I’m fed up with MP’s complaining about their salaries – this morning on Radio 4 we had Nadine Dorries claiming the expense scandal
Was because no prime minister had ever had the political courage to give MPs an appropriate pay rise.
Now the pay for a backbench MP is £64,766 which taking the UK median of £479 a week which equates to around £30,000 a year – now why should MPs be paid any more than double the average? The current financial crisis blows a hole in the theory that huge salaries attract the best – or if that’s the best then what’s the worse? Personally I believe MPs are paid too much, we don’t want career politicians we want people who enter politics because of their beliefs and convictions it’s why I was once a member of the Labour Party and why I’m no longer a member.
Good points there. Hopefully the crap concept about “we need to pay to attract the best” has been put to bed by the whole dreadful show. My MP says that he needs the money or he may as well go back to being a merchant banker. Some say you need to pay to attract people who have had real life experience in running a business. I say any prospective MP needs to have experience of real life as lived by the majority, ie low wages and a struggle to make ends meet. I’m hoping the career politician class is going to be killed off by the latest events.
I was in the Labour Party once, but left when it went right under Kinnock. Would never go back there now.