UKH

https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/stop-mps-entitlement-to-free-work-me...

I'm not normally one for sign and share petition campaigns, but I feel strongly that MPs should have to buy their own food and drink, at market prices without claiming it back from the public purse. 

Done . 

Thanks for the post.

Thanks for sharing this. Signed and shared

I very rarely sign petitions, but I shall sign this one. I did not know subsidised meals for MP was a thing.

They are not eating Gruel.

https://www.parliament.uk/site-information/foi/transparency-publications/ho...

https://www.parliament.uk/globalassets/documents/mdr-main-10.09.19.pdf

Signed.

Completely agree we should not be subsidising their lifestyle to the extent we currently do when the majority of the  people they are supposed to represent are having to make significant sacrifices to exist ... same applies to House of Lords. I seem to remember one or other of the houses got upset when they suggested getting a less expensive champagne for their free bar ... maybe Sevco could take over the catering .... give the elitists a dose of reality ...

Petition site closed down due to inappropriate content.

We shouldn't be seeking to make the role of MP worse (bear in mind there were 250+ who voted for the amendment), we should be punishing the MPs who saw fit to vote with the government on this issue and reminding them what moral values are.

A small food budget for expenses could be granted to MPs where they have meetings and work which precludes them from being able to make their own lunch/ dinner (not dissimilar to many professional roles) (say a fiver for each day where this applies) so that they are not financially disadvantaged by attending the house on long sitting days (these days are important to the role, MPs could however make a robust argument that they were busy dealing with constituency matters and decided not to attend a particular debate if they did not attend). They have flats/ houses in London so where they are just working from their office etc they can make their own meals to take in.

My personal feeling is that the government should build/ buy a block of serviced apartments close to the houses of parliament which could be used by MPs as required when they are in London on parliamentary business, this would do away with the nonsense about duckponds and so on and vastly reduce the expense claims associated with the role to the point that the rest of the expenses would be covered by a normal expenses policy for office based staff who travel on a regular basis.

I wonder what it was, I didn't read anything I thought even vaguely inappropriate? 

Its back up

I’ve just signed it, seems OK now. 

As a complete aside, friend of mine got his beer to be served in the bar there, Hophurst brewery. 

Well mine is we should Guillotine the lot of them and start again, but on this subject a Ham or Cheese Sandwich and an Apple, is more than adequate, anything else they should pay full price for.

Mini sirloin of beef with mini steak and kidney pudding, roasted baby carrots, savoy cabbage and potato terrine* £9.19

followed by

Fig, cream cheese and orange mess Candied figs, whipped cheesecake, crisp meringue and fresh orange (GF) £2.71

How can anyone thing that being subsidized by the tax payer to eat this is acceptable?

Done and thanks for sharing.

I bet all the Tory voters will still defend them though. They just won't admit they've elected a bunch of crooks. And I'm an ex Tory voter myself before they went all brexity and useless.

I'm confused.

Just because they are MP's, why can't they have subsidised meal allowances like many working people of the country?

Should these meal subsidies be removed from the general workforce allowances as well?

Traditionally subsidised meals were for those with manual jobs - keeping the work force fed was a means of fueling the human component of the system of production.

What 'general workforce' are you talking about nowadays. Me? 25 years working and never had a subsidised meal. My income is far below that of an MP.

Its also about needs, means and priorities, example setting, leading... MPs simply do not need the financial benefit of a subsidised meal and, in such times, it is indefensible.

I think moving parliament to a modern building with fit-for-purpose, space efficient facilities and without any of the opulent trappings such as the dining room shown would go some way to knocking our representative servants out of their isolated bubble.  

There would be a ban on audience jeering in the new building as well.  I'd have a big sign over the entrance "I've a feeling we're not in Eton anymore".

Erm, Because they voted not to subsidise young children so they could eat.

I don't get subsidised food where I work and I sure as shit can't pop to the bar at lunchtime and drink champagne.

I work in specialised manufacturing for a few pence above minimum wage and every morning I have to get up and make my own sandwiches because I can't afford to buy anything ready made (I could, but it would be a sacrifice against keeping some money for things like getting my lad a bike for Christmas). As a family we can afford to eat and eat well because we're thrifty and I cook everything from scratch.

I also know families who are struggling to keep their heads above water financially despite working and a consequence of this is that they are choosing between heating and food.

