IT is going to be a difficult and demanding year.

It started with horrendous hikes in bus and train fares, putting pressure on severely squeezed family budgets.

Our economic woes are set to worsen with spiralling job losses and more price rises in the pipeline.

But it's not all doom and gloom. This summer will offer the diversions of the Olympic Games and the Queen's Diamond Jubilee.

Over the past 12 months, incompetence and indifference have been the defining hallmarks of the Tory-led Coalition.

Our city was an early casualty when Bombardier and its workers were so heartlessly betrayed by the Government.

We now have a glimmer of hope with the company's £188 million contract to build 130 carriages for Southern Railway.

While this deal is encouraging news, more work is desperately needed to secure the factory's long-term future in Litchurch Lane.

So we must step up our campaign to reverse the unsigned Thameslink contract and win the upcoming eVoyager and Crossrail deals.

Our campaign to save this industry and today's economic gloom hark back to the dark days of the 1980s.

It also brings into focus the reality that Cameron has only rebranded and not changed the Conservative Party.

I have been around long enough to have seen Margaret Thatcher in action when she was first made Leader of the Opposition.

She performed so badly it was embarrassing.

Like his heroine, David Cameron was an underwhelming Leader of the Opposition, though, to be fair, it is known as one of the worst jobs in politics.

This is partly what makes the recent spate of silly nonsense about Ed Miliband so irritating. Eighteen months after one of our worst election defeats, Ed has led Labour to five by-election wins, the election of 800 more councillors and a 10-point rise in poll ratings.

What's more important is that Ed has a clear sense of what is wrong with the economy and the need for a change of direction.

Another challenge we faced under Thatcher, which is being renewed, is the attack on the NHS.

Nearly 50,000 jobs, mostly in the frontline, are under threat or have gone.

Since the 2010 General Election, Derby has suffered a staggering 224% rise in patients waiting more than 18 months for treatment.

At the same time, the Coalition is ploughing ahead with the billion-pound bill for its reorganisation.

These plans, for which neither the Tories nor the Lib Dems had a manifesto mandate, are the biggest danger the NHS has faced.

The Bill will break up the NHS. It allows a huge increase in private patients being treated in NHS hospitals, leapfrogging NHS patients, which will lead to longer waits for treatment.

Healthcare will be opened up to market competition, putting profit before care.

The reckless reorganisation will cost nearly £18 million in Derby alone, at a time when every single penny should be spent on maintaining standards of patient care and services.

The creation of the NHS is Labour's proudest achievement and we will keep up the fight to save a free, fair and fully funded public service for all.