First year as Prime Minister
Rishi Sunak reflects on his first year as Prime Minister.
As I mark one year as Prime Minister, there are many moments that fill me with pride.
WATCH: Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s first year in office.
When I spoke about my priorities in January, I knew they were going to be tough targets to meet, but I made them because they’re what’s right for this country, its economy and its people. And it’s why over the last 12 months we’ve been committed to meeting them - building a better, brighter future for all of us.
I know this year has been tough, and there is still work to be done to help hardworking families across the country, but I’m proud of the steps we’ve made.
Supporting people with the cost of living
I know that the rising cost of living is something families across the country are struggling with. It’s why we’re working so hard to halve inflation, reduce debt and grow the economy.
It’s inflation that increases living costs and our responsible plan is working, we’re on track to halve it by the end of the year – a promise many said wasn’t achievable.
But we’re also providing households with the support they need right now:
- Providing payments for 8 million vulnerable households
- Saving the average household £1,500 through our energy support schemes
- Freezing fuel duty to save you money
- Paying childcare costs up front for those on Universal Credit
- Delivering the Get Around For £2 bus fare cap scheme
- The largest ever cash increase to the national living wage
- Uprating benefits
- Delivering pensioner payments
- Winter Fuel Payments helping older people with their heating bills
See what support is available to help you.
Agreed the historic Windsor Framework
We’ve been supporting families and businesses in many different ways. In February we agreed the Windsor Framework.
This agreement is written in the language of laws and treaties. But really, it’s about much more than that. It’s about stability in Northern Ireland. It’s about real people and real businesses.
Things like goods and medicine can now move smoothly between Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
International partnerships
And our agreements haven’t just been at home.
We’ve also been focused on strengthening global partnerships.
We’ve delivered agreements with world leaders including the Atlantic Declaration with the US, The Global Combat Air Programme and the next stage in AUKUS.
Because it’s these sorts of agreements that deliver security for the British people and create opportunities for hardworking families at home.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak visits Joe Biden at The White House
Continuing to lead the international response to the conflict in Ukraine
As well as meeting President Biden eight times this year, it was a privilege to have President Zelenskyy in the United Kingdom in February.
I’m proud the UK has been at the forefront of international support for Ukraine.
We were the first country to provide modern, Western main battle tanks and long-range precision strike cruise missiles to the country.
And our support continues:
- Committed £4.6 billion in military assistance to Ukraine so far
- Providing a range of economic, humanitarian, and defensive military assistance
- Trained more than 27,000 Ukrainian recruits this year
- Hosted the Ukraine Recovery Conference in partnership with Ukraine this summer – raising more than $60 billion towards Ukraine’s reconstruction
- Training Ukrainian fast jet pilots
- Imposing additional sanctions on Russia and Belarus
President Zelenskyy’s visit to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
Historic Long Term Workforce Plan for the NHS
And one of my proudest moments has to be backing the first ever long-term staffing plan for the NHS.
Both my parents worked in healthcare growing up, so the NHS’s long-term success is personal to me.
In June, in the NHS’s 75th anniversary year, we launched the first ever long-term plan for the NHS workforce. And backed it with over £2.4 billion over the next five years to make sure the NHS has the staff it needs long into the future.
We are:
- Training more staff - doubling the number of medical and adult nursing training places, increasing GP training places by 50% and expanding dental training places by 40%
- Retaining our dedicated workforce - keeping hold of up to 130,000 more staff in the NHS by allowing greater flexibility and improving culture, leadership and wellbeing
- Reforming the way staff work by expanding new roles and using the power of technology to modernise the NHS
Tackling illegal migration
I’ve also been delivering on my priority to stop the boats.
Illegal migration is fundamentally unfair. It’s unfair to those who come here legally and unfair on the British people who play by the rules.
In the last 12 months we’ve delivered agreements with France, Italy, Turkey, Albania, Georgia and Moldova to strengthen European action against illegal migration.
In July we passed our Illegal Migration Act – and we’ve made significant progress this year:
- Small boat arrivals to the UK remain down by more than 20% compared to this time last year
- We’ve returned 4,100 Albanians since signing our enhanced returns agreement last December, and Albanian illegal arrivals have fallen by 90%
- We have increased the number of illegal working raids by more than two thirds since this point last year
- The surge has led to a doubling in the number of fines imposed on employers, and has tripled the number issued to landlords
- We’ve agreed a new partnership with social media companies to tackle people smuggling content online
- And launched a new taskforce to crack down on rogue immigration lawyers facilitating false claims
Cracking down on anti-social behaviour
And we’ve been cracking down on anti-social behaviour. This behaviour undermines the basic right of people to feel safe in the place they call home.
