Budget 2008

[Mabs]

i would be interested to see the lib dems get in on their own , would be interesting to see what they would do
end of the day, all politicians are a waste of space tbh, and i hate liars at the end of the day.. oh you can have a referendum on EU stuff.. hmm didnt come out the way we wanted, lets change the wording a bit, so we dont technically have to ask you anymore then push it thru. fuck the lot of them, almost tempted to vote BNP in future, if the countries going down, it might aswell go down in flames.

uke:

 

[Raven]

Y'see, I think this is a bit of a red herring; MPs earn £60K a year and have to live in their constituency and in London; its not unreasonable to claim expenses on a London home, because on that salary they simply couldn't afford to do the job otherwise. The important thing isn't "ooh, its taxpayers money, blah, blah, blah", its that such expenses should be properly accounted for, which is the real issue.

I don't have a problem with them claiming expenses for a second home in London, they need somewhere to stay but when you see how much they are allowed to spend on each item a year its ridiculous. They should scrap the second home allowance and instead the government should buy houses for the MPs and pay for their upkeep, properly managed through a neutral agency.

 

[Mabs]

I don't have a problem with them claiming expenses for a second home in London, they need somewhere to stay but when you see how much they are allowed to spend on each item a year its ridiculous. They should scrap the second home allowance and instead the government should buy houses for the MPs and pay for their upkeep, properly managed through a neutral agency.

as i see it, they are somewhere to sleep when working in london. thus they dont need a "home". they need a bed, a shower, and a toilet. a hotel type building would suffice for almost all of them and cut down on the space needed . ( no i didnt say a hotel, just a building with lots of single rooms they can all live in)
uke:

 

[Damini]

It's all a bit stupid really - it's revealing a very public plaster for what we all know is a gaping chest wound of an economy. I feel a little bit like that scene in Star Wars, where I'm dumped in with a load of crap and the walls are closing in. Yes, it's lovely that all the official things that mark the consumer price index say that inflation is at something like 2%, but my rising gas bill, electric bill, council tax, water rates, petrol costs, show that something is amiss there. The gold supplies were flogged for ridiculously cheap at the beginning of Brown's "NOTHING UP MY SLEEVES" slight of hand magic economy run, the pension funds were raided, and then millions of pounds flooded into companies that would fail simply to buoy labour votes up long enough to see them safe before letting the industry crumble. The theft and waste of this government has been criminal.

The whole economy is rotten. If you were to tap it too hard, it would crack. It's supported by far too much debt, and the piggy banks that the Conservatives left behind are empty. The average briton has to work for SEVENTY days a year just to pay off the interest on what they owe, before even addressing the debt itself.

IMO, It's going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better. The only real issue is whether Labour will admit how bad it is, and how much they are going to have to do in order to try to turn it around, or if they are going to brazenly Emperor's New Clothes it all the way into a full on recession, insisting nothing is wrong just so they can stay in power.

Either way, I'm sure they'll find a way to blame it on the Tories.

 

[DaGaffer]

I don't have a problem with them claiming expenses for a second home in London, they need somewhere to stay but when you see how much they are allowed to spend on each item a year its ridiculous. They should scrap the second home allowance and instead the government should buy houses for the MPs and pay for their upkeep, properly managed through a neutral agency.

I guarantee that would cost the taxpayer more. If only for the fifteen layers of bureaucracy it would add. As for how much they spend on stuff for homes; once again, it doesn't strike me as particularly bad; however, they also put things like staff PCs etc. on expenses and that is wasteful; things like that should be centrally sourced.

as i see it, they are somewhere to sleep when working in london. thus they dont need a "home". they need a bed, a shower, and a toilet. a hotel type building would suffice for almost all of them and cut down on the space needed . ( no i didnt say a hotel, just a building with lots of single rooms they can all live in)

So what you're saying is that they should live like students. Sorry, but you're being ridiculous. MPs are typically in office for five years, even if they only serve one term; for a lot of them it can be the best part of their working lives, and you want them to live in a glorified dorm. Apart from the obvious security implications; I wouldn't want to live like that, so why should I expect it of them?

MP expenses seem over the top, and clearly some of them are abusing the system, but to put it into context, their pay is low (for what they do, it is. I earn a lot more, with less responsibility), and they carry overheads on expenses (which is an area that should be fixed). If you compared the actual costs per MP versus a senior manager at a decent sized company (throwing in salary, expenses, cars, overheads etc. and I'm talking below Board level and not even looking at stock options) especially if it was a manager who travels as much as MPs do, then the costs wouldn't be that different.

 

[Mabs]

no im saying they should live like that when we are paying for it, and they have a 25 room house in the country that is their "home"
and i dont care about the money, they are public servants, says so on the job description, they should be doing it cos they want to improve thing (har fucking har) not cos they want to get rich
im fed up of the image of hard done to politicians who can only manage 2 cars, 3 kids in public school, 2 houses, holidays to the med twice a year, boo hoo. now i know not all of them do it, or are that well off, but as long as one of them does it, it tars them with same brush. if you started making like actually HARD for them, then you might get people in office who are prepared to put up with that rather than people who want to do a 5 year stint, write a nice book, and then go on the lecturing circuit ?

 

[DaGaffer]

. if you started making like actually HARD for them, then you might get people in office who are prepared to put up with that rather than people who want to do a 5 year stint, write a nice book, and then go on the lecturing circuit ?

Nice theory, but it doesn't work. That was the original logic behind MPs pay. All that happens is that the only people who can afford to stand for office are those that already have an independent income, in other words, the rich. You have to make MP's pay enough that it will allow the talented or able to become MPs without sacrificing too much, but not enough that they're doing it for the money. You may think MPs earn too much, but its all a matter of perspective. As I said before, compare their role to their private sector equivalent and they're not particularly expensive. And if you compared them to their American, or French (or God forbid, MEP) equivalents, they're downright cheap.

