This really is a vexed question. Most of the wives of MPs I know who work for their husbands do a proper day's work and are rewarded accordingly. However, when I worked in the Commons in the mid 1980s there were loads of wives on all sides of the House who did very little if anything. At that time, the salary allowance came to a grand total of £12,000. How times have changed.
When I stood as a candidate in the last election I made ten pledges about how I would conduct myself if I was elected. A fat lot of good it did me, but one of the pledges (and you can look it up, if you don't believe me) was that I would not employ a member of my family. This was done not because I thought it would be wrong to do so, but it was to avoid the perception of any favouritism or wrongdoing. I made this decision for myself, but I do not say that is necessarily right for others. For one thing, I don't have a wife!
Each MP must be open and transparent about their employment arrangements. While publishing the actual salaries of individual staff members would, I feel, be a step too far, every MP should now overtly register any family member who is employed, or receives a pass.
69 comments:
Salaries paid to family members should also be noted in the Register, Iain. It is not a private matter when the money comes out of the taxpayer's salary.
Conway's wife was being paid £60,000 if I am not mistaken. For answering mail and keeping an appointments diary. He would not have dared augment his family income with this princely sum if it were recorded as a public matter.
Neither would he have dared pay either of his boys at university in the north and list them as "researchers". Nor Freddy's boyfriend.
The salaries of all family members employed by MPs must be a matter of public record and the information easily accessed by the public.
Most of the wives of MPs I know who work for their husbands do a proper day's work and are rewarded accordingly."
How can you POSSIBLY know, Ian??
For heavens sake, twice in one week!
First of all,your "friend" caught with his fingers in the till, and now this??
Are you sure its ONLY diabetes you have Ian?
Equal Opportunities obviously do not apply to Members of Parliament staff!
Jobs for the boys or girls.
We should follow the USofA and have legislation banning employment of family members by MP's etc.
Why not have a central pool of secretaries? Part of the Civil Service. Now that would be fairer. The MP's would not have to claim any expenses!
Why not build a special tower block as accomodation for MP's so they do not have to claim those expenses?
verity, you are indeed mistaken. She is on a scale up to £40,000. She also does a full day's work. I know because every time I have ever phoned Derek's office she answers the phone.
Anonymous, I know about five MPs wives who all do a proper job and work full time. Calling me a liar now are you? So courageous for someone who is anonymous.
Perhaps some sort of registered indication of how the MP came to be aware of his or her employee (although I suppose that could be very difficult to prove one way or the other).
I don't really get why Cameron is limiting this to frontbenchers - Conway wasn't a frontbencher himself, was he? - one thing I fear Brown is taking the lead on (although it does look pretty pathetic that he scrambled to remake Cameron's announcement a few short hours after the original; desperate to look tough on sleaze, tough on the causes of sleaze, except when it's his own ministers who are caught up in it and then it's, let's see if we can get away with it).
Employing family members must be a mixed blessing. How do you deal with poor performance/timekeeping by your lady wife without ending up sleeping in the box room?
Surely the best reform would be to treat all MPs' employees as public servants, with positions openly advertised and competed for. After all, it's public money. Better still, follow the American practice and ban family from these jobs.
They would probably then move to a 'pairing' arrangement where they employ each others wives/kids.
erity, you are indeed mistaken. She is on a scale up to £40,000. She also does a full day's work. I know because every time I have ever phoned Derek's office she answers the phone."
Hahahaha-come off it Ian! Just because she answers the phone DOES NOT necessarily mean she is doing a full days work, for heavens sake!
I answer the phone here,in my office, and I can assure you I am the laziest blighter north of the Grampians!
Surely you are not so niaive Ian??
EUReferendum has a very good posting on this topic at http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2008/01/declaration-of-interest.html
Just because one MP has abused the system does not mean the whole system is wrong. It is odd that this long-standing scandal only came to light in the recent dodgy MP feeding frenzy. What will be the next publicity craze for bloggers and the media: adultery or treason? Some more transparency is needed but a blanket assumption that family members on the payroll do not work would be as bad as the current system of expenses without receipts.
