Labour spending plans will lead to £320m extra for Scottish Government

He also pointed to warnings from both the IFS and the Resolution Foundation warning that Sir Keir may be forced to make swingeing cuts to public spending. 

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Details of the Barnett's Consequentials were included in the fiscal plan attached to the policy document, launched by Sir Keir Starmer in Manchester on Thursday morning.

The party has also promised an extra £150m for the Scotland Office and another £150m to address child poverty.

In total, the party's plans amount to extra spending of £9.5bn a year, with most, around £5bn going on the “green prosperity plan.”

This will be funded in part by borrowing and in part by “a windfall tax on the oil and gas giants” but falls far short of the £28bn initially pledged.

Other spending promises will be funded through a number of measures including £8.6 billion in tax hikes, with most coming from closing the non-dom loophole and cracking down on tax avoidance.

Another £1.5bn is expected to come from the introduction of VAT and business rates on private schools and closing the carried interest tax loophole.

There was little in the 134-page manifesto document that had not already been outlined by the party. 

Sir Keir defended the lack of surprises.

"It's not about rabbits out of a hat, not about pantomime. I’m running as the candidate to be prime minister, not to run the circus,” he said.

He said the he would not hike corporation tax, VAT, income tax or national insurance. The party did not rule out any other tax raises, saying only that it has “no plans” to do so. 

Other policies include the New Deal for Working People, which will see a number of employment law reforms. 

Labour will also "immediately" remove the right of hereditary peers to sit in the House of Lords and introduce a mandatory retirement age of 80. 

On Scotland, there were a number of commitments aimed at “resetting the relationship” between the UK and Scottish governments.

They included strengthening the Sewell convention, as well as a promise to introduce parliamentary privilege for Holyrood to give MSPs "the same free speech protections enjoyed by MPs at Westminster.”

Under Labour, the Scotland Office would also be beefed up, to "maximise Scotland’s influence... both at home and abroad" to "ensure the voice of Scotland is properly heard on issues under the competence of the UK Government."

The manifesto also confirms plans for GB Energy, though there is little scant information about what it will do.

The manifesto says the publicly-owned company “will be owned by the British people and deliver power back to the British people.”

The firm will “partner with industry and trade unions to deliver clean power by co-investing in leading technologies; will help support capital-intensive projects; and will deploy local energy production to benefit communities across the country.”

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Sir Keir warned that there was no “magic wand” and the problems an incoming Labour administration would inherit would not “disappear overnight”.

He said: “We must rebuild our country. It will not be easy. Not only because there is no quick fix to the mess the Conservatives have made.

“But also, because their failures have sapped our collective confidence that Britain can still achieve great things.”

Asked whether it was a “Captain Caution” manifesto, he said: “It is a serious plan for the future of our country.”

He added: “I’m not going to do what Rishi Sunak does, which is offer things that he can’t deliver because they’re unfunded.

“People have had too much of that, they’re fed up with that.”

SNP Westminster Leader Stephen Flynn said: “The real story of this manifesto is not the measly amount Labour is offering but what it is deliberately failing to rule out.
 
"The Labour Party had two tests today - rule out £18 billion of Westminster cuts and rule out NHS privatisation - and they have completely failed on both counts.
 
“That will rightly worry every voter in Scotland who values our NHS and who values public services, which have already been hit by years of austerity.

"The truth is that the Labour Party have been so obsessed with courting Conservative voters in England, that they've ended up writing a Tory manifesto."

READ MORE: Labour vow to strengthen Sewell and give MSPs parliamentary privilege

The Institute for Fiscal Studies said the tax hikes and spending promises were “trivial” and would still involve the cuts to investment spending and unprotected departments included in current plans.

Paul Johnson, the director of the thinktank said Labour's fiscal rule of getting debt on a downward path between 2028/29 and 2029/30 would be difficult, if not impossible.

He said there was "literally no room" for any more spending than planned by Rishi Sunak's government.

"And those plans do involve cuts both to investment spending and to spending on unprotected public services. Yet Sir Keir Starmer effectively ruled out such cuts. How they will square the circle in government we do not know."

The Resolution Foundation made similar comments, with its interim chief executive Mike Brewer saying Labour’s cautious approach “sets the scene for a parliament of tax rises and spending cuts for unprotected departments.

“Even then, a modest dose of bad economic news could force a fresh round of tough fiscal choices if the debt rule is to be met.”

Laura Trott, the Tory Chief Secretary to the Treasury told broadcasters Labour’s manifesto “only contained tax rises, no tax cuts.

She also repeated her party’s widely disputed claims about Sir Keir hiking up taxes of working families.

She said: “What we saw this morning was Labour’s tax trap manifesto. It only contained tax rises, no tax cuts whatsoever.

“Under their own published plans the tax burden in this country will rise to levels never seen before, and that’s not including the £2,000 of tax they want to levy on every working family across the country.”