News round-up

Poverty wages for Londoners

LONDON has always been a city where great wealth and opulence has lived side by side with great poverty and deprivation and this divide is widening according to the charity Trust for London, which reports that one in fiver London workers get poverty wages.

 The study said the number of jobs paying below the so-called "London living wage" had risen by 100,000 to 580,000 between 2010 and 2011.

 Last year Mayor Boris Johnson raised the recommended minimum hourly wage to £8.30, a rise of 45 pence.

 Trust for London said the living wage benefited workers, employers and the Government.

 The anti-poverty charity said the Treasury could save almost £1bn a year if companies paid the wage in London, due to extra taxes and less spending on welfare.

 The research was carried out by Jane Wills, a professor of geography at Queen Mary, University of London.

 She said 55 per cent of those interviewed said it was difficult to manage their household expenses.

 One said they spent half of their wages on repaying debt, while others said they worked very long hours.

 Enhance Office Cleaning introduced the wage in 2010. Sandy Aird, its managing director, said the company believed it was "morally right" to do so.

 He added the company now had a lower staff turnover due to the wage increase.

Cop in court

POLICE Constable Alex MacFarlane appeared in Southwark Crown Court last week on charges of racially aggravated intentional harassment in an incident shortly after the August 2011 riots, in which the victim recorded police remarks on his mobile phone.

 MacFarlane denies causing racially aggravated intentional harassment, alarm or distress to Mauro Demetrio on 11 August 2011.

 Mauro Demetrio believes he was stopped on suspicion of drug-driving because he was black.

 The court had heard the heated exchange between the men recorded by Demetrio, which and included an alleged racial insult where Demetrio was told: "The problem with you is you will always be a nigger."

 MacFarlane claims that Demetrio was abusive to him first. The PC said: "Because of the racist abuse towards the police I challenged him."