£10,000 Pay Rise for British MPs: A Fair Deal?

[BritishLeft]

The following thread is to discuss the ridiculous proposals to increase wages for all members of parliament in the British Government by a staggering £10,000. I have also included my article below which I have submitted to pro-Left, independent news website 'ACA The Underground' which many of you know from RevLeft, join their group on the Groups page if not as they are a worthy cause which is worthy of support from all of us.

£10,000 Pay Rise for MPs: A Fair Deal?

I have been alarmed recently to see the proposals of British Members of Parliament receiving a further pay rise. In support of this is the Prime Minister and a majority of backbench MPs, whilst in opposition surprisingly is Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg, who up to this point has been virtually a Conservative puppet and seen a large majority of his Liberal Democrat party members vote in preference of a Lib Dem-Labour coalition in the next General Election if we are left with another hung parliament, in the latest polls.

Although, I am quite a liberal socialist and not as far left as the majority of people who post on forums such as RevLeft, I am completely outraged at this proposal and believe that the Labour government as well as the more apt socialist MPs should completely oppose this ruling, to save whatever integrity The Labour Party has as being a Leftist party.

In reference to the ‘Immediate Aims of the Left’ section of this site, which is incredibly well written and which I support fiercely, I believe that an MP should be paid no more than a skilled worker. It is perfectly fair as in reality many lesser MPs do relatively little to create or enforce large reforms or changes which help to better cater the people in local constituencies who are under their control. However, due to the majority of local MPs currently being of a Right Wing inclination, with Conservative dominance in the last General Elections and also the current boom in the United Kingdom Independence Party which I personally loathe, unfortunately I can see the likely event of MPs receiving a pay rise.

Even in the current economic climate, with inflation slowly rising amidst relentless austerity measures, a £10,000 pay rise is absolutely out of order. As if over £65,000 was not enough, yet Commons sympathisers including John Bercow, the Commons speaker, has said that MPs are paid little more than other civil service workers.

A survey recently published by IPSA (Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority) in January of this year found that MPs would like to receive an average of £86,000 a year. Some greedy whatnots even thought that £100,000 would be an apt sum.

It is interesting to note that none of the leaders of the three parties have convincingly come out to resist these proposals which is unacceptable with them all coming from privileged backgrounds. I cannot contain my despise for Ed Miliband, when reading that he has not been actively against the proposal, personally seeing him as a naive politician and a complete toff who does nothing to challenge Labour’s dramatic slants to the right which we have seen over the past few years under New Labour.

Overall, as everyone with the right mind would agree, a pay rise would be scandalous and I would expect a fierce backlash in the press if party leaders accept the talks and I would expect tax payers to be disgusted after the ongoing scandals over expenses which have scarred the Government for being corrupt.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

There are no socialist MPs in parliament and there is no more 'integrity' left in the Labour Party. Not since they kicked out the Militant Tendancy, genuine socialists, in the late 80's and early 90's and even before that it was largely lipservice and defence of the working class in word only.

When Dave Nellist, a former member of Militant who got expelled and went on to join the Socialist Party, was a Labour MP he took the average wage of a factory worker and gave the rest of his parliamentary wage to strike funds and donations to charity. There were Militant MPs who had to sleep on the benches in parliament because they couldn't afford a second home in London. None of that core spirit remains in the Labour Party. There's pretty much a wafer thin mint between the major parties' policies.

This talk of a pay rise, whilst public sector workers have been on pay freezes for years and minimum wage workers are getting shafted by zero-hour contracts that somehow count as 'employment', is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of all the attacks on the working class that are occuring in Britain today.

[BritishLeft]

Yes completely agree with you there. The ousting of the Military Tendency and Labour Members who were too openly left wing was foolish of the party and has led to the state of the party today.

It really can't be called a Left Wing party anymore when it takes the same stance as the Conservatives and the Liberals on almost all of the critical policies, just making it sound more left wing and always portraying them as a People's Party in campaigns, it's all a fraud.

Dave Nellist as you said was a true great of the party who actually wanted to campaign for the people; just as you see Arthur Scargill, who was a big Socialist hero during Thatcher's war with the miners, was too openly Marxist for Labour's liking and now has branched off as the leader of the Socialist Labour Party.

It's quite a shame really the way Labour has sold itself out over the years, Socialist parties in the UK really do not gain much popularity nowadays apart from the SWP which dominates the Left Wing. The political spectrum has just become dull and overpopulated with parties who are too Conservative and aren't proper lefties.

[tachosomoza]

£10,000 raise for people who, for the most part, would be able to support themselves from money made in their private lives? Outrageous bleeding of taxpaying workers to fund the frivolities of the elite, once again.

[Admiral Swagmeister G-Funk]

there are people on benefits who don't make that in a year but somehow they're the scroungers?

[BritishLeft]

There are people who don't match that salary on their income for 5 years let alone a year! It's ridiculous and especially because backbenchers are mainly in favour of it and in all honesty they don't do much do they!

As if 65k wasn't enough, the excuse for a pay rise is "to stop them fiddling with expenses" which they shouldn't need to!

Public sectors workers pay should be first priority over MPs

[Admiral Swagmeister G-Funk]

i meant the £10k rise alone.

[BritishLeft]

Oh right! But still the same principles, it is such a silly proposal and I will furious if it does materialise.

[helot]

It really can't be called a Left Wing party anymore when it takes the same stance as the Conservatives and the Liberals on almost all of the critical policies, just making it sound more left wing and always portraying them as a People's Party in campaigns, it's all a fraud. They act in the interests of capital, do you expect otherwise?




It's quite a shame really the way Labour has sold itself out over the years, Socialist parties in the UK really do not gain much popularity nowadays apart from the SWP which dominates the Left Wing. The political spectrum has just become dull and overpopulated with parties who are too Conservative and aren't proper lefties.

It never sold out as it was never "ours". It has always been fundamentally anti-worker. We can even look to the supposed golden age of the labour party i.e. after WWII. Yet within the first 6 days of them forming a government in 1945 they used soldiers to break up strikes.

[BritishLeft]

They act in the interests of capital, do you expect otherwise?




It never sold out as it was never "ours". It has always been fundamentally anti-worker. We can even look to the supposed golden age of the labour party i.e. after WWII. Yet within the first 6 days of them forming a government in 1945 they used soldiers to break up strikes.
I expect the Labour Party to act in the interest of capital but I don't expect them to be as liberal as they are. The scandal with the trade unions of recent has shown that even the trade unions, Labour's biggest political subsidisers and allies are turning on it.

[Comrade Jacob]

Not a fair deal, fuck them.