Letter from Parliament - Simon Danczuk MP

Simon Danczuk, Rochdale MP

In 1951 a young, aspiring politician named Cyril Smith complained about the rates of pay of council officials and criticised plans to increase officers pay from £20 a week to £22. Attacking the “runaway growth of public expenditure” and arguing that “the levelling of wages should commence at the top, not the bottom”, this young politician registered a concern shared by many at the time.

Fast-forward 60 years and public concerns about excessive salaries to council officials have not gone away. Only this time the pay rises are bigger and more offensive to people struggling to make ends meet. The idea that last week’s proposal for a £40,000 pay rise to Rochdale Council’s chief executive, along with other similarly eye-watering rises to senior council officers, would be deemed acceptable by the public shows to me that common sense is in short supply amongst the Council’s leadership.

Although I upset some colleagues by calling this a scandal and asking for the proposal to be dropped, I make no apology for merely expressing the same anger that was felt by thousands of others in Rochdale. If our politics is going to mean anything to the public then it has to stay rooted in people’s everyday concerns, it has to be recognisable to the realities they face and it has to reflect the public will. We do not need a politics that’s conducted through expensive consultants’ reports. We need one that’s in tune with the views of local people.

That extends beyond the town hall to Westminster where there is a similarly pressing need for ministers to do more to rebalance our economy away from London. Despite the Chancellor, George Osborne, promising not to “put all our chips” on London and support greater economic development across the country, he’s failed to do this. London is racing away from the rest of the country, and responsible for half the UK’s output. Meanwhile, unfair and excessive business rates are holding northern high streets back, unemployment across the North West has just risen by 8.6 per cent and a growing north-south divide is emerging.

However, one area where the north remains dominant is rugby league. And on the eve of the Rugby League World Cup there’s a real buzz in our town. I was delighted to attend the civic reception for Rochdale Hornets this week after their promotion success – and I’m looking forward to welcoming Fijan supporters to our town for their game against Ireland next week.