 

[Mabs]

Nice theory, but it doesn't work. That was the original logic behind MPs pay. All that happens is that the only people who can afford to stand for office are those that already have an independent income, in other words, the rich. You have to make MP's pay enough that it will allow the talented or able to become MPs without sacrificing too much, but not enough that they're doing it for the money. You may think MPs earn too much, but its all a matter of perspective. As I said before, compare their role to their private sector equivalent and they're not particularly expensive. And if you compared them to their American, or French (or God forbid, MEP) equivalents, they're downright cheap.

aye, the only way to swing it would be to do it like they do student loans - you get paid more, the less you have.

and while your right, i will add i was operating in the theoretical, cos its never going to actually change

 

[Jupitus]

Neither party can touch income tax (vote loser), we pay some of the highest basic rate VAT in Europe, so they can't really move that, so booze, fags, and most critically, fuel, is their golden goose. This is the pattern for the future, and your criterion when voting at the next election should simply be which party will deal with public spending better, because that's the only way to minimise their annual wallet raid. Labour have proved to be pretty incompetent in this area, but the tories weren't much better, they just have specialist areas of incompetence. My view is the tories would be the "least worst" option, if only because they would be slightly more resistant to turning us into a police state (but only slightly), but the choice is like the choice between catching syphilis or gonorrhea; both are going to ruin your week.

Quoted for truth.

 

[svartalf]

MPs earn £60K a year a[..] they simply couldn't afford to do the job otherwise.

I lolled.

 

[Trem]

I guarantee that would cost the taxpayer more. If only for the fifteen layers of bureaucracy it would add. As for how much they spend on stuff for homes; once again, it doesn't strike me as particularly bad; however, they also put things like staff PCs etc. on expenses and that is wasteful; things like that should be centrally sourced.



So what you're saying is that they should live like students. Sorry, but you're being ridiculous. MPs are typically in office for five years, even if they only serve one term; for a lot of them it can be the best part of their working lives, and you want them to live in a glorified dorm. Apart from the obvious security implications; I wouldn't want to live like that, so why should I expect it of them?

MP expenses seem over the top, and clearly some of them are abusing the system, but to put it into context, their pay is low (for what they do, it is. I earn a lot more, with less responsibility), and they carry overheads on expenses (which is an area that should be fixed). If you compared the actual costs per MP versus a senior manager at a decent sized company (throwing in salary, expenses, cars, overheads etc. and I'm talking below Board level and not even looking at stock options) especially if it was a manager who travels as much as MPs do, then the costs wouldn't be that different.

Its called the John Lewis expense, where everything they buy must not be anymore than what it can be bought at John Lewis. How about they make it the Argos expense or Ikea expense? 2 cheaper stores where they could get the stuff for cheaper thus saving money.

Oh wait MP's saving our money, where the fuck is my head?

 

[nath]

John Lewis is never knowingly undersold though, so in theory you shouldn't be able to get things any cheaper than JL.

 

[svartalf]

John Lewis is never knowingly undersold though, so in theory you shouldn't be able to get things any cheaper than JL.

Which is an example of the obfuscation, deception and rule bending which occurs throughout officialdom, politics and business. No wonder people are cynical.

 

[DaGaffer]

I lolled.

Why?

 

[DaGaffer]

Its called the John Lewis expense, where everything they buy must not be anymore than what it can be bought at John Lewis. How about they make it the Argos expense or Ikea expense? 2 cheaper stores where they could get the stuff for cheaper thus saving money.

Oh wait MP's saving our money, where the fuck is my head?

You don't think they actually buy all their stuff at John Lewis do you? I'm sure MPs buy their Billy bookcases like the rest of us. I think you're being over-literal. John Lewis is just a reasonable benchmark.

 

[nath]

I'm sure MPs buy their Billy bookcases like the rest of us.

Incidentally - there isn't a person alive who can put up a Billy faster than me. Fact.

 

[throdgrain]

Hang on a minute. They are the people running the country, they're supposed to get good wages fs.

 

[Tom]

No they don't run the country - they decide policy. We run the country.

 

[Raven]

lol

 

[throdgrain]

No they don't run the country - they decide policy. We run the country.

Are you really sure about that Tom ???

 

[pez]

The budget struck me as a whole lot of nothing really. It seemed that the only people who will really see a significant change to their tax is non-domicile residents. Although frankly, all the fuss they are kicking up about how they will leave London is droves sounds like a load of bollocks and I bet they all stay and just suck it up.

 

[Tom]

Are you really sure about that Tom ???

Erm yes actually. The politicians get the headlines, but they don't have carte blanche to do whatever they like. Businesses and public (who staff the civil service) run this country.

If you think I'm being obtuse, just look what happens when anyone in the public sector strikes. Look what happened when we had serious fuel protests - the country almost ground to a halt. Tony Blair was visibly cacking himself, I remember the news conference. Take a drive along the M20 and look what the selfish actions of a few hundred have done there.

Members of parliament work for us. By and large I think they do a good job, however the ones at the top need reminding that they can be booted out sharpish if they don't play by the rules, or don't find themselves in a safe constituency (god I hate that).

 

[throdgrain]

Actually, now you mention it




STOP SPLITTING FUCKING HAIRS as well fs !

 

[MYstIC G]

Either way, I'm sure they'll find a way to blame it on the Tories.

Well that's how they got voted in... "They're shit and you hate them, so come on... we must be better... right?"

 

[old.user4556]

nail, head, hit on.

 

[Tom]

I voted Tory in 1997 and people laughed at me.

They're not laughing now.