3 posts from 2008

Nice, howies t-shirt of the week : subprime minister

I really liked Nick Cleggs conference speech last week, unfortunately it doesn't match his actions when it comes to things like drugs, prostitution or even reform of parliament.

Last I heard he was still backing the speaker of the house and some other MPs to decide the new rules for expenses, not exactly revolutionary.

I would have thought that expenses rules would be fairly simple - after all we have the ready-made set of expenses rules that apply to the rest of us - HMRC has clear, well documented rules about expenses - they are quite generous enough and the legions of self employed people in the UK manage to (and are required by law) to account for their spending with receipts, etc.

It's not unreasonable to remove perks - outside of London, an MPs salary is almost unattainable, certainly in the top 0.5%, and nationally it's in the top 5%, and given the number of staff MPs can employ at no cost to themselves, the workload isn't unreasonable, nor is the travel to/from westminster.

The 2nd home in london scam is pure profiteering, it's beyond a perk, and in many cases it crosses into blatent fraud and property speculation. A more reasonable alternative would be to provide a minimal allowance, which the MP can "top up" to make rental or mortgage payments, but any mortgage would be held by the state rather than the MP - when the MP no longer requires the property they relinquish it and any financial gains (or losses) are left with the state (which after all paid).

Well thanks Nick Clegg for not sticking with the status quo, and really rocking the boat with your bold leadership on reforming parliament.

I think it's great you're supporting somebody who claimed tens of thousands of quid for his wifes shopping trips and pocket 20 grand more to cover accomodation costs that he didn't have, and best of all - this chap is doing the review of MP expenses, gosh it doesn't look like a corrupt old boys at all.

I'm sure that we as a nation can follow suit and you'd support us if we all decided to fiddle our tax returns and put things like shopping, family travel, lap dancers, etc through our books. I'm sure the Inland revenue wouldn't quibble over a few tens of thousands of pounds for us all, and it certainly wouldn't mean being prosecuted for fraud.

Speaking of bold moves - how is your big push for reform of drugs legislation? Oh. yeah. It doesn't exist. Did you forget about it? Don't be surprised that you will be forgotten too unless you stand out - because right now when people say our party doesn't matter or make a difference, with the notable exception of Vince Cable and some excellent MPs that feels like the truth at the moment.