NHS pay was only really harmonised nationally relatively recently. 'Agenda for Change' has been an arse to implement, however the who point of the process was to stop the huge numbers of sideways moves by people who could get better pay for doing the same job in a diffrent trust as the staff turnover this generated (over a prolonged period) would have cost far far more than pay harmonisation has.

It's a surefire way of persuading the Scots to vote for full independence too. Why should they vote for lower pay?

I don't think anyone could blame the Scots for breaking away from this shower of shit, although personally I hope they stay in the union. A truly federal UK is the only effective way to resolve the democratic deficit imo, devolving real power away from Whitehall to the English regions as well as the other nations. Directly-elected mayors are the bare minimum and aren't going to make much of a practical difference. I've seen people make the argument that Scottish independence could boost the regional devolution movement, but it's a risk I'm wary of taking. It seems clear to me that the north needs an effective bulwark against Westminster if it's to avoid years of further degeneration.

Britain's leading foodbank network, the Trussell Trust, says every single day it is handing out emergency food parcels to parents who are going without meals in order to feed their children, or even considering stealing food to put on the table, as the government's austerity measures start to bite.

The number of people to whom it had issued emergency food parcels had doubled in the last 12 months and was set to increase further as rising living costs, shrinking incomes and welfare cuts take their toll, the trust said, as it published its annual report, which is fast becoming a barometer of social deprivation.

This makes me spitting angry. We've worked for a hundred years in this country to eradicate poverty and hunger - and by and large managed it,or at least reduced it. Now ordinary citizens are having to rely on charity to eat, instead of having jobs or a caring state to look after them. That progress has been wilfully discarded by a few rich tossers and imbecile orange bookers - who are even worse - like Osborne and Beaker.
I'm not a violent man but in their case I'd make a happy exception.

Britain's super-rich have got even richer over the last year, with the wealthiest 1,000 UK residents now worth a record £414bn.

That's according to this year's Sunday Times Rich List, which shows that the top 1,000 wealthiest people have bucked the recession and seen their wealth grow by 4.7 per cent.

The collective fortune's of the 1,000 richest people now stands at £414.26bn, passing the previous record of £412.85bn, set in 2008 just before the financial crash.

There are 77 billionaires in the 2012 rich list, two more than the previous record of 75 in 2008.

The wealthiest Briton is Rich List veteran the Duke of Westminster, in seventh place with an estimated £7.35bn thanks to his central London property empire.

Homeless people face being moved outside their local area into rented accommodation rather than being placed on a waiting list for council housing under plans considered by a flagship Tory borough in the capital, according to leaked documents (pdf) obtained by the Guardian.

Hammersmith & Fulham council admitted last week it was in talks, along with Westminster and Kensington & Chelsea, to relocate 500 families on benefits to the Midlands – but said any agreement would not result in a large-scale exodus.

However, Hammersmith & Fulham's new strategy makes it clear that anyone claiming to be homeless will now be offered accommodation "potentially outside the borough" – a break with past policy which sought to offer the destitute a local home until they were allocated council housing.

This thinking extends to planning policy: more than 10,000 homes will be given planning consent in the borough this year, yet not one will be available to the poor on a social rent, even though mayor Boris Johnson's London plan requires a quarter of new developments to be available to those on low wages.

The authority admits its policy will "end the previously assumed link between a homelessness application and a social housing tenancy".

The council wants to prioritise "wealth creators" rather than the impoverished in its housing strategy. It claims it already has too many poor people living on social rents in the borough.

Hammersmith, which is influential with Downing Street, argues that 70% of tenants in social housing are "workless and dependent on benefits ... [and] not making a contribution that could help drive economic growth".