While this is common place and increasing in the UK there's no justification for subsidising well paid public servants who are capable of paying for their own food. The fact that they have voted not to feed the poorest children in society at Christmas quite frankly boils my piss. Dickensian Britain is becoming reality and it must be stopped. 

How can politicians make decisions about the real world when they don't live in the real world??? 

Understandable sentiment, but MPs aren't the only people working in that building.  There are cleaners, maintenance people, office wallahs, you name it.  They're not very well paid, but they do at least have access to a cheap and decent canteen for their lunch.  (It'll not be the posh one with its menu doing the rounds on social media right now.)

Handy, because "market prices" around there are generally ludicrous tourist prices and obviously people who work there but don't make a lot of money generally aren't people who can afford to live nearby, so they'll often spend a lot of time commuting.

I don't think for a minute this petition will achieve what it claims, but I'm not signing it anyway because on the offchance that it does:
a) The MPs we would most like to punish won't give a shit.  They're rich, they can always get an amoral billionaire to buy their lunch for them, or they'll just stick it on expenses.
b) Some MPs are not independently wealthy or constantly being given treats and baubles and free tropical holidays for themselves and their families in return for who-knows-what, and treat being an MP as a proper full time job.  Those are the kind we want, so lets not make the job less attractive to those ones with a move that will in no way take the shine of the perks available to the other kind.
c) People we don't want to punish, who are just trying to make a living, might end up having to choose between being able to eat a decent healthy lunch and being able to pay the rent this month.

On a more philosophical level, this petition is a kind of 'counsel of despair'.  It looks like activism but it's actually a call to apathy.  The subtextual underlying message says "You can't change anything, MPs are all the same." 

Well they're not.  They are all flawed human beings, subject to the same dodgy motivations and sometimes hidden agendas as the rest of us, but some of them are also vile grasping simpletons with some essential part of their soul missing, and a few are genuinely corrupt and evil scumbags.  It really plays right into the hands of the scumbags to promote a message that all the other MPs are just as bad as they are.

I cannot quote figures but I bet loads of highly-paid people in the UK get subsidised meals. Maybe hospital consultants and doctors do, maybe university chancellors and senior academics do, no doubt loads of non-MP people in government do

It should be if you want to stop one then stop them all. Make your minds up everyone

Asking people to routinely have a sandwich and an apple for lunch and dinner as part of a 12 hour shift as a routine matter would not go down well in any of the offices I have worked in, people tend to like having hot meals!

Cooking up a huge vat of chilli/ spag bol/ curry etc like a high quality school lunch would cost very little in the grand scheme of things and ensure that a reasonable meal was on offer without taking the piss. Charge it at cost for ingredients with overheads (staff cost+fuel etc) being soaked up by the cost of the estate and then don't provide expenses for food as they would be paying what they paid anyway and they still have somewhere to use for meetings over lunch/ dinner (restrictions of who these meetings may be with is a different matter, party donors who give over a certain amount shouldn't be allowed on the parliamentary estate or to have private meetings with MPs in my view).

Lots of "maybes" there. So you dont have a clue do you?

I can pretty confidently say those consultants and doctors wont have a subsidised bar though and the food wont match that which the MPs get.

ermm why?

Do you think it acceptable for the tax payer to subsidize;

Mini sirloin of beef with mini steak and kidney pudding, roasted baby carrots, savoy cabbage and potato terrine* £9.19

followed by

Fig, cream cheese and orange mess Candied figs, whipped cheesecake, crisp meringue and fresh orange (GF) £2.71

Is there a modern day equivalent of luncheon vouchers? 

I'd imagine that many public sector canteens serve food at cost? Whilst private sector workers are paying much more. 

There's a big difference between on-site catering being run not-for-profit and the MP's restaurant where I'd hazard a guess the catering is running at a massive loss.

I'd struggle to even find somewhere to eat out like that locally (The Black Bull in Frosterly having been a casualty of the pandemic, gutted), and if I did, it would cost a truck load more than they're paying.

Round my way, the senior academics get what they pay for with dining - the same slop or high grade slop (depending on the day) served to the students.  Subsidised dining doesn't really matter for a VC who gets a free house (mansion, really) and is on > 4x the salary of an MP...  The other difference is that the local VC hasn't just voted against subsiding meals for the vulnerable whilst happily gorging himself at taxpayers direct expense.   

