IT WILL BE LIKE TAKING CANDY FROM A ....VERY ANGRY SWARM OF KILLER BEES

Nick Clegg has said the government is going to get tough on executives who take home ridiculous sums of money often for failing miserably to do their job properly.


He and his government may well be reacting to the news that, word from last Wednesday's marches was that was most commonly complained about injustice was the fact that the average increases in pay at the top was 49% in comparison with the 0%-3% average of everyone else.  


To add to the insult, many of the people who managed to increase their pay by that amount had led the companies they managed into debt with bad decisions, disastrous take overs, and lack of management control on sections of the company. 


The perfect example, of course, is the CEO of Lloyd's bank, Eric Daniels, who agreed to Gordon Brown's proposal to take over HBOS without "due diligence". In short he didn't check how insolvent the bank was. He was also at the helm when all the dodgy insurance policies were sold, ripping off customers like old wallpaper in order to make a quick buck. He left the company with a loss of nearly £4 billion but took £1.4 million bonus. The company hopes to recover some of that now the full extent of his incompetence is known, but that may prove impossible!

Of course the government can't directly set the salaries of people in the private sector. I believe that was tried by way of a Prices and Incomes policy back in the 70s, and it failed, possibly because people found ways round it.


I seriously doubt that any Tory dominated cabinet would accept setting some sort of maximum payment based on multiples of, say, the minimum wage or lowest salary in the company. Not with well over 60% of party funding coming from the City and much more from rich individuals who gain from the free for all.



At the moment pay is set by committees comprising non executive directors, who usually rely on the people whose salaries they are setting to set their own salaries, as members of the remuneration committees of the companies where they are employed. So it's a you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours kind of situation. Chaps just help other chaps out. 



However, in many other European countries the committee that sets salaries for the people at the top must include a quota of shop floor workers. 


This is one idea that Clegg said the government was looking at. Labour has apparently been supportive of it (although you have to question what stopped them doing it during the 13 years they had the power to do so).


If the government is beginning to understand that constantly saying "we are all in this together" without actually meaning it or it being remotely true, is simply not enough to quell the anger of "ordinary hard working British families up and down the country", then that's a step in the right direction. Praise where it is due.


I  genuinely wish Clegg good luck with this policy. It will be an uphill struggle all the way, against the companies and his Tory backbenchers, many of whom are members of boards themselves!


Rather than 2 pics of Clegg, I though that pandas would be a more attractive alternative.