This morning’s Western Mail reports that Nick Bourne’s Welsh Conservatives are going to oppose plans to set up an independent body to fix AMs’ salaries and allowances.
This is despite the fact that it formed part of the recommendations made by the panel chaired by Sir Roger Jones that reported in July and which Mr. Bourne signed up to.
They argue that the panel will cost money and could open the door to regional pay agreements for public sector workers. What nonsense. The Tories’ preferred solution is to use the Senior Salaries Review Board instead. That also costs money and because it would report on Wales separately could also be said to be creating a regional pay structure.
The issue here is the recommendation by Sir Roger Jones’ panel that that the link between the system of financial support in Wales and at Westminster should be severed. The panel felt that the system of financial support should take account of the unique perspective of the work of members in Wales. To achieve this, the panel recommended that an Independent Remuneration Panel be set up in Wales.
With the SSRB, Assembly Members would still be involved in setting their own pay and allowances, there would be no account taken of how we operate in Wales and our pay and allowances would be tied into the discredited system at Westminster. Is that what the Tories really want?
With the proposed remuneration panel all powers to set pay and allowances would be taken off Assembly Members, a solution which seems more in keeping with the public mood.
As ITV commentator Gareth Hughes says on his blog, the Tories by opposing this move will be putting themselves on the wrong side of public opinion. He asks why why the Welsh Tories seem to be out of step with their own Westminster front bench. After all, as Gareth points out Cameron and his team have consistently called for transparency on the question of pay and provisions. Quite!
N.B. One cannot help noticing the headline in yesterday’s Telegraph that predicts that MPs are to be offered a pay rise to make up for a loss of income from expenses claims.
Under the Tories’ plans that pay rise would also filter through to AMs because the link between Cardiff Bay and Westminster would be retained. That is despite the fact that we are not having to radically restructure our allowances regime in the same way as Westminster because the abuses inherent in their system are not present here and never have been.
Just thought I would mention that.
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