Ed Balls repents over London living wage

[Big Daz]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/blog ... iving-wage

Mr Gradgrind has repented. Ed Balls, the children's secretary, whose department issued a statement branding the £7.45 London living wage "inflationary, artificial and unnecessary", has blamed his officials for putting out the damning words without his permission.
In an extraordinary U-turn, Balls now says that not only does he agree with a London living wage but he is going to make sure all the lowest paid staff at his ministry, the Department for Children, Schools and Families, get £7.45 an hour. Just the same view as Boris Johnson, the Tory mayor of London, who for a week Balls allowed to set the agenda on low pay in the capital.
As guardian.co.uk reported last week, Balls's department originally told a group of child protesters at a demo outside his ministry organised by London Citizens, a coalition of community groups, faith groups and trade unions, that "an artificial 'living wage for London' could distort labour markets and prove poor value for money".
Now we are told that this was a statement drafted by Treasury officials and that no minister - including Balls's wife, Yvette Cooper, the chief secretary to the Treasury - saw it before it was issued.

Yet Balls is not known for leaving his civil servants to get on with their work unsupervised. Indeed his passion for detail and his support for the complicated family tax credit system show he normally has a great eye for detail.
A more credible explanation might be in a leaked email from the TUC to a number of trade unions that has somehow ended up at the Guardian.
This reveals that one of the TUC's no-nonsense players, Isobel Larkin, their parliamentary liaison officer, had some words with the minister's special advisers.
Unions are known to have been furious about his department's statement - which led to a strong riposte from Dave Prentis, Unison's general secretary.
The end result was a climbdown. The email says: "The minister is keen to disassociate himself from comments that were attributed to him recently in regard to the living wage. Comments that living wage policies were unnecessary, artificial and inflationary appear to have been drafted by officials in the department without ministerial clearance."
Oddly enough Ed Balls made his climbdown a rather long way from London. Trade unionists were advised to read an article by Mark Hookham, political editor of the Yorkshire Evening Post, for clarification of his views.
There may however be another reason for breaking the news in Yorkshire. The campaign for a living wage in London has inspired a similar campaign in Leeds. Gradgrind's record in government and his return to parliament at the next general election depend on the voters in the new seat of Morley and Outwood, just outside Leeds.
Perhaps he might just not want to be seen depriving his constituents of a £7.45 an hour wage, even if the alternative is to claim his beloved family tax credit.

[dvbuk55]

Well now the recession has taken hold and house prices have fallen there should be no need to over inflate the economy by paying bumper wages to southerners.

[BELIAL]

Manchester going to do the same

[rockytony67]

Well now the recession has taken hold and house prices have fallen there should be no need to over inflate the economy by paying bumper wages to southerners.

Yeah I know, its all wine and roses here in London

[dvbuk55]

Manchester going to do the same

Manchester is currently holding a ballot on congestion charges, pretty soon there will be a Manchester Loading Allowance, and the streets, unlike London's', will be paved with dog s**t, as usual. Of course there is the theatre of dreams which makes it all worthwhile

[dvbuk55]

Well now the recession has taken hold and house prices have fallen there should be no need to over inflate the economy by paying bumper wages to southerners.

Yeah I know, its all wine and roses here in London

I always knew that Lunnun was the culture capital of the world giving us such outstanding things as ............... and ............ erm well I can't think of any for the moment, just give me a hundred years or so - I just can't wait for the deluge - you see when the oceans get deeper we live at the top and you live at the bottom - and don't think we are going to let you all come and live up here - oh no - if it isn't good enough for you now you can't come here when your feet are getting wet.

[Ernie Shoe]

Well now the recession has taken hold and house prices have fallen there should be no need to over inflate the economy by paying bumper wages to southerners.

Yeah I know, its all wine and roses here in London

Abuse deleted.