Nobody should have to live in fear or intimidation. We should be proud of where we live.
- In April we hit our target of recruiting 20,000 more police officers
- We’ve expanded targeted uniformed patrols in hotspot areas
- As well as expanding drug testing on arrest
- Banning nitrous oxide
- Launching a new digital tool for members of the public to report anti-social behaviour
- And we’ve created bigger fines for littering
Read more about our Anti-Social Behaviour Action Plan
Leading the way on AI safety
And we know that AI has the potential to transform our lives.
I want to make the UK is not just the intellectual home, but also the global leader in AI safety.
That’s why we’re:
- Dedicating more funding to AI safety than any other country in the world, with £100m for our Frontier AI Taskforce
- Hosting the first major global summit on AI safety right here in the UK
- Supporting research into cutting edge AI technology that can improve lives, such as creating targeted drugs that selectively kill cancer cells
Read more about our AI Safety Summit
Delivering the largest expansion of childcare
Being a parent shouldn’t impact your career, but for so many parents this has become a reality.
So we’re delivering the largest ever expansion of free childcare support.
That is why in the spring budget the Chancellor and I announced the largest expansion to childcare to support families. Reducing the cost of childcare for working parents by an average of £6,500 a year.
We’re giving nurseries over £200 million of additional funding this year to expand the free childcare hours available to parents and we are funding local authorities to help make sure parents of primary-age children can access wraparound childcare from 8am to 6pm.
But thousands of parents are still not claiming the hours they are currently entitled to.
Delivering a world-class education system
Giving children the highest possible standard of education is the single most important reason I came into politics.
It’s the best economic, social and moral policy there is.
It’s why we’re creating a new, combined single qualification, the Advanced British Standard, bringing together the very best of A levels and T levels and finally delivering on the promise of parity of esteem between academic and technical education.
This new qualification will mean every pupil will:
- study some form of English and maths to 18
- spend 195 more hours learning with great teachers
- study a broader range of subjects
This is a long-term reform. But to set it up for success now, we are investing over £600 million over the next two years on the teachers and schools and colleges who will be vital to delivering it.
Making long -term decisions for this country
I made the decision to redirect billions of pounds from HS2 costs into hundreds of local transport projects which matter most to people and their communities.
Costs for HS2 more than doubled since originally forecast, and the project has been repeatedly delayed - that is why we are investing £36 billion from HS2 in hundreds of projects across the country.
Network North will build the daily connections that people depend on.
We will:
- Extend the Get Around For £2 bus fare cap scheme to continue to help people save money
- Redirect funding to improve bus services across the North and Midlands
- Fund the Midlands Rail Hub to connect more than 50 stations, from Cheltenham to Derby
- Invest in a new station at Bradford and a new connection to Manchester
Find out more about what Network North means for you.
Protecting drivers across the country
Most of us use a car and for many, particularly in rural areas, it is a lifeline.
So we’re backing drivers with a new long-term plan to improve journeys for millions across the country.
- Ruling out blanket 20mph zones
- No new low traffic neighbourhoods without local consent
- Clamping down on rip-off fines
- Freeing up bus lanes when not in use
- Fines for overrunning street works
- Making it easier to install EV charge points
- New national parking platform
Read more about our plan to back drivers
Creating a fairer path to Net Zero
I know how important our commitment to Net Zero is, and I am proud that the UK has reduced emissions faster than any other major country.
We are taking a pragmatic, proportionate and realistic path to reaching those goals.
Our plans will ease the burden on working people – delivering energy security for the UK while making sure we have among the most ambitious and stringent decarbonisation targets in the world.
We are:
- Moving back the ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars
- Delaying the ban on installing oil and LPG boilers for off-gas-grid homes
- Exempting those homes least able to make the switch from fossil fuel boilers
- Raising the Boiler Upgrade Grant by 50% to £7,500
- Investing in a new generation of nuclear power
Read more about our new approach to Net Zero
Creating a smokefree generation
Smoking is the single biggest cause of preventable death, causing a quarter of all cancer deaths in the UK and putting huge pressure on the NHS.
But for far too many people, it’s an addiction that they can’t give up, even though most want to.
There is no more addictive product that is legally sold in our shops than tobacco, which is why we must stop it before it starts.
So, we’ll introduce new laws to create the first smokefree generation and, as any teacher or parent knows, we also need to crackdown on youth vaping.
Here’s the plan:
- Make sure children aged 14 or younger this year will never be legally sold cigarettes
- Reduce the appeal, availability and affordability of vapes to our children
- More than double the funding for local stop smoking services to support people to quit
- We will not criminalise smoking - anyone who can legally be sold cigarettes today will not be prevented from doing so in the future.
Have your say on our plans here.
