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Ed Miliband’s decision to clamp down on the number of Labour MPs who have second jobs caused some surprise the other week. Following the 2015 general election no Labour MP will be able to work more than the value of 15% of their salary. Miliband called on other parties to follow suit. The way this story was reported suggested that if this policy was a stealth attack on the Conservative Party.
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And cunningly dropped in Crosby too Henry - loyal stuff.
That is not the obvious duty of an MP. Ordinarily, the opposite would be preferable.
A house of 600 members frantically pressing for new laws, with no outside interests to inform them and provide the capacity to plan for an independent career, would be disastrous.
Would you work the hours, carry the responsbility and be away from home as much as they have to be for £66k a year? Plus they are forced to live siuch puritan lifestyles by the media.
I can outdo that working from home most of the time and living like Keith Richards on the weekends, with hardly any responsibility at all.
I'd never, ever, ever be an MP (not that I would be accepted as one). I quite admire their willingness to forego decent money by dint of their desire to perform public service.
The Gasman Cometh
MPs should not have second jobs unless they are gas-fitters, says Jon Trickett, a Labour backbencher. While opposing part-time lawyers and MPs with directorships, Trickett says elected gas-fitters (not that there are any) should keep working to maintain their CORGI hours. “I ought to be a gas-fitter; I would be better off financially,” Sir Paul Beresford, an MP and occasional dentist, replied.
Since Miliband recently said he wants to ban MPs from having second jobs, why not start with his former Cabinet colleagues? Many of them have very lucrative side trades, such as Jack Straw, who earns £60,000 a year for doing 140 hours of consultancy work.
The rule is a proxy for a difficult issue - how do we make sure that MPs do a good job, and indeed what exactly do we expect?
"Conservative MPs profit four times as much as their Labour counterparts. Conservative MPs have personally benefitted from £4.3M of outside work"
The term 'benefited' makes it sound, well, like benefits. They work more and get paid for it.
It's also entirely irrational to claim MPs should be more down to earth and in touch with the real world, and then try and ban them (although Miliband has failed to do this with his own MPs, for all his bluster) from having second jobs.
In addition, why can an MP spare the time to be a minister as well as doing his duties as an MP but cannot possibly spare the time to do an outside job?
"Just days after J K Rowling was outed as Robert Galbraith, author of the Cuckoo's Calling, the author revealed that a partner at Russells law firm was the cause of the disclosure by telling his wife's best friend who Galbraith really was."
I'd be amazed if this is anything other than fluff and nonsense along with shouting CROSBY!!!
Voters don't care. It may be useful fodder for a phone-in but will it alter a single ballot paper. No.
I'd rather MPs stopped being social workers/councillors and did their job as legislators. If they can be a good MP [and that's up to their constituents no one else] and have other paid or unpaid interests that's fine by me. Jacob Rees-Mogg manages to be the MP for a SW seat, be a company dir and have a 95% voting record.
We need more experience of *real life* beyond the Westminster Bubble not less.
And when EdM is rubbishing MPs who make a packet outside the HoC - perhaps he should start with Gordon I've Been in HoC Three Times This Year Brown.
"Conservative MPs profit four times as much as their Labour counterparts. Conservative MPs have personally benefitted from £4.3M of outside work"
That also leads me to think that Tory MPs have more marketable professional skills in the commercial sector and are therefore paid more when they do outside work.
Perhaps if more Labour MPs were polyglots like @NickPalmer - they'd be coming up on the rails too.
Work 4 times harder?
Are 4 times as valuable as employees?
Have 4 times as many marketable skills?
What's not to like?
Of course unions were famous for demarcation disputes, where tasks could only be undertaken by workers of a certain designation, so we shouldn't be surprised if so many Labour union MPs won't touch any other work...
Well, the evidence would tend to suggest that he spends less than 5% of his time on MP duties, which even hardcore SLabbers must raise an eyebrow at.
SLab would surely prefer to get another candidate in in Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath for 2015:
Result in 2010:
Lab (Brown) 65%
SNP 14%
LD 9%
Con 9%
UKIP 2%
oth 1%
Even the proverbial monkey with red rosette would be in with a shout, which is lucky as that is pretty much all that SLab have in the reserve pool.
Better alternatives would be to restrict the hours rather than the pay of second jobs. Either by limiting it to 8-12 hours per week, or by restricting second jobs to those with an attendance record for votes of say 75% (with appropriate provisions for sickness). This would also take in those who are not paid formally but benefit from free lobbyist funded junkets.
I would also like to see MPs taxed on the same basis as other citizens. I would pay tax as a "benefit in kind" for many of the expenses that MPs claim. This needs to be one law for everyone.