Is it not part of a bigger problem. How do you attract the right people to be MPs. Pay too little and those most able will feel less inclined to leave the private sector. Pay too much or have too many perks and that becomes a motivation or distraction in itself. 

Speak to a care worker who does 12 hour shifts all the time about what they eat. It's whatever they bring with them and no subsidies.

I'm amazed so many people are defending subsidised meals! I would be surprised to find many people working in low paid work benefitting from these subsidies! I have certainly never had any such benefits! 

MPs easily earn 10x what I do, why do they need a subsidy to eat?

The canteen at the factory where my brother works is ridiculously cheap but it isn't you and me subsidising it.

E

I think it's an acceptable perk, their base salary compared to any professional in middle management or above, living in London etc is pretty low. There can't be many MPs in it for the money! Yes it's way way above the average salary, but so is the job in terms responsibility and commitment, or even the grief they take.(ignoring the odd incompetent fool). 

Because we elect pigs capable of designing their own troughs (cf the expenses saga)

I feel that a subsidised meal is reasonable.

I do not feel that the standard/ type of food being subsidised is reasonable.

Tripe!

That is a seperate issue, care workers get a pretty crap deal and should be paid more and/ or have the length of their shifts cut to 8 hours. A hot meal in the middle of a 12 hour shift would be entirely reasonable.

Entitled to your view. I do also think they should find a way to fund kids food through the holidays. And, why don't all kids just have free school lunch, one decent healthy meal a day guaranteed. No more going home for lunch, chip shops, or packed lunches. It also removes any stigma attached to it. True equality. It won't happen as too many want to fight the evil rich at the top, rather than focus on bringing the bottom upwards. 

Let us try again.

Do you think it acceptable for the tax payer to subsidize;

Mini sirloin of beef with mini steak and kidney pudding, roasted baby carrots, savoy cabbage and potato terrine* £9.19

followed by

Fig, cream cheese and orange mess Candied figs, whipped cheesecake, crisp meringue and fresh orange (GF) £2.71

Yes or No?

Totally agree with that one, the house comes with the job.

No, as I said above, I don't feel that the standard of food being subsidised is acceptable.

There are plenty of healthy meals which can be made at low cost to feed large numbers of people which would solve the issues which I identified with long sittings etc without incurring excessive costs for the taxpayer.

Like many things, what seems like a small change will impact on other things related to it in a somewhat detrimental manner, a simple yes or no answer does not address this.

Don't forget the subsidised booze. I once bought a round of drinks in the Strangers Bar, it was cheaper than Timmy Wetherspoon's place in Rochdale town centre.

Do they have to pay tax on the food as a benefit in kind?

I completely agree.

There are many well paid public servants who are capable of paying for their own food and this includes the likes of people like me. However the system is the system and if politicians get their dinner money removed you can bet that as night follows day the they will find a way to remove this for everybody irrespective of where they fit into the Generalise Workforce spectrum.

There are also many poorly paid public servants along with the national workforce as well. This all opens a massive can of worms and one where I am not knowledgeable enough to even comment on how to fix.

It just confuses me that people raise pitchforks against greedy politicians for expenses that we get as well. MP's are doing a job and they are being paid to do that, so shouldn't they be entitled to the same expenses?

We could go back to the days of duck moats, if that is the alternative?

EDIT

My subsidy, for want of a better phrase, is a missed meal allowance for not getting my meal break after a specified period of agreed time. It is common place for me to wait 8 to 9 hours before my meal break. And if I wake up at 6 am to go to work this means that I don't eat until around 15-30hrs. Most office workers are thinking about a couple of hours till home time by then.

From my limited experience, there did not seem to be any system in place to manage that.

Based purely on my local MPs, both are out of their depths in a car park puddle, nevermind being high flyers in the private sector. 

You have a valid point, but very few MPs would make it much beyond junior management. It's a flaw in the way MPs are selected and possibly the sort of people attracted into politics, rather than a salary issue which puts off more able candidates.

If someone was on benefits and didn't prioritise paying rent and buying food before any luxuries, many people would complain that this was an unreasonable use of the money. Why isn't that the priority for MPs too? Do they go on holiday every year? Do they have a fancy car? Do they pay for their kids to go to posh schools? If they can't budget their huge salary to buy their meals, like the rest of society has to, then they certainly shouldn't be making decisions about how we run the country!! Maybe I should teach them some basic meal planning skills which would allow them to manage to eat on their pitiful pay!!!

