Let me thank Paul Murphy and Peter Hain before him for leading at the Wales office - two great Secretaries of State for Wales who have made sure the voice of Wales is heard not just in Westminster and in the Cabinet but in every part of the United Kingdom.

Let me also thank Rhodri Morgan - who for the last eight years has made Labour in Wales work for Wales: for advances in jobs, progress in education, regeneration, health, and the environment here in Wales: and he has written a new chapter in the annals of Welsh Labour which makes us proud.

And friends when these history books are written for service to Labour and to internationalism the pages of someone who retires at the next Election will grace its pages, Glenys Kinnock; in the villages of Africa, in the shanty towns of Asia, in the slums of Latin America. In every continent where there is need to be met and injustice to be rectified, men and women who will never know her will owe their education, their health, their release from poverty to her tireless campaign for debt relief, aid, and trade justice, for which we admire and pay tribute to Glenys.

And in this year - as we commemorate and celebrate 100 years since the Suffragettes - let the whole world salute the achievement of women in the Welsh Assembly. The first parliament in the world to achieve 50 per cent representation – equal representation – for women.

Colleagues, when I come to Wales, it always feels like coming home.
Not because I come from here - you would probably guess that from my accent. But because the ideals that drive what you do and the ideals I try to serve have been nourished here and lived here, and from here in Wales flowed out across generations to change Britain and shape its future.

Today I want to speak about our shared future, and it is right to do so here.
Proud of Wales, proud of devolution, proud of the innovative changes the Welsh Assembly has made.

We also know whether it’s the need to cooperate for a safe environment or national security, or for the safeguarding of pensions and general economic success, that there is no Wales-only, no England-only, no Scotland-only solution to the biggest challenges we face.
Our message is one for the whole of the United Kingdom: stronger together, weaker apart.
But for decades Wales has led the way, and often led the world.

Wales has led in health care, the NHS born in the valleys of Wales, to give, in Aneurin Bevan’s great words – Britain ‘moral leadership of the world’. And so it is right at the time of the 60th anniversary of the NHS to congratulate all the staff, consultants, doctors, nurses, midwives and all the carers, cleaners, orderlies, and porters of the NHS as we prepare for the next sixty years. An NHS always free. Provision based not on your ability to pay but always on your need.

And in recent years Wales has again led the way: in education, care of the elderly and economic regeneration.

And Rhodri, Labour members of the Assembly and councillors have led the way with the introduction of the foundation phase for 3 to 7 year olds, and at 16 the Welsh Baccalaureate. And with the UK’s first free bus travel scheme and the first Commissioners for children and for older people, you have led the way, showing here in Labour Wales, the needs of children and the elderly come first.

And you have led the way in economic renewal, from Anglesey in the North to the Heads of the Valleys in the South – around 130,000 more people in jobs since 1997 - a testament to what local and national government working together with local communities can do to move further and faster to our historic goal - full employment in Wales.

And let me thank our Welsh Assembly members, our Welsh MPs, our Welsh MEPs – Glenys and Eluned, and our Welsh councillors. Because of this partnership over 100,000 compensation payments have been made to former miners and their families as part of the Miners’ Compensation Schemes as we honour the dignity of our former miners who were so cruelly denied any compensation under the Tories.

And in thanking and paying special and direct tribute to the Labour councillors’ record of achievement, let us on May 1st send the message: Labour councillors will make our communities safer, cleaner, greener and better. Getting results for Wales.

The challenge of globalisation

And I am here today to affirm that Wales and Britain can lead the world again.
For today Wales knows what no nation can escape: we face no ordinary change; we are at the first frontier of a new global economy; in the midst of the most far-reaching economic and social transformation since the Industrial Revolution. This 21st century marks not only the passage of time, but also the passage of the old order. And as someone said, “the world is moving so fast these days that the man who says it can’t be done is usually interrupted by someone doing it.”

To lead and succeed in this new world, we in Britain must achieve for our era our own revolution - a revolution of rising opportunity and aspiration.
Why do I say this?

Because I have seen first hand globalisation at work around the world.

A few years ago, the face of globalisation was a Chinese teenager living in a hostel, spending 11 months a year hundreds of miles from home, assembling our computers or microwaves or sewing our clothes.

But last month, when I visited an Indian university with 300,000 students, I saw the new face of globalisation - thousands of young Asian graduates coming out of Indian and Chinese universities to change the world in front of our eyes.

Our Asian rivals are no longer just competing in low-skilled manufacturing.

They are competing in high-tech products and services too.

And they are educating millions to ever higher standards: 5 million graduates a year from India and China; 450,000 in Britain.

So we are in a race not to the bottom competing on low pay but to the top competing on high skills.

And the countries that will succeed in this new global economy will be those that recognise what Wales has always understood - the importance of education and skill - and of bringing out the best in people and their potential.

And only progressive forces in our country - only New Labour - can open up the opportunities, remove the barriers created by privilege, and equip all our people to make the most of their abilities.

