MP's expenses, what would you do?
Anonymous
Posts: 79,665
I would get the inland revenue and police involved. If you or I fiddled our income, car, council or VAT tax we would be for the high jump.
We have been taken for mugs by these smug gits and the only reason they are stopping is because they got caught. I feel so chaeted and helpless in this.
I am voting for a smaller party in the upcoming Euro elections as a protest against the big 3 parties.
They work for us, the electorate and should be reminded of it.
We have been taken for mugs by these smug gits and the only reason they are stopping is because they got caught. I feel so chaeted and helpless in this.
I am voting for a smaller party in the upcoming Euro elections as a protest against the big 3 parties.
They work for us, the electorate and should be reminded of it.
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put them all in front of a firing squad?"I spend my petrol money on Bikes, Beer, Pizza, and Donuts "
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dmclite wrote:I would get the inland revenue and police involved. If you or I fiddled our income, car, council or VAT tax we would be for the high jump.
We have been taken for mugs by these smug gits and the only reason they are stopping is because they got caught. I feel so chaeted and helpless in this.
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I think I might agree.Whenever I see an adult on a bicycle, I believe in the future of the human race.
H.G. Wells.0 -
Being serious for a moment. Nearly all of them have committed Fraud.
Under the Fraud Act 2006 they have all committed ''Fraud by false representation'', or ''fraud by abuse of position''.
Even though they have so called 'rules' these mean jack IMO. All have gained for themselves or another, and have ''mislead'' (mislead = fraud?) the entire country. I think I'm right in saying someone has been trying to get this info for the past four years? All should be arrested and face 10yrs inside.
Unfortunately I doubt the Police will get involved, as they keep getting their finger's burnt every time they go near an MP.
Member of Parliament have taken the piss for many years and this is another example. The sad thing is it doesn't suprise me in the slightest. The scarey thing is Euro MP's are even worse!! :evil:"I spend my petrol money on Bikes, Beer, Pizza, and Donuts "
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I`m not defending MP`s but I wonder how many of the journalists who write about them have fiddled their expenses somehow.It`s not public money,I suppose that`s the difference.Smarter than the average bear.0
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Works for me.If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.0 -
Don't get me started. As a tax payer I'm deeply offended that my tax is being used to purchase tampons on expences while our brave lads and lasses are perishing in Afghanistan for want of appropriate equipment.
Shame on these MP's.
Second homes, what's wrong with having a high security hotel type complex near the houses of parliament where MP's can base themselves when away from their constituencies.Tail end Charlie
The above post may contain traces of sarcasm or/and bullsh*t.0 -
I'd be using it to force a change in the way we deal with so-called benefits cheats. If they make a mistake, however small, and however unintentional, or however desperate or deserving they are, we demonise them and possibly throw them in jail too.
Those nice MPs though - all they have to do is say sorry and maybe pay some of it back.0 -
As you say its not public money. Its 'my' money. MP's are in a public Office and they all have a duty to be upstanding, and honourable. We're not talking the odd fewquid here are we?antfly wrote:I`m not defending MP`s but I wonder how many of the journalists who write about them have fiddled their expenses somehow.It`s not public money,I suppose that`s the difference.
Others in Public Office would be sacked or forced to resign. Or face charges?"I spend my petrol money on Bikes, Beer, Pizza, and Donuts "
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antfly wrote:I`m not defending MP`s but I wonder how many of the journalists who write about them have fiddled their expenses somehow.It`s not public money,I suppose that`s the difference.
I take your point - even if it isn't public money - dishonesty is still the same. Journalists are by and large hypocrites on this subject.
Oh and if it's a BBC journalist then it is public money - and I believe ITN get some public money for their Channel Four bulletins. I wonder what sort of fiddling they get up to?0 -
I'm not bothering to vote anymore. Completely lost confidence in the lot! If this were you or I in our jobs, we would be sacked or the Police would be called in for fraud. But no, they just get away with it. When you have MP's deciding on MP's wage rises, you just know it bent!
On the whole, the country is Fu@ked! I would not like to be young again in the UK. I just feel sorry for my kids...what have they got to look forward too..........ah yes I forgot, paying off the debt this country has built up....or should I say, Brown and his mob!0 -
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It's true - I've been put off voting because it doesn;t matter who you vote you always get an illegal war, poor NHS, demonised benefit claimants, privatised utilities, 2% pay increases and 8% council tax increases, no investment in renewable energies, an arms industry that's out of control, unfettered capitalism, a cash-starved public sector, increasing rich-poor divide, lack of transparency in government, a t.wat in charge of London, etc, etc.0
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Thanks for that.He`s somewhat sophisticated,is Stephen Fry.softlad wrote:
I liked the Lord Foulkes interview too,very funny.Smarter than the average bear.0 -
nicensleazy wrote:I'm not bothering to vote anymore. Completely lost confidence in the lot! If this were you or I in our jobs, we would be sacked or the Police would be called in for fraud. But no, they just get away with it. When you have MP's deciding on MP's wage rises, you just know it bent!