In my experience, that would have absolutely no correlation to talent, only ambition. The idea of meritocracy whether in public service or in the private sector, is a fantasy. All the people I've ever admired (with one or two exceptions in the civil service and none in the private sector) have been highly skilled in technical roles, not in management. Management as a general rule is for the ambitious, not the talented.

Is that a suggestion for the new HoP menu...?

I work in the private sector. Our canteen has always been subsidised, in that the catering staff are paid by the company, and we pay or the food. Although, in recent years, that subsidy has dropped (catering now outsourced as a service), as, on average, a main meal (no starter, dessert or champagne) was about £4. Canteen is closed for lockdown, so I'm living off discounted supermarket food, thus saving about £3 a day...

Drinking alcohol at work, except for rare, company organised celebratory events would be a disciplinary matter.

Oh, and, although the caterers like to tart up the names, we get moderate fare; nothing like that HoP menu.

Doctors do not get subsidised meals. Next.

Yes I do, . These are our representatives and they met and entertain people etc etc.. The alternative is that other people bribe them with meals.It elimates their need to declare meals and the costs of those meals.

If we want good people reperesenting us from across all divides then its time we adequately funded them with things like decent support services etc.

After all you get what you pay for.And  the current format suggests we are not getting decent politicans so we need to rethink the deal.

Given that most NHS hospitals seem to charge their staff to park their cars in the hospital car park, do you think that's likely...

But that's a different argument. I agree kids shouldn't starve, but its all turning into a two wrongs make right type of argument. 

Edit. Regardless of their wages or perks, the one thing they are guilty of is being out of touch. 

Interesting claim. So the only alternative to not being subsidised is being bribed? Geez and I thought I had a low opinion of them.

Of course thats leaving aside the fact they are currently do have dinners etc with special interest groups.

They are well funded. Personally I think most of the support services should be removed from them and professionalised.

After all this is bollocks. A cursory looks shows lots of professions dont pay that well comparitively but are more dependant on people being interested in the area as opposed to just wanting a large pay packet.

If that appeared on the MPs' menu it would have to be andouille.

The problem with too many of our current MPs is their shaky grasp of integrity and their lack of compassion or idealism. Paying more isn't going to change any of that.

How's that working out for us at the moment? We seem to have the most incompetent bunch of shits running the country at the moment. Ironically, controlled by an unelected autocrat...

Exactly the point.Since expenses etc was tightened up and things made harder...the quality of Mps' has declined. Its not exactly a great lifestyle for most of them.Most are not living in good  accomodation ( alot of MP's share apartments as they cannot afford living in London etc etc.. most cannot afford decent  support which lets down their reserach and they rely on free interns.

Its not exacly a money for old rope situation. For some , yes, but the majoirty no. And in the end brighter people go elsewhere.

So yes we need to look at oursleves. if you want good politicans get the deal right.Otherwise the rot will continue.

Is this why if you listen to MP's they subsidise from their salaries the cost of secretarial support?

Its just not adequately funded. And in turn we moan about what they deliver. Maybe just maybe if they were better funded we might get  quality politicans who are able to research their interests better and deliver more for their constituients.

Most of the current cabinet are veterans of the expenses abuse era.

I guess the three people most responsible for mismanaging our pandemic response are Johnson,  Sunak and Hancock. Boris has a 2:1 and the other two have firsts. All Oxbridge. I'm amazed anyone thinks the problems are to do with a lack of "brightness." It's their values and attitudes that are the problem.

Which ones? Since there are several who acknowledge that 137k (144k in London) a year is  plenty to run a professional office.

Maybe just maybe if we didnt confuse high pay with actual talent we would do better. Maybe just maybe if we looked at why people are willing to work in certain professions for low wages and see how we can extend that to politics we would get quality politicans rather than just money grubbing lightweights?

Maybe just maybe if we looked at the recruitment process and decided what we are doing we would get better politicans. If we asked who does the politican serve the party or the constituents and then took it from there.

I think the point of the petition is to highlight to the MP's that they are out of touch and are effectively receiving the free school meals they are denying children from having.

I am amazed that people just concentrate on a few at the top.If you improve the whole lot that will led to a bigger shift.

I know financially supporting MP's food is a drop in the ocean, however if cutting off their subsidised meals means that one Tory MP has to eat a soggy sandwich they had to get up early to make even ONCE then it will be worth it. 