A Government on the side of all the people, and not just some, is no longer only a matter of fairness and equality; it is the most powerful practical imperative because it is fundamental to our future prosperity.

In the coming decades, the number of the world’s skilled jobs will double - creating the greatest opportunities for whichever country rises to the education and skills challenge. And I want that country to be Britain.

And this is our agenda. The unfinished business of this generation. Unlocking not just some, but all of Britain’s talent.

Just think of the losses and injustices of past centuries. Yes, there was the creative genius of a few, but consider the tragedy of talents unrealised by the many: the books not written, the music not created, the art never seen, the science never advanced, the potential left buried.
Yet think what we can achieve in our century if - instead of unlocking only some of the talent of some of the people - we are able for the first time to unlock all the talent of all our people.

For New Labour, an enduring dream that is now an urgent national imperative.

For we in New Labour are and have always been the party whose basic mission is to deliver opportunity not just for some but for all.

Like so many people here, the power of opportunity has changed my life.

So I know that I am here because our fathers and mothers fought for education for all. Demanded an NHS, dared to march for opportunity for all, campaigned for it, and then in power wrote it into law and spoke up and then stood up in their millions to create a fairer society.

What was Aneurin Bevan doing when he built the NHS if not using the power of opportunity to change lives - by removing the fear of the financial consequences of poor health?

And what was Aneurin Bevan doing as housing minister other than using the power of opportunity to build millions of homes and change and improve lives by freeing families from squalid slums and slum landlords?

And we all know how the absence of opportunity, denying as the Tories cruelly did to millions the basic right to work, can damage and destroy lives.

And that is why with the New Deal and ten years of job creation we have been using the power of opportunity to bring dignity and self respect - by giving people skills and work and moving this country further and faster towards our goal of full employment.

So I believe in the power of opportunity to change lives.

And I want the power of opportunity that has changed my life to be there, not just for me and for my sons, but for other people to make the most of their lives.

I want to give all children the same chances others once gave me.

Our historic mission as Labour has been to mobilise the power of opportunity to change lives.

And because one talent squandered haunts us with thoughts of what might have been, and because we are just half way there to the opportunity revolution, we need our modern mission to drive forward social mobility and social justice for all demands – a new programme for our times.

For more than half a century since 1945 we have provided education free of charge but for millions just up to 16. Now we have to move to the next stage of the Opportunity Revolution and provide lifelong educational opportunity, and not just for some but for all.

And in our programme for the next decade we will give a guarantee for every adult who missed out, a second chance – the right, whatever your age, to learn basic skills free of charge.

For half a century our schools have provided teaching with now more teachers and classroom assistants than ever in our history.

But why should 90 per cent of children be denied the chance of help with tuition that could bring out their talents? So now we must move to the next stage of the Opportunity Revolution and start to ensure that not just the few but the many can have access if they need it to the benefits of personal tuition.

For half a century we have provided a labour exchange and then the job centre to help people into work. In the past decade we have seen nearly 3 million more people in work.

But now facing the global skills challenge we must move to the next stage of the Opportunity Revolution: ensure that everyone looking for work has not only the information they need but direct personal support and continuous retraining in the skills they need for the jobs of the future, and as a result decent well-paid jobs.

For half a century we have provided the basic curative GP and hospital services of the NHS free of charge. In the past decade we have seen waiting times sharply reduced and more nurses and doctors than ever. Now we must move to the next stage of the Opportunity Revolution and start to offer access to all of us what 10 per cent can already obtain by paying privately - the offer of regular check ups, early screening for cancer and other diseases, weekend and evening access to your GP when you need it, and the personalised care and support reshaped to your needs that will not only cure illness but prevent illness in the first place.

For half a century Labour governments have pursued policies that combine economic prosperity and social justice. Now we must move to the next stage of the Opportunity Revolution -combining economic prosperity, social justice and environmental care. So in the next ten years we will champion not only a new post-Kyoto agreement which we and our colleagues in the European Union will lead. But I call today for a World Bank with a budget of billions for development and the environment that can promote alternative sources of energy in the poorest as well as richest parts of the world.

For half a century we have offered people local police services, and in the past decade employed more police than ever before and cut crime. I praise all those who defend our security and keep our communities safe. But now, as Wales is doing, we must move to the next stage of the Opportunity Revolution - a guarantee to anxious families and our elderly of greater personal security with more police on the beat in neighbourhoods, police and community support officers in touch with and answerable to the needs of the citizens of every community. So that people are safe and feel safe in their communities.

For exactly a century the guarantee has been to every old person of a pension in retirement. In the past decade we have introduced the winter fuel allowance, free tv licences for over 75s and expansion in community care. But now we must recognise the rapidly changing needs and rising aspirations of the growing numbers of senior citizens in our country.

Every pensioner - men and women who have served our community all their lives - deserves security and dignity in retirement.

That’s why I can say we are committed to link pensions once again not to prices but earnings, and let me congratulate Welsh Labour MPs on securing justice for those deprived of their occupational pensions.