Which MP's have second jobs.
what the jobs are and who with
How much is earned.
If any other poster had written the header as a post then links would have been requiued
EDIT: Richard, the link is broken in Henry's article, but does this not satisfy your request?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2013/may/27/mps-jobs-interests-full-list-data
So why concentrate on Tory MPs? Most Labour MPs have second incomes. It's called being Trade Union stooges, the organisations which pay for their election campaigns, pay for their constituency offices and in most cases ensure they get selected in the first place.
The biggest problem today with the House of Commons is that far too few MPs of all sorts are no more than overgrown PPE graduate interns who have never worked in the real world. If Bland the Younger proceeds with his crazy plan, do we only get union stooges, the unemployable and people with partners who earn vast amounts as Labour MPs?
Bland's wife Justine earns vast amounts, the Rt Hon Lady Hodge has a large shareholding in Stemcor her family company, Dame Tessa Jowell gave evidence that she didn't study the £300k+ mortgage documents her husband kept putting in front of her. Are these examples of the very many Labour MPs with independent family wealth going to be required to give that up? I don't think so. This is a nonsense attempt by Bland to disguise the fact that most Labour MPs have just as many outside interests as Tory ones. They are maybe not just so lucrative yet, but as Tony Blair, Lord Mandelson and the bloated embarrassment from Hull who used to be Deputy PM have proved, they set themselves up well during their parliamentary careers for their future ones outside politics.
Researching the issues and coming up with alternative ideas is the obvious, but the system is absolutely not geared to that. You MAY be able to do it as a Select Committee member, on the narrow range of subjects currently being examined. But if you're member of Treasury and have a good idea on industrial policy, your options are (a) chat with the relevant (shadow) minister or (b) make a speech/ask questions in the Chamber. (a) can be surprisingly effective, but it's clearly unofficial. (b) is normally completely ineffective - there will be few people there and they're mostly waiting for you to shut up so they can get to say something.
What the system really needs is a better potential for MPs to introduce ideas for a discussion that fall short of a full-scale Bill needing masses of Parliamentary time. I used 10 Minute Rule Bills a lot for this, but it would be good to have a mechanism that e.g. if a majority of MPs voted for a 10MR proposal, it was referred for discussion to the relevant Select Committee. That would separate the trivial 10MR Bills from the ones with serious issues that most MPs thought worth considering.
"If Bland the Younger proceeds with his crazy plan, do we only get union stooges, the unemployable and people with partners who earn vast amounts as Labour MPs?"
You mean paragons of intellect and virtue like Jim Devine passim?
I'm amazed he was bright enough to fiddle his own expenses
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_flCtTmsXb4
Mind you, some authors do actually do that sort of thing. (Writing their own reviews, for example).
I tweeted yesterday that it was ironic that the less an author needs publicity the easier it is for them get it (even when they don't want it).
The Blues tend to be much more of the business world and to have skills or backgrounds of interest to companies. So inevitably they have a much higher share of MPs with outside interests.
Should MPs have outside interests? YES! The notion that we would be better served by spaddy wonky geeky politicos with no real world experience says all you need to know about the crushing naivete of many or most inside the lefty Westminster bubble.
Ministers by definition have another job apart from being a constituency MP. Should they stop being MPs? Should we have a formally separate executive and legislature? Clearly not. But maybe we should seek to limit the outside interests of ministers.
MPs generally? 90%+ are lobby fodder. They vote. That’s pretty much it. (Cue squeals of indignation from NPXMP). As long as they vote then who cares what else they do? And if the ‘else’ can improve the quality of their voting then so much the better.
Is this evidence that Milliband does not expect to form the next Govt and no Labour MP will draw a ministerial wage?
http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/2013win.html
http://metro.co.uk/2013/05/28/gordon-brown-is-parliaments-highest-earning-mp-but-he-donates-it-all-to-charity-3810963/
And your 10MRB idea sounds like a very good one. I'd rather we had fewer, better laws myself - so if the HoC only needs to sit for half the year or less - fine by me. Texas seems to do pretty well and they're jolly hands off [yes yes I know its entirely different but...]
http://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/top-stories/alex-salmond-accused-over-male-only-burns-club-1-3006891
Old humbug.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23368505
I'm amazed by how many big name authors are serial plagiarists - there are several tweeters who've unmasked scandals and even had books pulped after exposing the culprits to their publishers.
I'm flip-flopping over this a little, to be honest. I want full time, committed MPs, but don't want the ppe/neverhadaproperjob types we seem to be getting more of.
