Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

If he said "I'm paying people to do nothing" then no, but that isn't the case here, he paid his son to do some work, but the comittee believed it took fewer hours to do than what was paid for.

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

who makes up the committee?

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

Not the same thing. Company executives are not public servants elected and paid for by the taxpayer.

There is no honour left in politics if we can't trust our politicians to act with integrity because there are no rules. (And they are only making him pay a little of it back.)

I did, rotten and rancid, like I said.

From today's Daily Telegraph:

The rest of this scathing 3 page report, entitled "Derek Conway's head and shoulders in the trough", is here.

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/h...re/7223828.stm

Another fine example........

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

So why did you compare it to private business then in the first place? :confused:

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

It may have been posted before:Taxi bill and travel for Mrs Martin

But all this is very common with expenses accounts. How else can one afford 6 quid for a class of ordinary plonk?

How many times you forget the receipt and you cannot make a claim?

I was given a lot of *******ing for claiming for a usb charger for my mobile phone: I had to prove that I made no personal calls from the phone... I threw the claim away. And many more....

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

I compared what would have happened to me, and a hypothetical council employee, if we had stolen money from our employers. In all probability, we'd have been sacked and possibly faced criminal proceedings, unlike MPs.

What makes MPs so special?

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

OT, but an interesting example of how expenses aren't always run very well.

A fairly senior manager in an unnamed firm needed to take a trip on Virgin Trains, and looked for the cheapest advance fare. Because the cheap Standard class tickets had all been sold, the cheapest available fare was First Class, with all the trimmings, so she bought that. On submitting the expense claim she was carpeted by a Finance Director for wasting the company's money on First Class rail travel, despite clearly having picked the cheapest ticket...

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

The missus went on Virgin Trains the other day. The First Class ticket was cheaper than the economy one. seriously.

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

Yes, the First class problem...I was really fed up with explaining to the accountants that almost every Eurostar train has 25 First class seats that are cheaper than second class. In the end, I picked up the phone and I spoke to the senior management of Eurostar. The frogs renamed those seats as "leisure Select" and voila no problem with the accountants...

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

Given that MPs are apparently self-employed I wondered if they were governed by the same rules as mere mortals.

If a job comes available in a company, the company is required to advertise and interview candidates. This means that there is a job specification and a person specification that the candidate has to meet. Similar process occur for cvil service posts. Wonder if this process happened in these cases .

It does appear that MPs are above the law in that they don't have to submit to legal requirements which they lay down for others.

They are not subject to the Freedom Of Information Act and now we learn that they appear to be above criminal investigation even by the Anti-Terrorist police.

They are able to claim for allowances for duties which one would have thought to be part of the job e.g. attendance allowance. Imagine if your boss said that every time you came to work you would receive an allowance over and above your salary.

Derek Conway's comment that the wives of a number of MPs have used their maiden names to make the link to the MP less obvious seems to suggest that MPs are conscious of the fact that employing family members would be perceived unfavourably, which indeed it has.

Interesting too that Party Leaders can only ASK MPs to be more transparent rather than like the rest of us be legally required too.

Given all this, it begs the question who are MPs actually accountable too especially as they keep all the business in house, have a rather weak Parliamentary Ombudsman and only react positively when electors become aware of their Parliamentary transgressions?

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

Well, don't forget that MPs effectively have two jobs - they have to be available to their constituents, and have to appear in Westminster. Ministers will have even more work to do.

Re: Another MP in trouble?
 

Surely that would be claimed under travel expenses.

For example when a sales rep turns up to a meeting with a client in one part of the country he does not get an attendance allowance for turning up. He's expected to turn up and has been paid to do so.

If he then has a client in another part of the country similarly he does not receive an attendance allowance just for turning up but claims travel expenses.

We seem to have a system whereby MPs get paid an attendance alllowance and claim expenses as well. Even worse we do not appear to have a rigorous method of auditing MP's claims to see if they are valid.