And I mean a pension for every pensioner and let me congratulate Welsh Labour MPs on securing justice for those at ASW and other companies unfairly deprived of their occupational pensions.

And it is also our task in the coming decade to ensure that there is a range of social care that meets the very different needs of all our elderly people, from home-helps to health visitors, to personal budgets - services given direct to people, personal to their needs and where they want them - usually in their own homes.

And let me tell you what it means for children too.

Because we have all seen the power of nursery schools and Sure Start centres to halt the legacy of disadvantage passed from parent to child, more quickly today than any other country we must and will expand children’s centres, nurseries and early years learning so that every child has the best possible start in life.

And because poverty should not bar any child from the best start in life, we must renew our pledge to rid Britain of the scar of child poverty.

And for the first time in half a century we will promise any adult who needs it a second chance with support and mentoring for more young people, especially those from deprived communities to go to university - offer every qualified young person who wants it an apprenticeship.

And because the benefit system must also respond to the new skills agenda, we will make it a responsibility of claimants not just actively to seek work but also to seek skills.

And so today - for individual families to escape the daily injustices of poverty - I propose new Contracts out of Poverty.

Matching new opportunities to support their children with new responsibilities to take up work, to acquire new skills, to make the most of their lives.

Support for parents who undergo a skills audit and take up training to improve their job prospects.

Ensuring that work pays and is a route out of poverty for couples and lone parents.

Individual contracts between families and government showing in this generation the power of opportunity to change lives for good.

But we in the Labour Party believe not just in the power of opportunity to change lives, but something more, we believe in the power of compassion to save lives.

A few days ago I met the President of Sierra Leone.

He came to tell me that in his country one mother in every six dies in childbirth.

What should be the joy of a new life; instead the tragedy of an unnecessary death because no one was there to lend a helping hand.

And one baby in every four never reaches the age of five --- many dying agonising deaths because the treatment that could be provided for a few pounds is simply not there.

One mother in six dying in childbirth because in a country of 6 million people there are just 112 midwives in the public sector.

One child in four dying before their fifth birthday because in that country twice the size of Wales there are just 71 doctors.

Young lives ended unnecessarily almost before they have begun - and not because we lack the science or the technology or the medical knowledge but because as a world we lack the political will.

And yet we have also seen how the compassion for a better world can save lives when thousands from churches, faith groups and Trades Unions in Wales marched to Make Poverty History and with many others across the world persuaded the world to cancel debts so that poor countries can spend more on health and education.

And we have seen that compassion for a better world in action in Wales over the generations - the compassion shown by men going from the valleys to fight fascism, starting in the 1930s with Welsh men leading the way, joining the International Brigade to help fight fascism in Spain.

And we have seen that compassion in action when exactly 50 years ago Paul Robeson came to Wales, and Wales was the first European nation to stand up and support the battle across the Atlantic for Black civil rights.

Cynics once said civil rights and the battle against fascism could not be won. Cynics once said debt relief for the world's indebted countries was the proposal just of dreamers.

Cynics said getting world leaders to commit to the plan to double aid for the poorest was an impossible hope.

But working together in cooperation, first thousands then tens of thousands and then millions rose up in a demand for justice.

And if a past generation could defeat fascism and win rights for half the world’s people, and achieve what people said were impossible dreams. Then we need more people who seek after the impossible and it cannot be beyond this generation to release people trapped in what Nelson Mandela called the Prison of Poverty.

The power of compassion is, as the Poet Emerson said: ‘to leave the world better than you found it’;

‘to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived’.

So let us work tireless for a just peace in Darfur.

Let us strive unremittingly for democracy in Burma.

And today 10 million die from preventable diseases such as TB, Polio, Diptheria and Malaria. If we could save only one human life by our actions it would be worthwhile. But if we could by our actions save millions of lives that would otherwise be lost, what a difference to the world this would make.

So let us pledge to be the the first generation in history that eradicates these deadly but entirely treatable diseases from our planet and let it be mothers and children not just in the richest countries but in the poorest countries that have the chances of a decent life.

And today 70 million of the world’s children did not go to primary school because they had no school to go to.

So let ours be the first generation that makes sure that every child in every continent has a school to go to - the gift of this generation…free education for every single one of the world’s children.

So just as when I was young I was given the best education as of right so all the children of the world should have the right to education.

Just as when sick we are given the best health care so should all the mothers and children of the world have the right to healthcare.

Just as when I became a parent given all the help our family could have, I want all families to have the right to a decent family life.

So we cannot rest.

We cannot relax.

We cannot give up until all have the right to decent education, decent health care and the best possible chance in life.

Before the 1945 election Nye Bevan said at a meeting here in Wales:

"We have been the dreamers, we have been the sufferers, now we are the builders."

So here this evening from Wales let us rededicate ourselves.

Let us work to fulfill our dreams of a better world.

Let us work to end needless suffering.

Let our guiding purpose be to build a better future for all.