Now let me preface this by saying that any raise to the minimum wage is a good thing, and it can be argued that this pledge raises it more than other parties had promised in their manifestos. (Although this is less clear when weighed against cuts to things like working-tax credits also announced)
I was looking for facts more than opinions and the most useful was The Living Wage foundations site (http://www.livingwage.org.uk/calculation)
Well, if you look at that link you'll see that the living wage for the UK in general is considered to be £7.85. Quite a difference from the £7.20 that the government have announced and labeled "Living Wage". And that's just outside London. Within London the living wage is considered to be £9.15. A massive £1.95 difference to the just announced amount.
So this is already looking a bit shaky. Add on top of that the fact that they have already stated what it will raise to within 5 years, not as a minimum but as an exact amount, without knowing what inflation will be over those 5 years and it become very likely that the best we can hope for is that the disparity between the new minimum and the Actual living wage stays the same, however if the economy improves (as the government obviously hopes it will) that gap could actually become bigger.
Taking this into consideration it's clear that what this announcement is isn't a "Living Wage" at all, it's merely a current (and possibly temporary) lessening of the gap between the minimum wage and the actual living wage. By trying to inaccurately co-opt the "living wage" term they are deceiving the electorate and trying and make their policies appear better than they are. Which is a shame because if they had been honest and called this what it is, just a 70p raise to the minimum wage, they would have deserved a bit of credit.
I say a bit because I haven't even gone into the fact that this only applies to over-25s.
Hopefully the living wage foundation and others who support a true living wage will make sure people know the difference.
