When it comes to a fair wage, the government’s hypocrisy is staggering

Letters to the editor: our readers share their views. Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

The government justifies its stance by referring to the average driver salary, implying ‘that’s more than enough’, while their own salaries have increased (PA)

The Department for Transport expresses without irony its disappointment that Aslef is “continuing to target those who travel to work, school or important medical appointments by train”. Given that there has apparently been no meeting between the union and employers or the minister for the best part of a year, many rail users would undoubtedly say the same about the government.

What we need is an efficient rail network which works properly. That includes having enough of the right people to run it who feel they are being fairly treated. Not receiving a pay rise for many years in times of high inflation while employers do is not usually seen as fair, and the government justifies its stance by referring to an average driver salary of £65,000. Its implication: that’s more than enough. Yet when MPs get more, with expenses on top, it was justified at the last rise by needing to attract “good people”, the hypocrisy is staggering.

What the government needs to do, but seems incapable of doing, is to see the big picture. Fair salaries for big responsibilities will cost the taxpayer a lot less in the long term. Throwing money in to cover short-term deficits is a waste; growing revenue from fares by getting people back using a working service will ultimately reduce the cost to the Treasury.

Charles Wood

Birmingham

Our future looks bleak

To think that the Conservatives have governed Britain for 14 years is unbelievable given that they don’t know their way out of a paper bag.

It’s difficult to find any positive changes to our lives in all that time. Although they have had more than enough time to take us out of the European Union, severely reduce our standard of living, enlarge the network of food banks, and impoverish much of the country.

We should look to the future. But unfortunately, there is little hope for us down that avenue. Our future, under the Conservatives, looks bleak. And even if we elect the Labour Party they will struggle, in one term of government, to right the wrongs accumulated over those 14 years.

As a pensioner, I have seen many PMs and MPs of all parties come and go, but I can tell you that the current crop of Conservative no-hopers are truly abysmal.

At the core of the problem is their ethos. They don’t intend to help people, just the few that keep them in power.

There appears to be a move afoot to oust Rishi Sunak and reinstall Boris Johnson as PM. Please do. It would confirm just how out of touch the Conservatives really are.

If Keir Starmer and his MPs do their job in the coming months Britain might be able to look forward to a sea change which, if his upbeat speeches turn into actions, is worth giving a chance. Given that Sunak’s administration has run out of ideas and energy to improve our living standards we must look for an alternative.

Keith Poole

Basingstoke

Next for the chop?

The fact that at least three rebel groups within the Conservative Party have now joined forces to back amendments to the Rwanda bill simply shows how split the sitting UK government has become.

With Rishi Sunak’s majority tumbling and set to fall more with by-elections in Kingswood and Wellingborough just weeks away, the sight of these right-wing so-called “Spartans” on Sunak’s back only makes the chances of the Rwanda bill being voted down at third reading all the more likely.

Just as Theresa May’s political demise was caused by bad management and Boris Johnson’s by pure dishonesty, could lame-duck Sunak be next for the chop?

With new names from marginal seats like Karl McCartney from Lincoln already starting to make moves, with Lee Anderson threatening to quit the party, and both minister without portfolio Esther McVey and David Cameron’s former chief speechwriter Danny Kruger on resignation watch, if I was Sunak I would be thinking twice before making any future plans, before it’s too late.

Geoffrey Brooking

Havant

Tory ministers should be ashamed

Work and pensions secretary Mel Stride talks of a clear plan – is he kidding? They’ve been at this for years now, they’ve spent millions, yet no one has been deported to Rwanda.

This whole affair is nothing more than a sorry disgrace, all the respective Tory leaders and ministers should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves for wasting taxpayer’s money and putting genuine asylum seekers through hell.

The Tories have failed us – period!

Dale Hughes

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