Iain, how about a post setting out what Derek Conway MP has achieved for his constituents to balance the story?
Iain - £40,000 for a secretary is far,far above what secretaries make. She answers the phone, does correspondence and keeps an appointments diary. Some diplomatic skills are necessary, but frankly, that's about it, qualification-wise. And knowing how to use a computer. This job should pay around £23,000 a year. Especially as she gets free accommodation in the family home.
Iain, you did not address the issue of the two sons, at university in the North, getting princely sums as "researchers", plus Freddie's boyfriend also on the payroll as a "researcher". What, by any stretch of the imagination, did these three young chaps do to "earn" these princely emoluments? One son in he north was paid £43,000 in "salary and bonuses". Plus full-time student Freddie got £11,773 salary, plus bonuses totalling more than £10,000. Bonuses?? Bonuses for what? Freddie got almost £22,000 of taxpayer pounds for what? And how much did his boyfriend get?
This is inexcusable. I can certainly understand your reluctance to condemn your friend in public. But trying to excuse the inexcusable grates.
He has treated the Exchequer, which has no money of its own, don't forget; it all came out of taxpayer pockets, as his personal playground, and treated hard-earned tax pounds like Monopoly money.
Verity, I did not say she earns £40k. I said her pay scale is, I believ, £25-40k. Most senior house of commons seconds earn around £30-35k which is still less than they might earn outside.
You have obviously been away from britilain a long time if you think £23k is an acceptable salary for an executive secretary.
As a neutral what has annoyed me the most is the focus on employing family members. I can see nothing wrong with this. Where the problem lies is that DC employed a researcher that did little (if any) research. It does not matter (well maybe a little) who the employed person is, what matters is that the person receiving public money (DC) to employ them did not do enough to ensure that their employee was earning their salary. I have been involved in the voluntary sector where community groups are in receipt of public funds to carry out certain tasks and I have been in the situation where I have had to sack people who were not doing their job. It is a difficult situation but it has to be done!
Wife and Executive Secretary. She must be very tired. I wonder if he supports a mistress as well from our money.
"if you think £23k is an acceptable salary for an executive secretary." Please define "executive" secretary. What special skills does she have? Her boss, her husband, was being paid by the taxpayer to execute things. She was a helper, although doubtless she had some grandiose notions as to her own worth. She answered the phone and kept his appointments diary.
Freddie was not only receiving a salary for doing bugger all - other than throwing some amusing parties - at university, but his father was also throwing taxpayer pounds at a pension scheme for him! We still haven't heard how much the boyfriend was being paid, nor for what notional tasks.
I'd always considered the Conservatives the party of independence and self-help, not 'help yourself'.
I'm sorry, Iain, but I am just appalled by this. Once again, the Americans got there first, and once again, we should copy them.
According to the Telegraph, Conway's wife was paid £40K p.a.
The same article reports "The Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards found there was "no evidence" of Freddie conducting any work for his £50,000 pay-and-bonuses package."
This is the issue: Did they do any work at all and, if so, were they paid the market rate?
This is just papering over the cracks. MPs can still abuse their expenses without fear of serious punishment so what does this achieve?
Verity - £25k in London. You are having a larf! I have to pay my PA more than that, and that's in Hampshire.
Let's not chuck the baby out with the bathwater. There is nothing wrong with employing family, providing it is transparently done. There can be benefits too - as some MPs would never get to see their spouses if they didn;t work with them.
But all staff should be treated as public oficials, their pay decided by a revue body, and set within bands, which is public domain.
THe rest of the expenses - especially the mileage fiddle - needs to be clamped down on.
So an out of town DIY shed manager with a staff of 200 looking after a £10m business is expected to earn less than a secretary?
Where is the equality these days?
Executive secretary!
Excuse me Iain, but I do not regard an MP as an executive.
No wonder these people think they are better than us, with their inflated self importance, she is a secretary who happens to be married to her boss plain and simple.
