Danny “Beaker” Alexander (pictured), the newly appointed Chief-Secretary to the Treasury, is the man charged with swinging the spending cuts axe, enforcing a public-sector pay freeze and sacking quangocrats.

It has to be done to bring down Labour’s deficit and tackle the government’s debt crisis – Britain’s deficit is second only to that of Greece.

The Coalition has been spinning that they are taking a 5% cut in ministerial salaries, which sounds very noble, setting an example and leading from the front, except when you realise that every single one of them will see their income rise.

Take the example of Danny Alexander, he was on an MPs’ basic pay of£65,737 before the election, a month later he is on £134,565, a whopping 104% pay rise.  Not exactly suffering personally under the new austerity regime he is supposed to enforce is he? Are we really “all in this together”?

He would argue that following his promotion he has additional responsibilities, but do they justify more than doubling his pay? Is he working twice as many hours? Who (besides a politician) would argue that a lucky promotion justifies doubling your pay?