News snippets from today:
Speaking on the Andrew Marr Show this morning, the Liberal Democrat leader ruled out the possibility of the Government filling the gap in public finances through cuts to the welfare budget – something reportedly being mooted on the Conservative benches.
He said the Government would “start at the top and work down”, and was optimistic about his chances of persuading his Conservative colleagues to agree to a so-called ‘wealth tax’. [Politics Home]
Cable said that introducing regional pay was “completely unacceptable” and “terrible economics”. He said that although the Lib Dems were prepared to contemplate a measure of public sector pay flexibility in different parts of the country to help recruitment, across-the-board regional pay would be a mistake. [Guardian]
[Danny Alexander has announced that:]
- Half a million people with property and assets worth over £1 million will come under extra scrutiny to make sure they are not cheating the taxman.
- The Government is to order new BBC Director General George Entwistle to stop its celebrities and executives using tax avoidance ploys.
- Soccer players and managers who dodge tax face fines of up to £100,000. [Mail on Sunday]
* Mark Pack is Party President and is the editor of Liberal Democrat Newswire.
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3 Comments
“Cable said that introducing regional pay was “completely unacceptable” and “terrible economics”. “
Is that accurate reporting? We already have regional pay – indeed many of Vince’s constituents receive it, so I assume he isn’t advocating the scrapping of what regional pay there already is.
The fact that he is then reported as saying “Lib Dems were prepared to contemplate a measure of public sector pay flexibility in different parts of the country” makes me even more confused. Sounds like more regional pay to me.
Pay that reflects local conditions is a good idea. Regional pay would be little more useful than the current system. Regions are large diverse areas. Within the same region rural and urban areas and rich and poor areas will have dramatically different costs and requirements.
Localising pay as far as intelligently possible is a good idea. Same with benefits and the minimum wage. We already have bits and pieces of these: housing benefit is localised, council tax benefit as well. And we have london weighting in public sector pay. These are good ideas if intelligently handled, and should be rolled out across the entire country, in order to get more bang for our buck.
Some fine words there in those speeches. But the proof of the pudding will be in the eating. And Lib Dems will do well to measure success by the perceptions of those who the policies are meant to help rather than from the position of those who are doing the ‘helping’.