spaces like car parks. But that building again, "is critical for our economic growth".

Today marks the day Labour launches a new plan to get Britain building again, Starmer says, as he confirms an announcement we heard this morning..

"No more land banking. No more inertia in the face of resistance," he says. "A future must be built: that is the responsibility of serious government."

"It's time to build 1.5 million new homes across the country... new infrastructure, roads, tunnels and power stations," Starmer says.

"It's a future with more beautiful cities, more prosperous towns, new parks and green spaces... Sometimes the old Labour ideas are right for new times."

"We'll get shovels in the ground, cranes in the sky, and build the next generation of Labour new towns."

We're onto home ownership now - something in Britain that has "become a dream," Starmer says.

It really is a luxury for the few, not the privilege for the many, he continues, before sharing a story about his own family home.

"Look, I'm trying really hard not to mention the house I grew up in," he says, "but that pebble-dashed semi was everything to our family." There's laughter and applause here.

He said his family home helped them through various financial crises and "gave us security", adding: "Every family deserves the same."

Our future is one where Britain is respected around the world, young people have a place, and climate change is stopped, he says.

"Government can be a force for good," he adds, "that's why I came into politics".

Drawing on his past as a lawyer, he references his knowledge that "government can make or break a life".

This, he says, drives him forward. "Let's get to work," Starmer adds. But there is one barrier that "blocks out all light from the other side... we must bulldoze through it," he says - the security of home ownership'

Starmer continues: "If the country was behind you, imagine how much better things could be," he says, to applause and cheers from the audience.

Starmer lists all the things that need to be fixed for the country to be "strong enough, stable enough and secure enough for you to invest in your home, your possibilities and your future".

He then goes on to say there will not be more bonuses for "people pumping sewage into rivers", that MPs "will only have one job - service", that there will be "no more pensioners freezing while energy companies make record profits," and that "no more cleaners will be mocked as they scrub the walls of illegal parties in Westminster."

Starmer is now talking about his sister, a care worker, who he says worked 14-hour shifts during the Covid pandemic.

She worked mostly night shifts, the Labour leader says, and adds that even then she struggled to "make ends meet" week after week.

He says the Tories failed to support people like her by breaking the rules they themselves set. "It's about respect," he tells delegates, before hailing care workers for managing to keep going.

Still, Starmer adds, the government missed opportunities to deepen its bond with those key workers. This is something Labour would not take for granted, he adds.

"The 8am scramble for the GP appointment, we'll end it," is just one of the promises he is making to the audience.

The bigger lesson, however, he says is that across the board "we're here to make government more dynamic, more joined up, more strategic".

Focusing on long-term national renewal is their focus, he says.

Starmer says "people will say don't rock the boat... but it's our responsibility to do it."

Putting VAT on private education - one of Labour's policy plans - means the money can go into other school services, he adds, like mental health counsellors.

And on the police, he wants to invest to get more police on the streets.

Starmer continues to talk about the NHS reform. "I know some people don't like the word 'reform', but there's no other option...

"We must be the government that finally transforms our NHS, we need an NHS that prevents illness, not just a sickness service," he says.

He adds that tech and AI must be used to help spot illnesses and says Labour will "consign to history" the "dangerous waits for cancer diagnosis".