On the whole, the country is Fu@ked! I would not like to be young again in the UK. I just feel sorry for my kids...what have they got to look forward too..........ah yes I forgot, paying off the debt this country has built up....or should I say, Brown and his mob!
Mail reader alert!
I think the standard of living / quality of life enjoyed by most people in this country is better than it has ever been. When was this golden age when life was so wonderful???0 -
I voted Lib Dem in the last General Election. Nothing to do with Policies or Promises, just the fact that the fellow lived in the same Constituency that he was standing in. The others didnt, one didnt even live in london. (Seperate rant, sorry)
In two London constituencies near me their MP's have been spotlighted for their claims for second homes. WTF? I thought that was for MP's whose constituencies were "too far" from Parliament. That really peed me off.
I work for a Local Authority and our budget is cut Year on Year but our targets increase Year on Year. My Mum works for the NHS and they put up with the same thing. So, we all get slated for cuts in services while Little Lord Fauntleroy drains his moat and builds another Wing :evil:0 -
softlad wrote:
I heard the Fry interview & I disagree. Fry is clearly a very clever bloke, and yeah Fry makes some valid points about, the war, people dying and bad descisions made by MP's, & he's probbaly right about jounalist too. (He seems to dislike journos for some reason - urmm wounder why that is?) But to say it's nonsense and not important is a far fetched don't you think? What will equate to millions of wasted taxpapers money, not on trying to do the right thing or sort a particular issue out, but on their 'honourable' selves? It goes to the very heart of what being an MP is about. It shows how out of touch some MP's are, and makes many think why are they MP's in the first place. With many folkes losing their jobs, the banking crisis, the middle east, just for starters, people feel as though they have been smacked in the face!
And as for the Lord Foulkes interview. He comes across as a bit of an idiot, which I suppose sort of makes it funny."I spend my petrol money on Bikes, Beer, Pizza, and Donuts "
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I thought he came out on top with valid arguments and embarrassed the interviewer,who is also payed public money.Smarter than the average bear.0
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I did say he made some vaild points didn't I?, and your right about the interviewer, but Fry IMO was ignorant to disregard this issue as nonsense. My point still stands? no?antfly wrote:I thought he came out on top with valid arguments and embarrassed the interviewer,who is also payed public money."I spend my petrol money on Bikes, Beer, Pizza, and Donuts "
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alfablue wrote:nicensleazy wrote:I'm not bothering to vote anymore. Completely lost confidence in the lot! If this were you or I in our jobs, we would be sacked or the Police would be called in for fraud. But no, they just get away with it. When you have MP's deciding on MP's wage rises, you just know it bent!
On the whole, the country is Fu@ked! I would not like to be young again in the UK. I just feel sorry for my kids...what have they got to look forward too..........ah yes I forgot, paying off the debt this country has built up....or should I say, Brown and his mob!
Mail reader alert!
I think the standard of living / quality of life enjoyed by most people in this country is better than it has ever been. When was this golden age when life was so wonderful???
:evil: I am not a Mail reader, in fact, I don't bother with papers!
You most be living on another planet boyo. People loosing their jobs, companies closing down, borrowing at sky high levels, people can't get a mortgage, crime levels increasing......I could go on....but I see your point????? :roll:0 -
nicensleazy wrote:alfablue wrote:nicensleazy wrote:I'm not bothering to vote anymore. Completely lost confidence in the lot! If this were you or I in our jobs, we would be sacked or the Police would be called in for fraud. But no, they just get away with it. When you have MP's deciding on MP's wage rises, you just know it bent!
On the whole, the country is Fu@ked! I would not like to be young again in the UK. I just feel sorry for my kids...what have they got to look forward too..........ah yes I forgot, paying off the debt this country has built up....or should I say, Brown and his mob!
Mail reader alert!
I think the standard of living / quality of life enjoyed by most people in this country is better than it has ever been. When was this golden age when life was so wonderful???
:evil: I am not a Mail reader, in fact, I don't bother with papers!
You most be living on another planet boyo. People loosing their jobs, companies closing down, borrowing at sky high levels, people can't get a mortgage, crime levels increasing......I could go on....but I see your point????? :roll:
Are you very young or do you have selective memory? When I was growing up we had a 3 day week. I remember the house being lit by candles for several nights per week and no heating during the winter. Or towards the end of the 70's, literally mountains of rubbish piled up in the streets, or the early 80's, the miners strike and mass unemployment, or the first part of the 90's, recession and negative equity and repossessions over a 5 year period. Better times, eh? Or maybe you are older, there was a brief time of optimism during the 60's. Prior to that we had the austerity of the 50's with rationing, world war in the 40's, economic depression in the 20's and 30's, world war in the decade before that...
