A GP standing for election for the Liberal Democrats has welcomed the party’s manifesto pledge to pump an extra £6 billion a year into health and social care.

Alun Griffiths, a councillor and the party's Parliamentary candidate for Bradford West, also described the Liberal Democrats’ pledge to legalise cannabis as “a sensible, straightforward thing to do”.

Today, leader Tim Farron revealed the manifesto pledges, which included raising income tax by 1p to raise £6 billion for the health and social care sector, as well as raising £1 billion in revenue by legalising cannabis.

Other flagship policies included a second referendum on a Brexit deal and giving tenants the ability to use rent payments to buy their own homes.

The party plans to bring in a diesel scrappage scheme and ban the sale of diesel cars and small vans by 2025.

It would also offer regions greater devolution of powers from Westminster, "for example to a Cornish Assembly or a Yorkshire Parliament", the document says.

On the extra money for health, Cllr Griffiths said: “I have worked in the health service for over 30 years. I have seen it struggle. It’s particularly going through a crisis at the moment and it needs funding, and that has been acknowledged.”

And on the legalisation of cannabis, Cllr Griffiths said he was supportive of the idea.

Although he was keen to say he had never smoked the drug himself, he said it was “certainly no more harmful” than cigarettes, alcohol or other substances targeted by public health campaigns rather than bans.

He said by regulating the sale of cannabis, they could make it safer.

He added: “I’m actually pleased the party has got the guts to step up and say that.”

Conservative Party chairman Sir Patrick McLoughlin claimed that the Liberal Democrats’ policies were “an echo of Corbyn’s manifesto we saw earlier this week”, while the Green Party accused the Lib Dems of lacking vision, saying the party needed to take off its “Brexit blinkers”.