David Cameron this morning launched a furious attack on Labour MPs 'bleating' about poverty after it emerged more than a million people turned to food banks last year. The Prime Minister said Labour had left millions of people trapped on welfare in a system which 'punished the poor'. He accused Ed Miliband and Ed Balls of having 'some brass neck' by attacking the Tories for failing the poor, adding: 'Don't you dare lecture us on poverty.' Scroll down for video . The Prime Minister, delivering a major speech on the economy in Bedford today, said Labour had left millions of people trapped on welfare in a system which 'punished the poor' Mr Cameron, in a major speech on the economy this morning, said the Tories were overhauling the benefit system, increasing the minimum wage and providing more free child care to help parents get to work. He added: ‘True compassion isn’t giving people a benefits cheque – it’s giving them a chance.’ He said Labour had left a system where a single mum, working 15 hours and earning £87 a week, would have actually lost money if she had taken on any more work. Mr Cameron said families stuck on benefits were not ‘playing the system’ but were ‘victims of it’. He said they were ‘victims of a welfare trap laid by Labour, paid for by hardworking taxpayers’. The PM added: That destroyed aspiration. It created resentment. And it was never meant to be this way. Welfare was meant to be a safety net – not a web from which no-one could escape. ‘So when I hear Labour politicians bleating on about the same old Tories, not on the side of working people, I just think: some brass neck. ‘It was you who trapped the poor on welfare and widened inequality. Yes, you Ed Miliband and Ed Balls who designed these systems that punished the lowest paid. So don’t you dare lecture us on poverty. ‘And know this – the true party of working people in Britain today is us, the Conservative Party.’ Mr Cameron accused Ed Miliband and Ed Balls of having 'some brass neck' by attacking the Tories for failing the poor, adding: 'Don't you dare lecture us on poverty.' Mr Cameron promised extra free childcare for 600,000 children a year to counter spiralling costs and said the expense of nurseries and childminders has become a major barrier to employment. The Conservatives have pledged to reduce tax relief on pension contributions for people earning more than £150,000 to fund additional free childcare places. ‘For many second earners, work didn’t pay because the cost of childcare was so high. So we introduced 15 hours of free childcare a week for three- and four-year-olds and disadvantaged two-year-olds. ‘In the next Parliament we will double that for three- and four-year-olds. That’ s right – 30 hours of free childcare a week – worth £5,000 to working families. ‘That means over 600,000 extra free childcare places available for families every year – nine million extra hours of childcare a week and parents able to work an extra 78 days a year without any childcare costs – all by 2017.’ Mr Cameron also argued ‘that true compassion isn’t giving people a benefits cheque – it’s giving them a chance’. The new free childcare will be available where all parents in the household are working at least eight hours a week at the minimum wage. The new 30 hours entitlement will cost just under £350 million a year.
Prime Minister said Labour had left millions of people trapped on welfare .
He accused Ed Miliband of having 'some brass neck' by attacking Tories .
Mr Cameron said he wanted to 'make hard work pay' unlike Labour .
He said that work rather than benefits is the best way to avoid poverty .
The Prime Minister announced 600,000 new childcare places today .