MP - expenses - first class travel

[whole diary]

[Trowres]

Maybe there is some merit in paying MPs^▸ (Member of Parliament, or Mile Post - a method of measuring the railway in miles and chains from a starting point - usually London, depending on context) £100k? - provided working practices are modernised

[TaplowGreen]

In my job before retirement, we were expensed with first class rail fares and were a lot less important to the country than MP^▸ (Member of Parliament, or Mile Post - a method of measuring the railway in miles and chains from a starting point - usually London, depending on context)'s.

When that was ended, we just went by car, avoiding the standard class scrum.

My HSBC CEO^▸ (Chief Executive Officer) gets £5M a year. Paying MP's £85k/yr in SW1 is a recipe for incompetence and corruption.

Singapore shows the way pay by paying premium rates for the public service (and expecting performance).

OTC

......it would seem obscenely high salaries are a similar recipe (although perhaps with more expensive ingredients?) 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-59689581

[IndustryInsider]

Maybe there is some merit in paying MPs^▸ (Member of Parliament, or Mile Post - a method of measuring the railway in miles and chains from a starting point - usually London, depending on context) £100k? - provided working practices are modernised

Don’t they already have Sunday in the working week?

[onthecushions]

......it would seem obscenely high salaries are a similar recipe (although perhaps with more expensive ingredients?) 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-59689581

I think that there's probably a "bathtub" curve for salaries; too little and the job's done badly or not at all, too much and you've  a complacent fat-cat, living on another planet from both his employees and customers.

OTC

[johnneyw]

As the Chief Accountant for the South Western Electricity Board in the days before privatisation, my father was entitled to claim for first class rail travel.  His stance however was that, as an employee in a state industry, it was more appropriate to travel standard class, especially as overcrowding never seemed to be an issue on the odd occasion he had to use the train for business purposes.

[Witham Bobby]

You do of course reach the point where you need to provide enough of an incentive for talented people to want to become MP^▸ (Member of Parliament, or Mile Post - a method of measuring the railway in miles and chains from a starting point - usually London, depending on context)’s in the first place.  The annual salary is very low (£85k) compared with similar jobs people of the required talent can get in the private sector.  Some form of perks for the job are necessary and inevitable, otherwise you simply won’t get MP’s that are good enough.

Whilst public money should not be squandered I personally have no problem with what current guidelines state in that if a first class advance is cheaper than the standard single that should be allowed, and indeed encouraged where possible as it does provide a better work environment.

I've long held the view that an MP's salary should be linked to the average salary in his or her constituency.  Probably not a multiple of 1, but maybe 2 or 2.5 times average.  This should keep MPs fighting for their constituent's economic benefit and (please) stop them all toeing the party line so much (particularly when they're members of the governing party(ies).

[onthecushions]

The regressive nature of taxation means that you have to have a gross income much higher than 2.5 times the average, to take home a disposable 2.5 times the average. Also, one's expenses are proportionately higher in Council tax, clothing etc etc.

Lower pay could work if the necessaries were provided separately (not as an expenses claim), such as accomodation, travel, food on site, etc.

My retired railway officer friends have silver and gold passes, after all.

OTC