I think the best thing to do now is to take this perk away from MPs, just simply issue them with a Civil Service secretary, and perhaps one researcher from a similar pool.
I would not limit action to employing family members. I would make MPs justify all their expenses and actively audit at least 10% per annum. The detailed audit results would be published.
Gallimaufry writes: "Iain, how about a post setting out what Derek Conway MP has achieved for his constituents to balance the story?"
And what Freddie has achieved for Daddy's constituents to earn his generous pour boire. And what the other brother, on an even higher salary and bonuses has done to earn his salt at the taxpayer table. And in what way Freddie's boyfriend has contributed to the health and civil order of Mr Conway's constituency?
This family beggars belief.
There has been a great cultural change in the last 20 or so years, and some of this change is embodied in the conflicts of interest thrown up here.
The wife (and it used to have to be wife) of a vicar, a don in a collegiate university, a diplomat etc., was expected, no matter how young, to take on a complex social/public role that was recognized but, while not unassessed, wholly unpaid. Sometimes it could carry huge responsibility, particularly for wives dealing with young or vulnerable people whose world met their own.
The ending of 'wifeliness' and the payment of staff to undertake often onerous duties has helped to create these circumstances.
I do not write about the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup - he and any member of his family and acquaintance who accepted our money, that was in his charge, and did nothing for it, are what they are.
Hatfield Girl: What on earth are you on about?
I love how because its paid for out of taxpayers money people believe they have a right to know the exact salary of individuals.
When are we going to see the salary packages of every signle person employed by the state then?
Lets start with evey employee of the BBC from Jonathan Ross downwards - with a clear explanation of what they do to justify their salary.
Hello, HG. Nice to see you back and nice to read your rational, thoughtful post.
Any views on the MORI poll that allegedly has Labour 1 point ahead of the Tories (based on a sample questioned before the Conway saga burst out to remind us what sleaze is really all about)?
Iain, why do you think a husband couldn't work for a wife? Why does 'a wife work for a husband'?
Whatever... the point is that Conway was embezzling taxpayers money - and criminal charges should be brought against him.
So, DC, Brown and Clegg better be worried...
Verity
I am afraid you have no idea of what MP's secretaries do and by the way they are not called secretaries in the 21st century. Most PAs in the Commons in addition to diary work (which can be quite complex especially if the MPs are front benchers or sit in committees) do a huge amount of complex casework which can include anything from solving tax credits problems, CSA problems, dealing with immigration issues, dealing with people who have been let down by the NHS, getting care for old peoeple, services for autistic children and just be a sounding board for constituents and their problems. If they don't actually solve the problem they often put them in the right direction by suggesting agencies, charities etc. There are also letters to write to people who want to know where the MP/Party stands on particular issues. Oh and there is also office managing thrown in. The job nowadays involved excellent problem solving skills,a good manner with people and political nous. I am sick and tired of having people denigrate what is done and act as if they are little more than typists.
Moreove I am absolutely furious that this whole sorry episode has brought hardworking PAs and researchers into disrepute. Yes, there are rotten apples and for most part it has been an open secret and I am all for exposing them but do not denigrate the rest who are loyal, hardworking and earn a great deal less than they would in business.
MPs and people like Conway loving Dale should be hung before dawn.
Lady Finchley - I respect your ire, but the things that you list as PAs' (everyone has an elevated title nowadays; dustbin men are sanitary engineers) duties are surely what the MP elected by the voters for the job, is being paid to do?
In any event, I think we should take a lesson from the book of our more liberty-loving cousins in the US and ban MPs from hiring relatives. It leads to this kind of abuse.
Where is Trumpeter, btw, so we can get his opinion on the legalities?
Lady Finchley,
They are not called Bin Men now! Shop workers are not that anymore. Sales Assistants or Executives!Neither are office boys or girls called that...it appears that everyone has got a nice new title, which means what exactly? Absolutely Nothing. The PA's as you call them do exactly what Secretaries did.
Why not just read what Verity has been saying. I agree, as usual, with everything she has said.