You earn less than £160  a week?

Wow!

All PPE.

I find that pretty depressing.

But when I checked numerous NHS hospital websites, they describe subsidised meals for doctors and nurses - why is that, if "Doctors do not get subsidised meals" as you said in your reply to me? Here are some:

https://www.chelwest.nhs.uk/about-us/work-with-us/why-choose-us/staff-benef...

https://www.westhertshospitals.nhs.uk/joinourteam/benefitsofworkinghere.asp

https://www.ruh.nhs.uk/careers/staff_benefits.asp?menu_id=7

http://www.boltonft.nhs.uk/work-with-us/staff-benefits/

I can’t help but feel that this is part of the undermining of our democracy, our grand parents and great grandparents Fought for generations for a seat at the table of government and democracy  that included a descent wage and  reasonable expenses for MP’s that stopped politics just being the preserve of the monied classes.

who does this hurt most, Rhees Mogg or a backbench MP from the NE.

if we’re going to have petitions let’s make them for  positive reform, reform of the lords, increased child care In the commons, let’s make the commons less of an 18th century gentlemen s club and more like a functioning modern democracy so that we can open up to a more representative parliament.

There is so much wrong with U.K. politics at the moment, but if we go down the route of thinking all MP’s are useless then we have given up on democracy because the present system is all we have to work with.

Hancock and Sunak are PPE, but Boris is classics. Hence Scylla and Charybdis in his recent address to the nation. I wonder if he remembers which was which?

See my reply above - when I checked numerous NHS hospital websites, they describe subsidised meals for doctors and nurses - why is that, if "Doctors do not get subsidised meals" as you said in your reply to me? Here are some:

https://www.chelwest.nhs.uk/about-us/work-with-us/why-choose-us/staff-benef... 1

https://www.westhertshospitals.nhs.uk/joinourteam/benefitsofworkinghere.asp 

https://www.ruh.nhs.uk/careers/staff_benefits.asp?menu_id=7 

http://www.boltonft.nhs.uk/work-with-us/staff-benefits/

So it's a fact

Maybe we should have a ten year ban on anyone with a PPE from standing as an MP 😏

Of course. Much more useful...

I didn't say it was a fact. I asked you a question. But I see you chose to C&P your reply to nick.

Exactly! Someone above compared the salary with that of 'middle management'. Why is that even a valid comparison?

Are we vying with the private sector for suitable candidates for our representation? What qualities of middle management translates into what we should want in public servants who have the power in their hands to shape regulations, to take us out of the EU, change laws, how the country is run, whether children go hungry, whether the poor have access to legal services etc. etc. 

I'm hoping for an entirely different kind of person, though not saying those in the private sector are not suitable, simply the role of MP should not be just another career option Vs accountancy or business consultant or Head of Regional Sales, Arnold Clarke. Some level of...what're those qualities...vocation? duty? compassion? vision?

I’d say one of the biggest flaws in the current government is the lack of real world business experience. 

We should have representatives from all walks of life and the current MP salary is far to low to attract talent from the private sector.
 

The only cabinet member who has decent experience in the private sector (Sunak) is only there because he’s made so much money he never needs to work again.

It’s popular to bash MP wages and perks, but at the end of the day you get what you pay for. I can’t see how withdrawing a pretty merge subsidy would help.

Done,

cheers

FTFY

What do you think business experience will bring? I work in a large private sector firm, operating in the finance sector. Nothing here to eulogise. 

Management are simply on the career roundabout, which they spin themselves, going from one senior position to another, gathering up golden handshakes & parachutes, friends or figures in the same social circles as the senior staff who decide their remuneration, of the directors who interview them, re-arranging the deck chairs while in their post, their successors replacing them back in the previous order only for theirs to move them about again. An illusion of progress, of getting things done. All propped up by the actual hard work of the 'ground level' advisers and support staff, many whom want to do the right thing, which surprisingly clashes with the goals of the organisation - profit above all.

Now I believe in profit - its reward for taking risks, for experience, ingenuity & learning, but not at any cost, unbridled, only hemmed in by regulation which looks to impose a consciousnesses & accountability on the corporate body.

'You get what you pay for'. Its may be true, but you don't actually know what you are getting or whether its value for money.

Yes it's a tricky one, isn't it.

