Ealing North
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Steve Pound MP Ealing North |
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 Value for Money?October 2004 I often find it difficult to reconcile the facts that most people seem to think that MPs are a waste of space while scores turn up at my weekly surgeries and hundreds contact me every week by ‘phone and letter. Last week’s publication of MPs salaries and allowances seemed at first to confirm the worst impression of the Honourable and Right Honourable Members of Her Majesty’s Parliament. Headline figures about thousands of pounds in “expenses” certainly gave the press a lot of fun – although I don’t know of any journalists who publish details of their salaries and allowances – but didn’t give anything like the proper picture. I don’t know anyone, of any Party, who entered politics to fill their boots. Many took a pay cut to become an MP. My colleague Eric Joyce was a Major in the Black Watch and earned more then than he does now. Howard Stoate is one of several doctors who became MPs and saw their earnings decrease. Clive Soley was a Probation Officer and would be on a much higher salary if he had stayed in the job and been promoted through the years he has been an MP. In my case I was an Area Manager for a Housing Association and the person now doing my job is on considerably more than I am now. I don’t expect any sympathy and I am certainly not implying that I am one step away from standing on Greenford Broadway playing the violin with an upturned cap at my feet. I earn a decent wage but let’s get this business about “expenses” out in the open once and for all. I don’t have an expense account. I may take constituents to dinner at the House of Commons at least once a week but I pay for the meal. Here are the facts. In the most recent financial year, April 2003 to March 2004, I received a basic salary of £57,485. My staff costs were £74,910 and we spent £5,005 on stationery and postage. Yes, I could have claimed an allowance of nearly £20,000 for a flat in Westminster but I didn’t do so. When I was elected in 1997 and we often sat through the night it would have made sense to have found somewhere within walking distance of the House and I was actually offered such a flat by an MP who had lost their seat. I could have – entirely legally and within the rules – have bought that flat and had the mortgage paid off by now. I could have sold the property today for nearly £200,000 and kept every penny of the money. It may be a little hard to explain to my family why I chose not to do so but it just wasn’t the right thing. That might make me a financial failure but I just couldn’t justify it – even though I feel more than a twinge of regret when the Co-op Bank send me the latest details of my overdraft. MPs may not be loved but we are needed and many of us do our best to provide a service to our constituents seven days a week because we believe in the work we do. A few cheap headlines about expensive MPs may be the price we pay for being completely open and transparent about our earnings and allowances but I happen to believe that the principle is worth the price. There is now pressure on BBC staff, local government officers, teachers, the police and NHS workers to follow our example but I’m not calling for that. MPs are different and I don’t regret the publication of our financial details. I just hope that the people that I represent, and the community that I live in, will take the trouble to look up the real facts and see that we’re not a bunch of venal money-grubbers. We may not be saints but I don’t believe that we are sinners either. Now how do I explain to Mrs.P.that I’ve missed my chance to pocket that £200,000! |
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