If Iain cannot grasp - or more importantly ignores!-the truth, that Conway has done far more damage to the Tories than Hain and Co. did to the Labour Party.
The Conservative Party should place a motion to the house worded the same as the American Law that forbids n e p o t i s m! because that is what it is. It is also opposite to the requirements of The Equal Opportunities Legislation.
Now is the time for the Tories to make a real claim for the moral ground.
read what Huntsman has blogged:-
There is something of a competition taking place as to which Party can be the most transparent in the matter of its Members of Parliament disclosing which of them has members of their family working for them. Whilst this is to be welcomed it is not enough. It must lead to comprehensive detailed online disclosure of expenses and allowances.
In the meantime perhaps Mr. Brown, well-known liar and Prime Minister, might care to promise that there will be no repeat of the vote on the Third Reading of David Maclean�s Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill (the purpose of which was to conceal for ever any information about expenses and allowances of MPs) when 22% of the Parliamentary Labour Party went into the lobbies to support it.
This was the list of those Labour MPs who supported Maclean�s Bill in May 2007:
Graham Allen, Janet Anderson (Member, Administration Committee Member, Chairmen's Panel Committee), Adrian Bailey, Sir Stuart Bell (Chairman Finance & Services Committee, Liaison Committee Member, Members Estimates Committee), Clive Betts (Member Finance & Services Committee), Liz Blackman, Nicholas Brown (Member, Administration Committee), Colin Burgon, David Cairns, Alan Campbell, Ronnie Campbell, David Clelland, Harry Cohen, Wayne David, Parmjit Dhanda, Brian H. Donohoe (Member, Administration Committee), Frank Doran (Chairman, Administration Committee), Jim Dowd, Angela Eagle, Maria Eagle, Clive Efford, Jim Fitzpatrick, Caroline Flint, Michael Foster (Worcester), Mike Hall, Tom Harris, Doug Henderson,John Heppell (Member, Administration Committee), Keith Hill, Huw Irranca-Davies, Kevan Jones (Member, Administration Committee), Martyn Jones (Member, Chairman's Panel Committee), Fraser Kemp, David Lammy, Bob Laxton, Tom Levitt, Ivan Lewis, Tony Lloyd, Khalid Mahmood, David Marshall (Member, Chairman's Panel Committee), Thomas McAvoy, Steve McCabe, Ian McCartney, John McFall, Shona McIsaac, Tony McNulty, Gillian Merron, Alun Michael, Laura Moffat, Elliot Morley, George Mudie, Meg Munn, Denis Murphy, James Plaskitt, Stephen Pound, Ken Purchase, John Robertson, Frank Roy, Joan Ryan, Martin Salter, Jonathon Shaw, Jim Sheridan, Si�n Simon, Angela C. Smith (Sheffield, Hillsborough), Anne Snelgrove, John Spellar, Ian Stewart, Mark Tami, Dari Taylor, Gareth Thomas, Dr. Desmond Turner, Claire Ward, Tom Watson, Dave Watts, Malcolm Wicks, Phil Woolas, David Wright.
Key = Government Blair and Brown Government Blair Government Brown
It is a matter of note that 41 Labour MPs who are or were at the time members of the government voted against any sort of transparency and that a whole slew of them are members or chairmen of committees involved with the running of the House of Commons (ten of them), notably the Administration Committee.
It is pertinent, though inconvenient to Labour, to enquire just why there was such enthusiasm for opacity.
And we must remember that Mr. Speaker Martin, the embittered toff-hating class-warrior from the Gorbals, was said to be hand in glove with those supporting this Bill and is said still to be resisting the New Order.
Cameron can steal a march here and respond swiftly to the public mood which is clearly and unambiguously in favour of complete openness on this topic. Labour will then be seen to be playing catch-up.
PS - Lady Finchley, you write that Commons PAs "earn a great deal less than they would in business". PAs in Britain in private industry expect to earn more than £40,000 a year? How much more? £10,000 more? Elevated secretaries in Britain earn US$100,000? I'm sorry, but that is very hard to credit.