Crime is not increasing (though it is predicted to increase during the recession), people are losing jobs and companies are folding, but we have seen worse in previous decades, people who can't get a mortgage are probably being saved from their own financial foolishness.
In the six decades I have lived in, life has never been as good as in the noughties!
Mind you, I know people love to moan and exaggerate about things never having been so bad - it is part of the human condition! They always have, they always will.0 -
alfablue wrote:Are you very young or do you have selective memory? When I was growing up we had a 3 day week. I remember the house being lit by candles for several nights per week and no heating during the winter. Or towards the end of the 70's, literally mountains of rubbish piled up in the streets, or the early 80's, the miners strike and mass unemployment, or the first part of the 90's, recession and negative equity and repossessions over a 5 year period. Better times, eh? Or maybe you are older, there was a brief time of optimism during the 60's. Prior to that we had the austerity of the 50's with rationing, world war in the 40's, economic depression in the 20's and 30's, world war in the decade before that...
Crime is not increasing (though it is predicted to increase during the recession), people are losing jobs and companies are folding, but we have seen worse in previous decades, people who can't get a mortgage are probably being saved from their own financial foolishness.
In the six decades I have lived in, life has never been as good as in the noughties!
Mind you, I know people love to moan and exaggerate about things never having been so bad - it is part of the human condition! They always have, they always will.
Alfablue, I would always agree with anyone who points out that life is better now than ever before, but I think that what really winds people up is that the people who have caused this crisis have walked away with millions of pounds, for which everyone else is going to be paying for decades to come.0 -
According to some sources I have seen/heard crime is drastically increasing, it's jusr REPORTING of it to the police that is decreasing as a lot of people have lost faith in the police's ability to solve crimes, or even do anything about it. In cases of theft all they are really good for in a lot of areas is getting a crime reference number to make an insurance claim.
Even in comparitive terms the country is in more debt than it ever has been, partly down to mismanagement by the government (lack of regulation of finances, pandering to the corporate big boys) and partly down to the banks themselves not keeping their own houses in order, meaning huge bail out payments that the public will be paying back for many years through increased taxation (not my fault some idiot bought up a load of bad debt on the cheap.... why should I have to bail said idiot out?)
As for the MP's expenses..... I'm sure there are many that use the system sensibly to only claim legitimate expenses. The few that "abuse" the system are the ones that are considered newsworthy though, so they'll be the ones you hear about. The 2nd home is something that irks me greatly. Why do they need a "home"? Why not a hotel and a reciept? Why not a single purpose built complex of moderately furnished studio flats with office space? Why is it not possible for an MP to travel 20 miles to work in London when a great many people (myself included at one point, paying for travel from my own pocket) travel up to 100 miles EACH WAY to get to work in the city every day? A back bench MP gets a very good wage as it is (£64,000). A cabinet minister gets an ADDITIONAL £90,000 a year. Why should we then further subsidise these people by paying their bills and personal purchases? Why are they able to claim up to £400 personal allowance a week without showing any reciepts for anything? Political finances should be sctutinised in great detail by an independant body and EVERY penny of expense, whether claimed in allowances, expenses, wages, bills, or expendature on a public service such as the NHS, defence, policing should be accounted for with reciepts and made available to the public who are funding it. ANY politician found to be benefiting personally should then be sacked and prosecuted for fraud or tax evasion, whichever is appropriate0 -
No can do. The whole thing is sickening. As zedders points out, this is fraudulent behaviour. If you condone it then you can justify letting people get away with just about anything short of rape or murder. Does no-one have any ethical standards now? Is it a free-for-all? Are the people in whom we invest the responsiblity of managing the affairs of the country fit for the task? I can see no honour in screwing the system even if the system is broken. Dishonesty is like a cancer.softlad wrote:
Benefit cheats and tax evaders are demonised (but not the über-rich Non-Doms). What difference is there between them and this bunch of hypocrites? If my employer thought I was doing something even remotely like this I'd probably get my P45 on the spot and be escorted off the premises (and subsequently find employment very hard to come by). Complete double standards. All the self-pity, the squirming and attempts at justifying their indulgences and tax dodging demonstrates they do not have any personal morals. Those are for everyone else, the mugs who pay for the sofas, the big TVs, the buying & selling of property.
You can finger-point at journalists for hypocrisy but that's missing the point. I can live with that far better than what's being exposed here. Without journalists no-one could ever call the government to account and tell the nation about it. I don't like the idea of that - look at all the countries with state-controlled monopoly media. <shiver>
IMHO this is up there with institutionalised racism in the Police force as a sign of something very rotten at the heart of the system. I don't care what Fry thinks. Being influential, batting away any hint of seriousness by admitting some dishonesty himself and appearing to be a vox pop for intelligent comment does not make him right. Slavery, smoking and putting lead in petrol (to name but 3) were all considered good ideas in the past.