You could argue we should cut back expenses but just pay them a million or two a year each. That way not only do you attract the best and brightest to the job but you hopefully put them above bothering with lobbying on behalf of firms for financial gain and it would remove the desire for them to have 2nd jobs etc. 

Those who have a million tend to want more. They hang out on the edges of the rich world and think, perhaps, I need another million. Got to send the kids to the best private school, the best university, got to have a top end car, cars, at least three, then a house with enough parking, an exotic holiday at least three a year...and so it goes if money moves you

The solution is not to employ those motivated by financial gain. Pay a good salary, yes, but that should not be the main attraction.

What does business experience bring? It brings an understanding of how the private sector works (which employs the majority of the people in the country).

It would be pretty handy right now in a government where a certain individual said “f business” and a confusing and an uncertain brexit deal is being agreed with the EU.

I’d much rather have a government led by someone with a proven track record at a financial services firm (or any other business for that matter) than a chancer of a journalist.

The last thing this country needs is career politicians (whether right or left) - politicians should have some real world experience whether that be in business, the public sector or in the charity sector.

My point is that by being pretty stingy on the overall benefits package for MPs you’re discouraging a element of people with real world experience (in the private sector) from being MPs.
 

I don’t see how this is preferable to attracting low paid career politicians who haven’t done an honest days work in their lives.  

I think a lot, of MP's go into politics because they want to make a difference. The money is nice, but there isn't a well trodden path from business. E.g. 'I could climb the corp ladder and get an extra £5k per year, or become an MP and get a £10K increase on what I'm on now.'

After spending years of working their way through the political structure: activist, council meetings, knocking on doors, etc. it's still not clear cut. The local party and central party has to recommend them as a candidate. Then the electorate has to back them. Someone could be the best and the brightest, but unless they have the charisma and are able to make friends and influence people, they wont get anywhere.

If you paid £2 million a year, every dodgy chancer or wannabe millionaire would go for it. I'm not saying that the current systems is perfect, far from it. But by having a huge incentive like the figures you mention, would make it far worse.

It will give knowledge, generally, of one or two companies which doesnt necessarily translate to the broader private sector.

That would be a certain individual who has spent a fair amount of his life in the private sector?

How much real world experience and how would, for example, my expertise in DB design and batch job management help vs having a good knowledge of how laws are discussed and made gained from working the way up through the political ranks?

Which is why it is paid at the top end for many sectors. It is only stingy compared to a few roles.

May I remind you that that certain individual has been reported as complaining about taking a pay cut?

Is that the sort of understanding that Dido Harding (Woolworths, Sainburys, Talk Talk etc) has brought to the disaster we call Test and Trace? If I'd run my school like that no kid would have been able to read, write or add up. The idea that you attract the "brightest and best" by offering mega bucks is certainly a triumph of hope over experience.

I'd merge some constituencies and chop their numbers down to around 400, pay them £150-200k(perhaps more for cabinet posts) with an absolute ban on any secondary jobs, positions on boards etc.. their work load shouldn't give them the time to even consider another job. 

To be fair I think the model is wrong with track and trace, I’m less sure about the short comings of delivery. Presumably Dido has a wealth of experience in running call centres which is why she got the job. Clearly the centralised call centre model isn’t working. Despite the flak she gets in not sure that’s completely her fault.

Ideally when setting up the process you’d have someone with call centre experience (a theoretical MP) who would have pointed out that the model is unlikely to work.

Agreed, but it’s better than nothing.

Yes, but not running a business. Writing trash is miles apart from what most people do.

Well (assuming by DB design you mean data bases) I’d say you have some real world experience about how the IT sector works. Presumably if you’d been involved in creating a data base that tracks the number of people testing positive for Covid you wouldn’t have missed 16,000 positive cases.

Somehat disagree, yes it’s more than a lot of people earn, but in many careers it’s small beer.

Not that he’s a role model MP, but it demonstrates my point that compared to many jobs being an MP involves a pay cut.

My point was partly that she was hardly a great success at Talk Talk: they paid her mega bucks and didn't get a very good leader. She mishandled the data breach disaster spectacularly. But this was just one more in a long list of corporate failures that makes me very sceptical that the private sector is any better at leadership and management than the public sector. In fact, I think our national politics would benefit immeasurably from more of a public sector ethic. There is a wealth of talent in this sector, possessed by people driven by the values I want to see in MPs.

Just signed it. 