"Alice Sheffield, Research. Assistant to David Cameron. MP."
Oh! Isn't that David Cameron's sister-in-law?
Why, yes, it certainly is....
hmmmmmmmmmm
I am interested to know what your "Ten Point Pledge" was.
I cannot find it anywhere.
I would also be interested to know why you felt you had to make this commitment?
Hello, V. I seem to have attracted the attention of a First World World War Imperial German howitzer.
Abolishing the status of wife and all the skills and social contribution that carried hasn't been understood by that kind of person yet ;big and authoritarian yes, but not much range.
Seeing as how this post has attracted 27 comments so far, it would be a great shame if I missed the opportunity to direct readers towards this image of the Conway "family business" on my blog.
For what it's worth, as the husband of a GP, I get paid sweet FA for answering the phone on her behalf.
Do I complain?
No.
But I do tell some of her patients to pull themselves together and stop moaning about a service that few of them have contributed much to via their net taxes.
I consider it my little contribution towards that slow-motion car crash that is the NHS.
Let's be honest , it's a lot easier for a confirmed bachelor like yourself to say he's not going to employ any family members than it is for a family man with a wife and two teenage sons.
I understand David Cameron has asked for this Transparency project to be concluded by April 1st-- April Fools Day.
I think the project is going to create a feeding frenzy for the media. Where does an MPs declaration stop in this transparency exercise - Wives( which one) Girlfriends and Boyfriends past and present, Secretaries, Interns Mistresses, Ladies of the night, One night stands, etc.
The best way is to adopt an Anti Nepotism Act and allow the Parliamentary Administrators to allocate Parliamentary Staffing from a central Pool.
Also all expenses must be backed with a receipt, so ending the minimum £250 rule. Businessmen must present all receipts as a Tax Rule.
I reckon this transparency frenzy from all three Party Leaders is going to become a Laugh and a Joke by April Fools Day 2008.
It would be best for all of us if you just answer D.I. Verity's question Mr Dale. You don't want to see her when she gets angry
HG: Do you speak English?
HG - As always, your observations are astute.
Jamoncito - You write as though Iain is emotionally isolated when he not only has a large family around him, but a longtime partner and his family too.
I cannot imagine Iain shovelling his family into privileged slots in the government. I just can't.
There is absolutely no excuse for what Conway did. He is sickening and I hope he is the Deus ex machina for the rules being changed.
Every Parliamentary employee who is a member of an MP's family should have his/her salary stated publically. For the record. In the newspapers. Because it is pounds the taxpayer has had taken away from him/her and the taxpayer has an absolute right to know why his pounds are being siphoned back into the same family.
And for what services?
For example, how does Freddie Conway dressed in what looks like a no-longer ambulatory sheep further the cause of the Conservatives? Come to think of it, Freddie looks like a barely ambulatory sheep soi-meme, but he may have had some cocktails, or whatever, before he posed so proudly for his piccie.
Family members with jobs in Parliament are not ordinary employees. They got their positions through close family contacts - as in, Daddy - and their qualifications and salaries have to be open to scrutiny by the taxpayers whose pounds have been siphoned into the Exchequer.
Also, we should know what other people applied for the position of earning these taxpayer pounds who failed to win the position. What were their qualifications and how were they outmatched by the MP's family member?
I must confess, though, I cannot imagine anyone stupid enough to be better qualified than Freddie Conway to contend for Prat of the Decade.
Fred, I hope the people and the media do not let it become a joke. The people have to take the reins of government into their own hands, because it is a decrepit, corrupt mess.
(This also includes the end to obeissance to islamics on our turf. It's all intertwined.)
From The Telegraph today: "Friends of Lisa Rayson, a single parent who lives in a council house in Bexleyheath, claimed Mr Conway told her last June he could not afford her £15,000 salary. She declined to comment on the allegation yesterday."