Gordon Brown is a prime example of what few hours he judges is needed to represent his constituency. And what Labour supporter could argue with Gordon's judgement?
Leaving aside the fact that it's immoral, it's also stupid. There isn't a finite number of readers, and readers usually buy more than one book ever. Plus, if one book in a given genre gets them into it, that makes them more likely to buy more books in that genre.
"The notion that we would be better served by spaddy wonky geeky politicos with no real world experience says all you need to know about the crushing naivete of many or most inside the lefty Westminster bubble."
Just listen to some Select Committees and you'll want to cry. Even the Public Accounts Committee appears to have a tenuous grasp on the basics of employment law and remuneration.
When News Int were before the DCMS group - there was no understanding of compensation agreements, being paid in lieu of notice etc. It was the same with the BBC at PAC. Several MPs asked why someone who was paid in lieu of notice was allowed to get another job in the next 6 months/didn't have to pay it back. Whilst the HR Dir was a complete numpty at times - she clearly was having trouble that such a basic thing was beyond their comprehension. They were desperate to find something nefarious about what is a very common way of managing someone out.
The problem with our current batch of MPs is not that they see too much of life outside Parliament: quite the reverse. If Ed Miliband had taken a few second jobs, he might be able to speak in a language that the general public can relate to.
From the current crop, they certainly don't have the law making under control, their understanding on matters of many things (the tax system for example) is worrying to say the least.
BBC Breaking News @BBCBreaking 31m
Boatpeople seeking asylum will no longer be resettled in Australia but will go to Papua New Guinea, PM Kevin Rudd says
"A BBC executive at the centre of the payoff scandal helped to arrange an inflated severance deal for a colleague before leaving with a golden handshake that broke the same rules. Mark Byford, the former deputy director-general, took part in talks over the departure of Pat Loughrey, who received £866,000. Two years later, Mr Byford negotiated an even higher payoff of £1.02 million.
In both cases, the payoffs breached BBC policy by including a full year’s salary in lieu of notice, even though the men had already been paid for most or all of their notice period.
Steve Barclay, a Tory member of the Commons Public Accounts Committee, criticised the deals yesterday, saying: “A clear picture is now emerging of managers inflating the sums paid to colleagues in the hope that they could pick up an even bigger payoff when they move on to well-paid jobs elsewhere.” http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/medianews/article3820221.ece
If Labour are going to bore the arse off the rest of us by making insinuations about Mr Crosby - I noticed a couple of things that rather stymied that last night.
1. He's going full-time with CCHQ from early next year so he won't have any other clients then.
2. Mr Crick has already been told of who he isn't acting for
Michael Crick @MichaelLCrick 12h
Firms who say we've NOT used Lynton Crosby: BAT, Imperial Tob, Japan Tob, Diageo, Tesco, Wm Hill, BAe, Serco, Atos, G4S, Centrica, Cuadrilla
and most tellingly:
Michael Crick @MichaelLCrick 17 Jul
John Howard: Crosby entitled to "whatever clients he wants.. This brouhaha indicates political enemies of Cons Party don't want him around"
Is it the other word starting with F then a K sound finishing with ING but when the earth moves!
They must really fear him.
Who on earth would want to employ people like that ?
Until there is a job description for being an MP with minimum standards, there's is no way to judge if MPs are underpaid or not.
How do we know if Government ministers are doing their jobs as MPs?
I don't care if Gordon Brown gives away all his outside earnings, he shouldn't get paid for doing next-to-nothing as an MP. Furthermore, having a safe seat means there is no electoral discipline for him. I do note that most Government ministers come from safe seats and some resign in order to keep their marginal constituencies.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/matthewholehouse/100227173/jack-straw-gordon-browned-misused-the-office-of-prime-minister/
On the visit to Iraq timed during the Tory conference in 2007
"It showed both that he was paralysed in terms of decision making, but also this remarkable propensity for double-think and disingenuity which I’d not really understood was a characteristic of his until then.”
In 2007 he noticed this. Teensy bit slow on the uptake?
Pity it isn't the lagershed, I have an old KFC joke to share
Labour is going at this issue, and the LDs should do too, because it looks as though Cameron has not acted in a proper manner.
Dave's bluster might have helped him not answer the question but his evasion suggests that he thinks that something is wrong.
It all helps create a "sleazy Tories" narrative that could come inro the open at any stage between now and May 2015
YouGov poll for The Sun today: Only 11% of Brits say they know who Lynton Crosby is. So Crosby/tobacco is still just a bubble story.
@tnewtondunn
...12% say they have heard something about him. 61% say they've never even heard of him.
