Cable admits concerns about Treasury push for regional pay rates in public sector

PUBLIC SECTOR

Cable admits concerns about Treasury push for regional pay rates in public sector

Business secretary Vince Cable has warned of “practical problems” with HM Treasury’s plans for regional pay in the public sector. Cable reckons that not only are there issues about wages being “levelled down”, there is also a danger that local pay rates could affect career progression across the public sector.

He told WalesOnline: “The government’s overall approach is, as you know, to try to encourage flexibility but I do recognise the practical problems in the public sector. It isn’t just the political issue that people are going to be levelled down in some of the relatively low wage areas; I think there is this genuine problem about how you get a career progression [among] long-term civil servants if you have differential pay.

Cable said he was not opposed to the government’s policy but said: “[I] do recognise the practical difficulties. I realise it’s a subject we have to approach with very great care.”

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In his autumn statement George Osborne asked the pay review bodies for the NHS, school teachers, prison service and senior salaries to make recommendations on how pay can be “made more responsive” to local labour market conditions.

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Title: “Business secretary Vince Cable admits issues with regional pay push”, by David Williamson, WalesOnline, 23 January 2012.

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