THE Tories have broken 21 promises in the 21 weeks since they won the general election, Labour’s Jonathan Ashworth revealed yesterday. 

Mr Ashworth said that the pain felt in the Labour Party after May’s election defeat had been eclipsed by the suffering of people at the sharp end of Tory cuts.

He recalled how a pensioner came into his surgery “in tears with no money to buy food” and forced to turn to the foodbank.

“Her tears are our tears,” he said. The shadow cabinet minister told members that it was now Labour’s duty to expose the “emptiness” of the Tories’ pre-poll pledges and their “incompetence” in government. 

PM David Cameron was named and shamed for vowing to “protect” tax credits and child benefit, before both were slashed in the Tories’ first Budget. 

And Mr Ashworth told the Tories that they could not “pose” as a workers’ party while attacking the right to strike.

“There is a party of the workers in our country,” he added. “The Labour Party is the party of the workers.”

He charged Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith with “one of the cruellest broken promises of all” when he cut employment support allowance for disabled people and those suffering from cancer and Parkinson’s disease. It’s a disgrace!”

While the Tories “carry on with the same old tricks and deceit,” Labour will build a “new politics” under Jeremy Corbyn, Mr Ashworth concluded. 

“No Tory attacks, no misrepresentations, no divisions on our part will prevent this party rising again to be party that delivers equality and fairness,” he said.