THIS is my last column as your local MP before the election, as on Monday Parliament is dissolved and there will be no MPs – only parliamentary candidates – and the election campaign begins in earnest.

It has been an honour to serve the people of Penarth and the wider constituency regardless of how they voted in November 2012, and since then I’ve done my best to help local people, businesses and organisations.

There’s so much at stake in this election, and a huge choice facing voters - not just between local candidates or parties, but between two visions of how this country succeeds.

The Tories’ vision is to give priority to those at the top, in the hope that wealth will trickle down. But this approach has failed. Working families are on average £1600 a year worse off – the worst record on living standards since the 1920s.

They speak of economic recovery - but it’s not being felt by ordinary, hard-working people, who are still struggling to make ends meet. The next generation, and the most vulnerable in society, have been let down by Tory/Lib-Dem policies, yet this is a record of failure they want to repeat.

I fear they will continue to prioritise the wealthiest at the expense of working families; continue failing to stand up to tax avoiders and big vested interests ripping off everyone; and their plans for cuts are even more extreme than those they’ve imposed over the last five years.

Labour has a different vision, based on the idea that when working people succeed, Britain succeeds; that we do well as a nation when the people we serve are able to do well too. It’s a plan for:

• A strong economic foundation – balancing the books and cutting the deficit every year, whilst pledging not to put up VAT and to reverse tax cuts for millionaires.

• Higher living standards for working families - taking on energy bills and improving support for childcare.

• Fair play on immigration – recognising the benefits diversity brings, but introducing restrictions on welfare payments and the undermining of wages.

• An NHS with time to care – an extra 1,000 doctors, nurses and healthcare workers for Wales funded by a mansion tax.

• Support for young and old with jobs, opportunities and security – an increased minimum wage and ensuring pensioner incomes keep pace with the cost of living.

This is a plan that will bring real, enduring prosperity to every part of Britain, and we’ll do it by putting people first.

On a different note, I was heartened to receive such positive reaction locally to my previous column, when I wrote about irresponsible and dangerous comments by UKIP’s Nigel Farage. It seems many people agree that his party seems determined only to stoke up deeply unwelcome divisions.