Strapworld,
Just what do you do for a living, big shot that makes you so condescending? In the old days secretaries booked meetings and took dictation - you can't even compare that to what most Commons PAs do. And, if you read my post carefully instead of trying to be a wise ass you would have seen that I am not in any way defending Derek Conway - just clarifying what most Commons PAs do. If you ever read my previous posts you will know that I have often railed against the hiring of relations at inflated wages.
Verity
MPs are elected to debate and make legislation on behalf of their constituency not to be quasi social workers which is what the job has now become. In the past 15years people (for better or worse) have been getting a stronger sense of entitlement - this has been fostered by the Lib Dems who inviegle themselves with the voters by doing what was once the work of local councillor workers and social workers. If the MP were to spend the day tending to the enormous mail bag he gets each day doing these things he or she would never be in the Chamber or in committee debating and scrutinising and legislation. The PAs also serve the purpose of being the eyes and ears of the MP as to what is concerning his constituents which he is then able to act upon in terms of proposing legislation. The pay ceiling by the way is £38,000 per year. In London, where most PAs are based, £23,000 a year will buy you a green graduate. You really can't even equate what an MP's PA does to anything else in the private sector and if you were to equate it with a top city PA you would find the city PA making £45-50,000 a year with generous perks. By the way there is no 'overtime' in the House - it is supposed to be time taken off in lieu but it never happens.
What I do think is that MPs need to be is more honest about what they do and what their staff does.
I for one think the Conway debacle is a good thing as it will force those who are being dishonest to come clean.
Lady Finchley. You obviosuly had far too much champagne last evening. You awoke with an inability to read what people have written.
I was a big shot, now I am a impecunious pensioner paid less than what Conway paid his son!
I knew many MP's Secretaries. I know the hard work they put in. BUT so do the secretaries employed in any other organisation.
I do believe you would be far better employed by the Civil Service and placed in a typing pool to assist the Honourable Members as and when.
I do believe that your blog 'identity' shows your conceit! Lady Finchley - indeed.
I thought the title lady only accompanied a Titled male?
But thank you for reminding me of my big shot past!
The trouble is, any reform would have to be voted through by the MPs themselves. Is that likely? Does the ban on smoking apply in the Palace of Westminster? Are their pension arrangements like ours? Etc, etc, etc.
Lady Finchley - "A top city PA" makes £45,000 to £50,000. That is a TOP PA - meaning she/he may be fluent in a second language and may have a law degree or done substantial work towards a law degree or is working towards an MBA. And this person's skills are productive, given that they contribute to the bottom line of the company.
For a PA in the Commons, you note that the top pay is £38,000. A mere £7,000 less than a trained individual with sharp skills that contribute to wealth creation. I find this ridiculous. And we can be sure, can we not, that Conway's wife was at the top of the pay scale? I wonder what qualifications she has.
So she's rolling in gravy, given that she lives in the family home - which the taxpayer may well also be contributing to if the Conways are claiming to have an office there. {I don't know that they are; but this seems to be a group that doesn't miss a trick.)
Thirty-eight thousand for a secretary - sorry, PA - is way too much of taxpayers' money,even if they're not related to the boss.
Your comments about the Lib Dems were interesting.
From today's (Saturday's) Telegraph: For years, Derek Conway has joked privately to fellow Tory MPs about "Conway Family plc" being bankrolled by the taxpayer.
But those Tory MPs who laughed loudest no longer think the joke is funny, now it has emerged that the family - and a friend of their eldest son's - have received a mighty £1.5 million from the taxpayer since 2001.
Frankly, my stomach turned over when I read that last year, Conway cut the salary of his constituency secretary from £15,000 to £7,875, claiming that money was tight. From The Telegraph: Yet weeks earlier, he paid his son Freddie, a full-time student, a £1,765 bonus for his parliamentary work.
I hope the police are taking note of all this. What a blow for the Tories! Britain needs to copy the US one more time and have real investigations into people, and for the hiring of family members to be prohibited by law.
Until the 1980s, MPs were paid the same as academics. I propose that we return to this, i.e. government ministers and professors, £49,607; MPs and senior lecturers, £42,791; MPs' administrators and university senior secretaties, £27,466. Add on a few thousand in each case for outstanding performance. These figures are for full-time jobs, so if MPs take on part-time work their salaries should be proportionately reduced. No support staff to be employed unless the post has been advertised and is open to all.