I wonder if they pay tax on their free meals? Isn't that payment in kind?

Is that meant to be cheap? Glad I don't have to pay that much for my lunch.

Yes, but should the tripe be subsidised?

How would you define public sector ethic?

From my somewhat limited interactions it seems slow and  bureaucratic. I’d rather have Dido than someone at the local council by a country mile.

I suppose we disagree in what we want in an MP. I’d rather have someone who’s entrepreneurial and understands the wider business environment who can create laws that benefit the majority.

I don’t want someone who enjoys working 9-5 and spending other people’s money.

Why?

Wait, running a business? So thats discounted most people.

Which is irrelevant to passing laws. We dont pay MPs to write code.

No it really isnt many. Its a well paid job especially for one which for most is a mix of citizens advice and following orders.

Again, not many jobs. Most journalists dont get paid anywhere near that amount and yet still manage to do the job.

It's funny how the local T&T services are outperforming the national one, despite its incredible resources.

NO!

You've never tried to get support from TalkTalk, have you...?

Only the elder variety 

If that's how you see the public sector ethic I guess you haven't met many teachers or paramedics or police or nurses or firefighters or doctors or soldiers etc etc!

For me the public sector ethic means doing a job because you want to make a positive difference to society by helping other people improve their lives in a meaningful, fulfilling way. You have to be motivated by more than money.

I think you misunderstand the purpose of MPs. They’re not there to draft legal texts.

They’re supposed to impose a vision which they believe will better our lives (something along those lines anyway).

How are you supposed to understand how to improve people lives if you’ve done PPE at Oxbridge, worked as a MPs research for a bit, contested a opposition sage seat and then won a safe seat at the next election.

I don’t want someone who’s taken that career path representing me.

Thank you

Ok fair one, happy to be corrected.

Hospital food is of a very, very different calibre to the Westminster fayre.

Certainly here the prices are exorbitant for endless versions of stodgy stodge.... virtually all the docs and nurses bring their own food in as a result!

No question at all about that - I've eaten in plenty of hospitals and also in universities, but never where MPs eat of course - I'd bet anything that MPs get outstanding food and drink

Actually that is a major part of their jobs. They pass the laws which impact our lives. If they do a bad job then we all suffer the consequences. A good example is the recent one to "protect the soldiers" when, if you bother to look at it gives some protection to the personnel, including those who should be locked up, but gives even more protection to the MOD against the same personnel suing them for failing them.

What if you have done straight economics at Oxbridge, worked as a McKinsey consultant for a bit and then got parachuted into a board role before switching to politics?

I dont disagree that we do need a better mix but simply shouting "real world" is meaningless. I would reckon someone who started in politics early in a constituency office of someone who cares and so has spent years fighting the corner of constituents would have the advantage over someone who has just worked as a fireplace salesman.

As an aside I really suspect any proper entrepreneur (note it is often misapplied to career managers nowadays) would find it really hard to become an MP since, at least initially, your job is pretty much a mix between a citizens advice bureau and a box ticker on behalf of your party.

They were superbly efficient at providing customer details though. No bureaucracy at all.

I think they need to wake up and realise the population of this country is getting mighty pissed off with their toadying, snouts in the trough of incompetence. Never in my life have I felt more let down by a group of people. At a time like this, a government of national unity should have been formed. Instead, we have a polarised political shambles with blatant cronyism awarding millions in contracts to private companies with no accountability. Libertarianism? Don't make me laugh. Corruption through and through.

Like many big organisations public sector outfits have a distribution of people from those i/c paper clips to those making life/death/liberty decisions. A common strand at operational level would be an “expenses” value base of minimum necessary, e.g shortest/cheapest journeys, subsistence at true subsistence rates and only when necessary because working away from base. ( I don’t trust my own recall fully because I never claimed it but I think my entitlement as a social work middle manager was for example circa £2.50 for lunch when I retired a couple of years ago). And a highly prescriptive policy on gifts.

i don’t see why I should expect less from my MP.

I've just been reading her Facebook page and there's some serious mental gymnastics going on! Reason 1 for voting to starve vulnerable kids is being compared to pond life by a Labour mp. Reason 2 is that they have increased universal credit so generously.

The rest of her page is just as bad with boasts about how many thousands more nurses and doctors the tories have brought into the NHS. 

Scum. 

