Michael Howard has slammed the Queen's Speech as an example of the government's lack of delivery.

The Conservative leader sprayed around the soundbite that Labour was "all talk" on crime and the economy when he responded to the state opening of parliament in the Commons on Tuesday.

He said ministers had continually made excuses for failing to live up to their promises since Tony Blair came to power in 1997.

"If it took Winston Churchill five years to win the second world war, and if it took Clement Attlee six years to build the welfare state - surely seven and a half years is more than enough for you to get a grip on the problems that face Britain today," he suggested to Blair.

"In a year or so we're going to have an election when people will say: we've paid a lot of taxes but what's really been achieved with all that money?"

With crime and security forming the central theme of the speech, Howard said ministers could not be taken seriously on either subject with lawlessness rising and the future of Scottish regiments serving in Iraq under threat.

"How can he keep a straight face talking about security when he is going to cut our armed forces, including the Black Watch?" he asked Blair.

And claiming that recorded crime had gone up by 16 per cent under Labour when it had gone down in his own time as home secretary, he said the government "has failed where I succeeded".

"Why now, with just five months to go before an election, should people believe that this government is going to fix crime?" he asked.

"All we get from them is more rhetoric, more promises and more talk. But this government will never turn promises into action so it is time for a government which will," Howard concluded.

Constitution

On the bill to pave the way for a referendum ratifying the EU constitution, Howard quoted Blair's former economic adviser Derek Scott in describing the prime minister as "gutless".

The bill failed to set a date for the poll, despite the foreign secretary indicating that it will not be held until 2006.

"Why are you waiting for the rest of Europe? Why are you content to follow? Why can't we have a date for the referendum?" the opposition leader asked.

And on the economy he hit out at the chancellor's "tax and spend".

"People are paying a lot more in tax and they aren't getting value for money," Howard said.

"Hard working families are paying the equivalent of £5,000 a year more in tax. But what have they got to show for it - a million patients still on NHS waiting lists, a million children playing truant from school and a million violent crimes.

"It's no wonder that hard working families feel hard pressed and hard done by under this government.

"People are fed up with talk, they want action."