One of the arguments politicians have used to deny higher salaries to academics is that there is no shortage of qualified people willing to do the job for the salary on offer. The same should apply in the case of MPs themselves. The only justification for raising the salaries from those stated above would be a lack of people willing to take on the job. After all, we taxpayers have to secure value for money, don't we?
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20080202/tuk-uk-britain-sleaze-fa6b408_2.html
The tory leader employs a sister in law. OOO sexy. What does he pay her for. This in my problem with this idea. Mps wives are apparenlty working all hours serving their partner but what are they doin for them. Are we paying for mps to have sex.
I do not care really I say well done to the tories for employing their buddies, people deserve work, but they should just rember it is the tories who stopped the governmment employing ordinary workingpeople in sibdisided employment.
personally I don't care one jot whether Derek Conway employed his wife, mistress, son's catamite or his pet terrapin. Nor do I care if they spent the money on Cristal champagne or crystal meth. They could have wasted it instead and donated the whole pile to the Mother Theresa Foundation for Homeless Cat's for all I care. Nor is it relevant if every single other MP was filling their boots with public funds at the same time in full public view. These are all side-issues that should at best be considered by the judge when passing sentence.
What matters is that at some stage Conway authorised their "employment" by signing an official document of Her Majesty's Government in the full knowledge that he was committing fraud.
Nonetheless (pace Verity) it doesn't suprise me that his family indulge in this sort of putrid, pond scum sucking behaviour that is a complete kick in the teeth to gainfully employed taxpayers - the Westminster acorn never falls far from the tree.
Troll Patrol writes: What matters is that at some stage Conway authorised their "employment" by signing an official document of Her Majesty's Government in the full knowledge that he was committing fraud.
Yup. That's the nub. The son's boyfriend's "salary" is the MacGuffin.
Dozzy said
"Until the 1980s, MPs were paid the same as academics. I propose that we return to this,"
Nice try but the effect of this would be to lead to a sharp rise in academic salaries to the level of MPs not a fall in the other direction.
This reminds me of the frequently mooted suggestion that party electioneering funds be met out of the public purse. I guarantee that within 5 years the "Independent Party Funding Review Committee" (composed of MPs and one or two tame outsiders, natch) will have doubled whatever they were intially getting. Today £20m each, soon it will be £50m. Which will all be wasted on election ad carpet bombing as in the US.
Which brings me to another point - fixed parliamentary terms. Just like a fixed date for xmas means we are inundated with xmas advertising earlier and earlier each year, and as the current prenatal round of US electioneering shows, a UK combination of the two means we can reasonably expect to be personally paying for electioneering advertising at least a year before the event.
Strapworld are you the Liberal nark who is upsetting the Cornish. Do you live in mid cornwall or somewhere in those Liberal backwoods,
Troll Patrol said
"the Westminster acorn never falls far from the tree."
Appropriate then that the Tory symbol these days is an oak tree.
trollpatroll said "a fixed date for xmas means we are inundated with xmas advertising earlier and earlier each year"
at least the turkeys hve time to get their affairs in order.
Verity said
"Yup. That's the nub. The son's boyfriend's "salary" is the MacGuffin."
Big V, do you mean "macguffin" or "red herring"? He sounds to me like he might have actually been smart enough to get his photo taken in the office to prove he was there at least once. That crafty Canuck. Taking the family Sloaneway for the fools they are.
Though with photoshop these days it's hard to know if they were genuine photos.
Verity
So work that is not wealth creation is worthless? Pretty crass I think. I guess you don't think much of teachers, charity workers,police officers, nurses and countless other excellent professions that actually help people yet require brains, wit and a good way with people.
