With all due reference to Terry Pratchett for the title.
Or to put it another way pay peanuts and get monkeys.
Now I would ask you to bear with me and read this to the end
- because I suspect on face value you aren't gonna like it.
This is about our members of parliament.
The mother of parliaments etc etc
Now - are you proud of them? Ah no I thought not.
So we have 650 or so of the people who CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE
particularly in this era of no one having control of the commons etc etc
So - do we have the best possible minds there - well in some senses we do.
We have a number of M.P.s (and P.M.s) who are of independent means - and fair play
to them - I have no problem with them working in public life - but - does that mean we
have a HOUSE full of the best minds - of course not.
I don't know where you are but it seems to me that 65K plus expenses in London in 2010
is NOT going to get you the best - good yes - the best - NO!!!
And for fucks sake we need the best - there are only 600+ of them - given that the GDP of the UK
is 1.whatever Trillion pounds what we pay them is of zero significance to the country in reality.
So - here is the bit you are not going to like.
I propose that from AFTER the next election we pay all M.P.s 10 times average salary.
So at the moment that would be around 220K as far as I can tell.
Yes that's a lot of money - but -
1) It would get the BEST minds going for it because there would be no finanacial reason for almost anyone to to work elsewhere.
2) It would give them a cracking incentive to get the average salary up.
So - please - think for a minute before you rip my head off.
Is it SUCH a stupid idea?
In principal, I agree
ReplyDeleteHowever, I would favour £100,000 basic pay plus another £100,000 available
for "performance related" actions.
Otherwise you get people like Dennis Skinner, Sinn Féin MPs, etc who will be getting a lot of money for either doing sod all or just being dickheads.
Quite how you assess their performance I'm not sure , but to pay £200,000 just to turn up & make a few snidey comments or shout "here here"
every now & again doesn't sound like good value to me.
I've been arguing a similar case with my friends since the expenses scandal blew up, though was looking at a figure of £150k with a similar idea to Pete with a series of 'bonuses' that MPs can earn for working harder, something like:
ReplyDeleteAt least 75% attendance (to debates and votes) gets you £25K
Being a member of any committee another £20k
Responding to 90% of constituients mail yourself (not staffing it out, etc) £20k
Keeping your expenses below 40% of the allowances an extra £25k.
Speaking in at least 33% of debates, £15k
Therefore giving them a personal financial motive to better serve the public. Also providing a valid back bench carrer would help to cut the control of the party whips - something I feel very strongly about!
A
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