Dave was very un Prime Ministerial at times.
But boy did the Tory MPs love it.
Fraser Nelson article on the dangers of the immigration ponzi scheme..
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/10188220/We-have-to-wean-the-country-off-the-drug-of-immigration.html
On the other hand, one of the obvious reasons Labour are going hard on Crosby is because they are a bit confused on what else to say.
You gov says 11% know who Lynton Crosby is - well those that told the truth anyway.
61% said never even heard the name.
1. He's not going to be dropped by CCHQ
2. No one outside the Bubble cares
3. Even if they did - it won't change how they vote
4. It makes Labour look like they aren't interested in normal people's concerns by banging on and on about this.
If Labour and the LDs want to play this silly game - let them, the more time they waste on the telly talking about this, the less time they have to talk about issues voters are bothered about.
Isn't it ironic that MPs have been seeking to take councillors' pensions away, on the grounds that many councillors are part-time and so can get a pension from elsewhere, when at the same time these part-time MPs enjoy the most attractive and expensive pension arrangements this side of Alpha Centauri?
Also worth flagging the role that a voting system that gives more or less absolute security to at least 25% of the post holders has in influencing their behaviour and standards. I reckon that external earnings would show a positive correlation with majority.
Coalitionistas are also thinking Ozzie will eventually become Patron Saint of Master Strategists !!
Tom Newton Dunn @tnewtondunn
@paulwaugh @anthonyjwells no. we thought it was too bubble for our readers! YG will publish on their site tho.
Tom Newton Dunn @tnewtondunn
@paulwaugh remember that's just those who said they knew, no proof, so as @anthonyjwells will tell you, real figure phaps half that?
Anthony Wells @anthonyjwells
@tnewtondunn @paulwaugh yep - is if people THINK they know who he is. If we'd made them type an answer and marked them, would be even lower
I'd have thought the better approach would be to stay out, buy some popcorn and let the 2 big parties drag each other into the mire. Then tut tut at the end and say just shows why you need us in government.
In any case, it's probably unworkable and would certainly be ineffective. What is the practical difference *in the impact on an MP's performance* between doing a job for free as a volunteer and doing it for £10k or £100k or any other amount? Likewise, if an MP writes a dog of a book that sells half a dozen copies that's ok, but write a bestseller and that's prohibited? Bizarre. Likewise, would the rules apply to the Lords? If not, why not, if this is a matter of principle?
What campaigning like this and on Crosby by Miliband tells me is that Labour has given up on campaigning on the big issues: crime, the economy, health and education - perhaps with good reason. It's Westminster wonkery.
Do we really want a political class that has done nothing but politics since its members were 18 or younger? We could understand why Miliband might think that ideal but the practical effect would be to isolate the caste even more, both from the rest of the country and in terms of barriers to entry.
Ed isn't leading on anything - it's all about defence - poor.
He posted the links on an earlier thread - my Google Fu is too poor to find them, so all help much appreciated.
Has any newspaper run with that yet, or are they waiting for the actual birth?
http://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/0599udosnq/YG-Archive-Prospect-results-010713-private-schools.pdf
The variables in deciding the differences in outcomes are seen as being (true and very or fairly important):
Better educated parents: 47
Smaller classes/better facilities: 77
More freedom over what is taught: 50
Pupils made to work harder: 56
State school bright pupils held back: 57
State school classroom disruption: 61
The panel is split on whether on balance Private schools benefit Britain(y/n): 42:41
On altering entry criteria for State school pupils, more think Universities should do more to find talented state school pupils (56) than leave things "A level results only" (36). While most (41) think standards would remain the same, more think they would fall (31) than rise (12).
On foreign students the panel divides evenly between those who think this good (32), bad (28) or makes no difference (32) for Britain.
From Waitrose weekly sales report.
If MPs treated their position as a full time job, we might save a bit of money on interns and parliamentary aides. So actually fewer professional pols in the long run.
Labour have done nothing that Cameron would not have done in opposition.
Are there figures for 'You Smell So Here's Bathroom Stuff' gifts? We had Miss Thompson who looked like a tubby version of Caroline Lucas in a Purdy haircut - she got loads at the end of every term.
That can only have been due to an evil lobbyist.
Oh, wait...
There is a nice and a nasty answer to this. The nice one is that they feel an MP should have experience of the outside world (though how outside-worldish working at the Bar or running an investment company is, is moot.) The nasty one is that Conservative selection committees are stacked out with snobs who would rather rub shoulders with a very, very rich man in a fracking great mansion, than someone in a semi on a housing estate.
I'm in the undecided camp for once.