Paid more than the PM?

An ugly alliance between some trade unions and anti-public sector populists in the coalition is taking hold. The latest victim is a London headteacher, whom the Daily Mail (editor's salary: £1.1m a year) this morning claims is being paid £276,000 a year. In fact, he is being paid £82,000 a year as an inner London head, and received around £50,000 a year for helping improve other inner city schools through the very successful London Challenge. The rest would seem to be out of hours work, arrears and pension contributions. In other words, he is being paid for more than being head of his primary school, and even then his salary for the two jobs is closer to £140,000 a year. We are invited to compare this 'outstanding' head's pay (inflated by the GMB and their pals in the Mail to £276k) with the saintly David Cameron, who toils away cutting the public sector for a mere £142,000 a year.

But is it true that Cameron earns just £142k? Well, not exactly. First, the millionaire PM has the ultimate two grace and favour homes at his disposal - the 11 Downing Street flat and Chequers - the annual rental value of which would surely bump up the value of his salary quite a bit. Then, he gets his travel sorted with a chauffeur-driven car. And he has a pretty hefty pension to boot, all of which would surely bump the real value of his salary towards the £300,000 mark. I don't say he shouldn't get such a deal - of course he should as Prime Minister. I just wish he and his acolytes would stop being so sanctimonious about the pay of other public sector leaders who don't enjoy his perks.

Secrets, lies and grown-up politics

George Osborne has a rather shabby piece in today's Mail on Sunday accusing Gordon Brown of lying over planned spending cuts. Yet the economically illiterate Osborne has been caught by the independent Institute of Fiscal Studies - so often cited by David Cameron - either telling massive porkies of his own or being asleep on the job, as he tried to claim that figures in the public domain about projected tax receipts as a result of growth were a secret plan to put 3p on taxation.

Meanwhile, having expressed a relish for savage cuts, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg was impressively evasive on this morning's Andrew Marr show about what it would all mean. He couldn't even bring himself to pledge to keep tuition fees, one of the most progressive changes introduced by the Labour government, because as Charles Kennedy effectively admitted on the same show, it had been useful in hoodwinking student voters in some university seats.

But perhaps the most remarkable intervention of the day is from the schools secretary Ed Balls, who has been thinking imaginatively about using federations and sharing senior staff, as well as keeping teachers' pay in check, to drive down costs. While the Sunday Times suggests this is about secondary schools, it is particularly valuable in small rural primaries, which cannot sustain or often cannot find a head for each school. Whether this is easy to introduce given the relative independence of state schools remains to be seen, and its desirability will be questioned in some cases, but at least it has the merit of honesty in a debate that has been characterised by people shouting 'liar' at the opponents whilst claiming honesty for their own imprecision.

Yet, when this idea is put to Honest Nick Clegg, who surely knows exactly what Balls means, all he can do is throw about silly accusations about damaging children's lives. What people want from Clegg and Osborne is a sense of where they believe savings could be made. And they then want those things debated on their merits. The yah-booh-sucks politics of previous elections - of which I know Balls was an advocate until some months ago and from which Vince Cable is often impressively immune - has little place in these straitened times. It is time that all those engaged in the political debate realised it and treated us all like grown-ups.

Candour on spending is vital

The Sunday Times reports that there is a split within the cabinet on the best way to approach the spending debate and the battle lines with the Tories at the next election. On capital investment, this Government has an excellent story, which can be illustrated in every constituency with new schools, health centres and other public buildings. That capital may fall in future years as a result of the recession would still mean that far more is being invested that under the Tories, who provided less than a billion pounds in 1996 for school building.

But the Government is in danger of obscuring the real progress that it has made for two reasons. The first is that it has largely given up reminding people of the difference that has been made. An audit of school buildings in 2007 showed that by that stage over 1100 completely new schools had been built since 1997, yet there has been little effort made to update the data, partly because of a bizarre Year Zero approach that characterised the early Brown period.

But the second more pertinent danger is that a lack of candour on public spending will deny legitimacy both to the real achievements on the genuine differences in approach between the Tories and Labour. It is vital that ministers have the chance to set out in detail ahead of the election exactly what will be spent or invested - and what will need to be saved - in the years ahead. Only then can the party genuinely erect dividing lines with a Tory party that failed to invest when in power and is unlikely to provide the further necessary investment if it wins power again.