Both you and Strapworld (who has to be the biggest moron I have come across so far - who and what on earth is he?)seem to think I am defending Mrs Conway or other MPs wives - I am not, I am defending MPs PAs (many who have excellent degrees) who are now being maligned by people with lazy intellects. I thought more of you Verity, than someone who would have such values that you think because someone has an MBA and 'contribute to wealth creation' that they are more deserving of money than those who do things to better the lives of others in some way. I am really disappointed. Strapworld obviously doesn't know any better but I did think better of you.
anonymous 3.41pm.
Have the guts to reveal yourself and I will answer you question.
Troll Patrol - Well, yes, red herring would also work, but I did mean MacGuffin.
If Cameron wants to stay in control and be seen, at last, to be a leader, he needs to announce this weekend that Tory MPs will no longer be allowed to employ family members.
He could give them all, himself included, six months to phase family members out of their offices, but the important thing is a) to be seen to recognise the gravity of the offence and the injustice; b) to be remedying it, as the Leader, regardless of how the corrupt socialists are allowed to continue with this practice.
It would immediately elevate the Tories, somewhat, in the public mind, Cameron would be seen as decisive and able to recognise corruption when he sees it, unlike anyone in the Labour Party, and it would put a plug in the jokes.
Big V., many years ago when my father was a town clerk he went on national radio to defend his council's policy of sacking women when they got married. He regrets it to this day.
Not allowing MPs to employ wives/partners/mistresses sounds like a distasteful echo of those extremely sexist (but still in living memory) days of yore.
After all there must be very many of them who "screw the crew" and we can only applaud them for doing the right thing and keeping them on the payroll.
It can only add to the sorry litany of excuses for the extramaritally challenged to avoid commitment - "sorry I can't divorce my wife and marry you but then I'd have to sack you. You do understand don't you?".
Mmmm Big V - here's the wikipedia defintion of Macguffin - "a plot device that motivates the characters or advances the story, but the details of which are of little or no importance otherwise".
Actually fits the canuck catamite doesn't it?
Mr Conway insisted both Freddie, 22, and elder son, Henry 25, who he employed earlier, did the work they were paid for.
"A lot of students do part-time work. He was working for his father rather than working in McDonald's," he said.
This is great - Derek Conway's excuse in the Mail on Sunday (no payment I am sure)
"He used to come home frequently. He would go up and down like a fiddler's elbow while he was away.
"There are MPs who commute greater distances than that on a weekly basis and some are three times Freddie's age. I don't think it was unusual."
And exactly how does any of the above excuse you Derek? Give us a!single! (I search for the right emphasis I really do) piece of evidence, you know, even a badly written report, whatever, that your son did a blind bit of work for his pay.
Something like "The effect of Conservative Party Policy on 'poor twats who deserve it'" - Not sure, was there something like that? Was there Derek?
Think I am angry. Boy I am.
TP - Yes. That's why I used it. Your red herring was not as apt although it might have worked in a counter intuitive sense.
I think Alfred Hitchcock invented the phrase and he always had a McGuffin in his movies. I think he let it slip in an interview once - although given how clever he was, it might not have been a slip - and ever after that all his audiences sat glued to the screen looking for the McGuffin.
It might be apophrycal.
Big V. - I think Hitchcock's use of the MacGuffin is pretty well established. Not a huge fan (actually I think he is a bit of an old queen) except for one movie "Rebecca" - which he did before he left England. One of my faves of all time (see profile). I even saw the musical in Vienna. And been listening to the audiobook on my iPod last few nights.
Don't think this is a weakness you can exploit you old baggage.
Verity said
Your red herring was not as apt although it might have worked in a counter intuitive sense.
you do rate yourself don't you Verity.
11:20] I was putting down a troll. I'm sorry it was too subtle for you.
Incidentally, Troll Patrol - My blog nickname is Verity. This is how I choose to be known on the internet. You are in no way qualified to change or modify this identity. I will accept V in the cause of brevity, but you are not to ascribe over-imaginative descriptions of me personally.
I have had cause to complain to Iain about your aggressive over-familiarity before.
If you cannot control your impulse to insult total strangers for no reason other than a drive to control, I suggest you find a new berth over at Guido's.
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