Sponsored by
Curb huge salaries, Leeds MPs urge
TWO Leeds Labour MPs want the Government to create an organisation with the teeth to curb whopping salaries and bonuses.
John Battle (Leeds West) and Colin Burgon (Elmet) want "fairer pay" across the business world and have joined a coalition of campaigners who want ministers to take "decisive action" on excessive payouts.
Mr Battle told the YEP: "We cannot have people flying away at the top end into real wealth while the people at the bottom are still held down."
Centre-left pressure group Compass has organised a campaign amid rising public anger that huge bonuses continue to be paid out by UK banks.
Barclays recently provoked outrage after announcing it was giving a 30m reward package to just five staff.
See what's in store for us with our video weather forecast
The Compass campaign calls for the creation of a high pay commission to look at measures such as linking executive pay to ordinary workers' wages and heavily taxing bonuses.
It also urged the Government to take a "moral lead" by setting "reasonable pay structures" in public sector organisations.
Mr Battle was a minister in the Department for Trade and Industry in 1997 when the low pay commission was established to help implement the minimum wage.
He believes maximum pay ratios should now be introduced, where the top earner of a company could never earn more than a certain multiple of the lowest earner.
Mr Burgon added: "The pay of chief executives has ballooned as a proportion of the pay of those workers on the lowest salaries. Whereas they may in the past have been getting paid 30 times what the lowest paid got, it has now gone up to 50, 60 or 80 times that amount."
A letter published by a national newspaper calling for a high pay commission has been signed by more than 100 campaigners, politicians, union leaders and academics including Dr Ian Greer, a senior research fellow at Leeds University Business School.
City watchdog, the Financial Services Authority has dropped dozens of proposals aimed at stamping out risk-taking and watered down rules aimed at ending the bonus culture.
However, Chancellor Alistair Darling has made it clear that he is prepared to bring in new laws to curb city bonuses.
WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THIS STORY. CLICK THE COMMENT BUTTON BELOW TO HAVE YOUR SAY - WE'LL PUBLISH THE BEST IN FRIDAY'S YORKSHIRE EVENING POST.
Email to a friend
Print this page- Politics: Mark Hookham's Westminster blog - 5.33pm
- Castleford RSPB Fairburn Ings: High wire act Swallows’ summer parade
- Worker dies on North Yorkshire Moors Railway
- Video: Restaurant reopens on Leeds Harry Ramsden’s site after £500,000 refit
- Chocolat author will tempt guests at Leeds Big Bookend Festival
Looking for...
Featured advertisers
Jobs
Search for a job
Motors
Search for a car
Property
Search for a house
Weather for Leeds
Friday 25 May 2012
Today
Sunny
Temperature: 10 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 20 mph
Wind direction: East
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 8 C to 20 C
Wind Speed: 16 mph
Wind direction: East