I've just signed it. My tory (formerly of Ukip) mp, Mark Jenkinson, has claimed over £60000 in expenses since he was elected to 'represent' Workington in December last year. He voted against providing free school meals over the holiday.

He has recently posted on twitter that a minority of his constituents sell or trade food parcels for drugs. He seems to be attempting to defend Ben Bradley, who (also on twitter) seemed to suggest that free school meal vouchers issued in the summer were effectively like handing cash to crack dens & brothels.

I'm trying to picture the scene:

User: I need a smoke/wrap/hit but I've got no money, want to trade from my food bank parcel?

Dealer: OK, that'll be 4 litres of uht milk, 2 tins of peaches, a bag of porridge and that packet of 'Nice' biscuits. 

Without wishing to be offensive it strikes me that as a breed Tories would rather see the poor and disadvantaged suffer than accept a small proportion of benefits expenditure go to a fraudulent claimant.

Keir Starmer was interviewed by Andrew Marr who suggested that Keir should be allowed to join the government so that he could put forward his ideas and take some responsibility for them.

Keir was having none of this.

And, as we’ve discussed on this forum before, if you’ve got proof of corruption by the government then there are avenues for you to pursue your allegations. 

Sums it up. And this isn’t only a problem in the government, this is at every level of the UK economy.

Oh yes. That’ll be the corruption watchdog overseen by Dido Harding’s husband then.

You’d have difficulty passing this kind of perversity off as fiction. And meanwhile, we are smirking at those rednecks who lionise Trump or at the jobs-for-the-boys(sic) culture in Brussels?

No brain, no common-sense, no morals. 

A lot of success in the Private sector tends to be linked to paying as little as possible to the workers, selling off anything not profitable, making redundancies to get past the downturn, getting the Share price as high as possible before selling it off to a foreign hedge fund and scrimping on things like worker welfare. All great if the only aim is to make money for you and the shareholders, not so great if you're running a country where every part of society needs to be taken care of.

£25 a day is standard across the U.K. for overnight stays away from home. I think it’s the HMRC limit. 
 

It’s what I get if I’m away from home on business. And I don’t get paid for sitting in a hotel instead of being at home doing what I want.  The MPs only get it if they’re staying away from home and away from London. 
 

As far as I am aware the MPs didn’t vote for children not to be subsidised, they voted against central government subsidising them. This is because schools are shut doing the half term holiday and local councils are better placed individually to supply meals by managing which schools should open to provide the meals. 

Yes, the revolving door system in our politics, where corporate lobbyists serve as MP's then go back to being corporate lobbyists, is a huge failure of our democracy. In whose best interest are they making their decisions?

I'd have the ban on second jobs and positions on boards, etc, plus a time limit on how long after serving as an MP they would have to wait before taking one of those roles. 

I'd link their salary to a fixed multiple of median earnings so that they have a direct incentive to make decisions for the benefit of ordinary workers.

I wouldn't cut their numbers though as fewer MP's = reduced democracy as each vote then has less influence. Cutting numbers of MP's amplifies the perverse effects of the FPTP system. 

The Norwegian system has a number of non constituency seats and these are awarded based on PR. A happy medium. Plenty of ways to ensure a more balanced political representation. 

It could be worse though, as the USA will demonstrate in less than 2 weeks. 

This is a line I've heard increasingly from the government over the past few days. Its very much a thin end of the wedge of passing the blame to schools ie "its the fault of schools not being open over half term, therefore we can't distribute FSM vouchers".

Schools don't just shut down for a week, especially in the current circumstances, how do the government think the scheme was operated during the previous holidays?

Schools won't be providing the meals, they have been responsible for distributing vouchers to eligible families, if the scheme had been agreed and in place before the holidays then no extra school opening would be required.

Infact the biggest problems logistically schools faced over the previous holiday period was being forced to move to an inadequate centralised system, weeks into the process, causing more work and delayed vouchers. 

With adequate foresight, planning (and compassion) the government could have announced the continuation of the scheme used over previous holidays, minimising disruption to everyone, especially hungry children who are now on half term, living in households with vastly reduced income, but increased food costs.

That scheme was far from perfect(!) But better than nothing.

Free school meals and free school vouchers are not the same thing. 

From what I've heard hospital docs rarely get time to eat let alone get fancy cheap meals. And from my experience in academia, there aren't many people getting subsidised food other than the odd bit of buffet bribery to get staff to attend things that they should but don't get paid for.