Cameron imposes ministers pay cut

David Cameron has stamped his authority on the first meeting of his new coalition Cabinet ordering a 5% pay cut for his ministerial team.

David Cameron will hold his first Cabinet meeting David Cameron will hold his first Cabinet meeting [PA]

The Prime Minister and his Liberal Democrat deputy Nick Clegg also issued a warning to ministers in the new Lib-Con alliance against airing their differences in public.

The two men will chair a Coalition Committee set up specifically to ensure any disputes which arise between ministers are swiftly resolved behind closed doors.

However the first strains in the new coalition were appearing on the backbenches, with one Tory MP warning publicly that the Lib Dems lacked the discipline to sustain the Government for a full five years and there were also reports of unrest brewing in the Conservative ranks over plans to legislate for fixed-term parliaments, intended to reassure the Lib Dems that Mr Cameron will not call a snap election when they are at a disadvantage.

Ian Liddell-Grainger, the Conservative MP for Bridgwater and West Somerset, said the Lib Dems were subject to "incredible swings" from left to right, making them unreliable coalition partners.

"You will always have at least 50% of the Liberals who will never agree with what's happened whereas in the Tories we will hold our noses much better to say: 'No, we have just got to do this,'" he told a news organisation.

Meanwhile, other Conservatives were said to be unhappy over the proposal for legislation requiring a vote of 55% of MPs for Parliament to be dissolved before the end of the five-year term. The plan was angrily denounced by former Labour ministers as a "stitch up". Former justice secretary Jack Straw said it was "completely undemocratic and totally unworkable".

Mr Cameron was doing his best to smooth over any tensions, heaping praise on Business Secretary Vince Cable, the new Lib Dem Cabinet minister thought to be the most uncomfortable at the idea of working with the Tories.

For Mr Cameron, the cut means he will receive an annual salary of £142,500 - £7,500 less than the £150,000 Gordon Brown was drawing when he left office. The salaries for other Cabinet ministers will be cut from £141,647 to £134,565, while the pay for a junior minister in the Commons will be reduced from £94,142 to £89,435.

No 10 estimates that the reductions will save £300,000 this year and around £3 million over the lifetime of the Parliament.

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