Yep. I did about ten years....Crap is a little bit harsh although it'd of been a lot better without the southerners.

Wouldn't be difficult to implement a sensible sliding scale. It'll only cause unrest in those places that have a complete lack of understanding towards life outside of their home towns.

Which is half of the country - not just a few in Yorkshire or Lancashire. I don't have a lack of understanding either. I understand that in London and surrounding areas it is expensive to live, so instead of punishing workers in the North for this, why not look at WHY its expensive and see what can be done about it. Landlords for a start charging a kings ransom to live in a shed at the bottom of the garden.

Why is it that so many Northeners have such a persecution complex? It doesn't seem coincidental to me that the more rational posters on here have fled South

I'm going out now to buy some expensive Southern petrol and expensive Southern goods, why are we Southeners punished like this? It's absolutely outrageous

Like I said, there is already an essential worker allowance for London, you aren't listening either, this is not about London. Is it more expensive to live in Cambridge, Norfolk, Leicester? Will those towns and cities be in the North or South??

Having recently come back from holidaying "down south" the disel was far cheaper than in Hull, so please don't patronise.

In the public sector there is already a London weighting so wages there already reflect the difference and it is completely transparent. The job pays the same hourly rate wherever you are in the country but if you are in London you get the weighting so there is no need for this policy.

The policy is clearly all about paying people less in the regions and nothing else.

The net effect will be to depress there regional economies further as spending power decreases further and push more people into the bracket where they can claim benefits so the tax payer will subsidise them anyway.

We have also seen this week another leak about the likely content of the budget which is the scrapping of the 50p tax rate for higher earners.

So at one and the same time the Tory party is going to tax the rich less and reduce the wages of the ordinary person. They truly are the scum of the earth in my opinion.

I know this place is more left wing than a seagulls port side but how naive do you have to be to think this is a bad idea?

If a card carrying leftwing nut job nurse in Hull thinks it's unfair get her to move to London or Kent or Surrey and pay her the same, see what she says after a year.

Besides if the nurse is unhappy up north on the pitiful wages move down south, it would seem the English are the least mobile work force in the world and refuse to work further than 6 miles from where they were born.

Yeah everyone living in the south works doesn't it.