Jeremy Corbyn: Next Labour government will tackle housing crisis
Jeremy Corbyn is hitting the Home Counties with a promise to tackle the housing crisis as he continues his blitz of marginal parliamentary seats.
The Labour leader is campaigning to unseat Tory MPs with slim majorities in Reading and Milton Keynes under a plan to keep his party on a general election footing.
Mr Corbyn will highlight rocketing house prices and attack the Government for "giving tax breaks to the wealthy".
At a rally in Milton Keynes, he is expected to say: "The Conservative Government has spent seven years giving tax breaks to the wealthy, who don't need them, while making it harder for most people in our country to make ends meet.
"Here in Milton Keynes, like so many towns and cities across the country, the cost of housing is sky-rocketing - house prices have gone up 50% in five years.
"The next Labour government will tackle the housing crisis.
"We will create a new Department for Housing and build 100,000 homes a year by the end of the next Parliament.
"Housing should be about homes for the many, not investment opportunities for the few.
"Commuters from Milton Keynes to London have seen rail fares increasing faster than their wages year in, year out.
"Labour will bring down fares by returning our rail system to public ownership, putting more money in people's pockets and making sure our railways are run in the interests of people, not profit.
"The Government has no plan to help people struggling to get by.
"The price of everyday goods keeps going up faster than wages.
"Labour will introduce a real living wage of £10 an hour, scrap the public sector pay cap and take action to reduce utility bills through bringing public services back into public hands, to keep household costs down.
"Labour is campaigning right across our country this summer, putting forward our plan for a country that works for the many not the few."
The Conservatives held Reading West with a majority of 2,876 and Milton Keynes North with 1,915 votes.