Is £63,000 not enough of a salary? Plus generous pension. Plus the opportunity to either slide effortlessly into nice jobs in business consultancy/lobbying or a comfy seat in the Lords. Perhaps they'd like to work 12 hour shifts on a nurse's wage trying to pay for a flat (just the one) in London with no bleedin' expenses to claim and a place on the scrapheap when they're burnt out.Aspire not to have more, but to be more.0 -
I don't think he was defending MPs as such - merley pointing out that in the scheme of things, a few million on expenses is not really that bad.
Not as bad, for instance, as several billion squandered on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and the several hundred lives lost in the interim - all as a result of a few debates and votes in parliament.
I still agree with Fry - of all the things Parliament deserves to get a severe kicking for - this one is pretty low on the list....
As he says - we voted for these people, so we all know what to do next time.....don't we..?0 -
The thought did occur to me the other night as I repaired a puncture that if I was an MP I could probably have my LBS do this and then claim it back, regardless of cost. In fact, I could probably just claim a whole new bike. Maybe even get someone to ride it for me now and again to ensure its upkeep and then claim back his fees. You couldn't actually make up what some of these idiots have claimed for!
What really upsets me is the way the MPs, public servants supposedly, have so flagrantly abused their positions here. A particular point in case is Sinn Fein. They are claiming for flights to and from London (from Belfast) and flats in the capital which cost several thousand pounds in rent. Admittedly, they only have 5 MPs and use two flats between them. So why the case in point? They resolutely REFUSE as a party to swear allegience to the throne and as such do not take up their seats in parliament. So why the hell are they travelling to and staying in London at taxpayers (our!!) expense?
As for the rest, I am in the Army and live in a married quarter which I have to pay for. I've got two kids and a third inbound but that matters not as I'm only entitled to a 3 bed house. It has mould, flaking paint, leaky windows and a whole host of other minor issues which the company that own the houses do not deem a big enough problem to fix. I cannot claim to get a top designer in to do it up nor can I have my garden sorted out and then the bill paid at public expense. When I go to Afghan in a couple of months I'll be living with very few home comforts, away from my family and for the pleasure I'll get a medal and an extra few quid a day on top of my pay (which to be fair I'll have limited opportunity to spend so the wife will do that for me back home!). I'll also have to live with the constant, daily threat of the Taliban trying to kill me and my colleagues by a variety of means. When I come home, if I want to travel to Scotland to see my side of the family, I won't be able to claim for it because I've been in the Army more than 3 years (I still can't work that one out).
The fact these knobs seem to think it was all ok because it was allowed does not make it right. The idea that if they pay it back it will make it ok does not make it ok. The only thing that will right this wrong is by voting them out, but then they will merely be replaced by some other knob who is out for him/her self. Billy Connolly once said that "the very desire to become a politician should bar one for life from ever becoming one." Very few of them put themselves (IMO) up for election for the greater good of their or the wider community. They do it for themselves and this type of thing has been going on for years. As for the rest, Power corrupts etc etc.0 -
Sorry, can't see that. It's about personal principles. Individual conduct is important. Complicity in small crimes leads so easily to bigger ones, "just following orders" or "everyone else does it" are not valid excuses.softlad wrote:I don't think he was defending MPs as such - merley pointing out that in the scheme of things, a few million on expenses is not really that bad.
What if it was a few billion? Where do you draw the line? It's like asking someone to justify speeding when the law says there's a limit. If you're over the limit you're breaking the law. I disagreed with invading Iraq but that was an executive decision, for good or ill. I don't think you can compare the two.
I did not!. And even if I did I didn't vote for corruption and abuse of powers, I never saw that mentioned in anyone's manifesto. What happened to the anti-sleaze stuff after the 'Back to Basics' era? Conveniently forgotten.As he says - we voted for these peopleAspire not to have more, but to be more.0 -
It's just the newspapers making the news.
It's the gift that keeps on giving.
Everyone likes to be outraged once in a while!Note: the above post is an opinion and not fact. It might be a lie.0 -
Yes but I meant Foulkes .zedders wrote:
I did say he made some vaild points didn't I?, and your right about the interviewer, but Fry IMO was ignorant to disregard this issue as nonsense. My point still stands? no?antfly wrote:I thought he came out on top with valid arguments and embarrassed the interviewer,who is also payed public money.
After seeing tonight`s news I agree, some of it is just plain fraudulent.A lot of it is just pettty.Smarter than the average bear.0 -
A lot of what they have been claiming cannot be justified as legitimate expenses and would be classed as a benefit in kind which is taxable. If they haven't been taxed the police should be investigating tax evasion
The fact that so many MPs have been paying back huge sums over the last few days shows that they didn't need the money if they had it all there to pay out0
