Sum Rise!

BRITAIN'S workers have taken a massive kick in the pay packet over the last seven years, new figures reveal.

Wages have been rising by a pitiful ONE PER CENT a year on average since 2002 - an increase of barely £2 A WEEK.

And some some parts of the country have seen their income plummet by a FIFTH as hundreds of thousands of staff were forced to accept pay cuts because of the recession.

The depressing figures, released by the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, highlight a worrying growth in the gap between rich and poor - with the greatest share of national wealth spent on wages for the prosperous middle classes and super-rich.

Study author Stewart Lansley said: "For the last 30 years Britain's low and middle earners have seen their pay and living conditions stall while the incomes of the affluent, the rich and super-rich have vastly outpaced them."

The study pinpoints the Eden district in Cumbria as the worst place for wages. The collapse of manufacturing and a steep drop in tourist bookings combined to cut pay there by a whacking 21.7 per cent to an average wage of £350 a week in the seven years to April 2009.

Also among the top five worst areas hit by rising unemployment and people being forced into poorer paid jobs were Great Yarmouth, Norfolk (16.3 per cent wage drop, average pay £345 a week), County Durham's Wear Valley (15.5, £387), Worcestershire's Malvern Hills (14.8, £390) and Denbighshire, Wales (14.8, £364).

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Tax expert Charlie Elphicke, of the Centre for Policy Studies think tank, told us: "It's not just the recession to blame. Real pay packets have been flat for seven years now, but the recession hasn't helped. Things need to change. The government must build a richer future for our pay packets and the nation."

TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said: "The truth is that ordinary families have had their wages squeezed and have had to borrow money which should have been part of the wage packet instead.

"While the super-rich have secured themselves a personal wealth boom on a scale not seen since Dickensian times those on middle incomes have slipped behind."

ian.kirby@notw.co.uk

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