Thread by @rcolvile

Another day, another sloppy, bad-faith piece from the @Independent's 'chief business commentator' @JimMooreJourno on public sector pay independent.co.uk/independentpre…

When he first wrote about this, he failed to address the disparity between private sector and public sector pay at all, or the disparity in terms of the impact of the pandemic.

If you read what he says this time, the implication is that the public sector have suffered disproportionately. There's no other charitable interpretation of this section.

But the same IFS report he is quoting makes absolutely clear that public sector pay has 'fallen' from a position of significant superiority to private to rough parity for the same type of work.

This is without considering pensions, which as the IFS has said, and everyone with even the vaguest interest in this area knows, bumps up the differential hugely - eg from 3% to 20% in 2007

As for the fact that private pay and job security fell massively post 2008, and are doing so again, as per these graphs? Moore airily claims that 'the private sector is expected to bounce back next year'.

Again, this is just not true. The OBR's central scenario for the pandemic shows GDP and employment not returning to 2020 levels until 2023. It's a few months out of date, but literally no one is predicting a V-shape at this point

You can get a flavour of Moore's politics from the fact that the only person he got a quote from in his original report was Frances O'Grady, head of the TUC. Although he called her France O'Grade, just like he called me 'Colville' throughout #premium

Anyway, I'm very happy to discuss/debate @CPSThinkTank's ideas with people who actually use facts - eg @julianHjessop, who's cited in the second piece. But this kind of bad-faith bullshit pisses me off.