Public Sector Pay Policy
Debate between Luke Graham and Christian Matheson(5 years, 11 months ago)
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Christian Matheson (City of Chester) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Owen. I offer my congratulations to my good friend, the hon. Member for Glasgow South West (Chris Stephens), who has been a consistent advocate against this disastrous policy. I also thank my hon. Friends the Members for Easington (Grahame Morris), for Barnsley East (Stephanie Peacock) and for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Hugh Gaffney), who have all given clear real-world examples of the effect of the public sector pay freeze.
The hon. Member for Ochil and South Perthshire (Luke Graham) and my good friend and, dare I say it, fellow Cestrian, the hon. Member for Solihull (Julian Knight) talked about the genesis of the public sector pay freeze policy, which dates back to the financial crash. I will simply make the point that it was not public sector workers who created the financial crash, but they are the ones who still have to live with the detriment of it, seven to 10 years afterward, while it took Wall Street and the City of London only a couple of years to get back on the big bonus trail. But we are where we are.
The slogan is, “A country that works for everyone”, although that slogan has not aged particularly well. The country is on its knees, facing the largest inequality and division since the 1980s and early 1990s. As we have seen with failures such as Capita, G4S and Carillion, commercial failure is rewarded with more public funding, while our public sector services at the sharp end are being taken for granted.
Christian Matheson
Just the once. The hon. Gentleman was very generous with his time, which is why I cannot be too generous with mine.
Luke Graham
Understood. I have a quick question: the hon. Gentleman said that inequality had increased and was the worst since the 1980s. Can he quote the source of that data, please? I would dispute it.
Christian Matheson
First, I do not necessarily trust the figures from the current Government, because they are well known for cooking the books, but I genuinely suggest that the hon. Gentleman comes down to any food bank—