May 312009
As David Marquand put it eloquently in a Guardian piece on Tuesday: what lies behind much of the public anger [about MP's expenses] is the collapse of the post-war social contract whereby citizens offered the state their loyalty in return for jobs, rising living standards and social protection. I’m afraid it will take a lot more than fixed term parliaments to re-build that contract.
I agree with Adam Lent.
I also think PR will help.
2 Responses to “MPs’ Expenses Row: There’s tough economic questions in this”
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And all Brown is doing is cotinuing to blatantly try to take people for fools, with crass spin. He is disgusting. And he has a family of spin doctors, including his brother’s spin job with EFDF, where the nuclear contacts have gone. Now that’s the sort of parliamentary corruption we want discussed.
I find it very strange that people like David Marquand fail to understand that the public’s anger over MPs expenses has little or nothing to do with the current state of the economy and everything to do with utter disgust at the greed of MPs. The idea that the anger would have been any less if the story had broken before the financial bubble burst simply does not stand up.
Even the dimmest member of society can see though the “It was within the rules” hogwash emanating from the Commons. The rules were perfectly clear that the expenses were only for payments directly relating to performing MP’s duties. The fact that payments were made outside of the rules does not and cannot bring the claims within the rules. Many people, well OK cynics like me, have long suspected politicians of lining their pockets, but until now the evidence has not been in the public domain.
Electoral Reform might help but PR with party lists would concentrate even more power in the hands of the whips.