Harrogate Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate Phil Willis today promised his party would cut primary school classes to an average of 25.

Mr Willis pledged an extra 12,500 teachers to achieve this goal, and also promised to recruit an extra 5,000 secondary school teachers if the Liberal Democrats won power.

The education spokesman said there would be increased funding for books and equipment by an average of £1,250 per primary school and £4,250 per secondary school, and funding for 1,000 "early years specialists" to work in nursery schools.

Mr Willis said: "Every child deserves the quality education that books and modern technology can bring. As a former headteacher, it angers me that too many pupils are still having to share dog-eared and out of date books."

He said teachers should be given more time to get to know their students.

He added: "Unless we can get stability back into our schools, our young people will remain hostile to the system and education itself."

The Liberal Democrats and Labour have criticised the Conservative Party for failing to discuss health and education during the campaign. And Labour was today claiming the Tories believed people should pay for "non-urgent" operations like hip replacements.

Health Secretary Alan Milburn claimed the party's health policies would put this into practice - with current private sector prices of up to £9,000 for a hip replacement.

He said Labour would offer more than 100,000 extra free operations each year for "non-urgent" conditions.

"Tory proposals will make people pay for what Labour is committed to provide for free."

Updated: 16:46 Thursday, May 24, 2001