To think that MP's should have their wages capped at £500 a week?

[ValarMorghulis]

No access to expenses as that is a perfectly acceptable amount to live on apparently.

They are of course usually managing a hand span big enough to house fingers in pies elsewhere so have additional income anyway.

I just find it infuriating that they are pushing through the £26k limit to benefits despite knowing that it will push thousands into poverty and homelessness, yet they recently voted to award themselves £20k payrises.

How on earth could someone be in poverty and homeless on 26k per annum?

MPs do a demanding job, of course they deserve to be paid well for it.

Can i direct you to the numerous threads about the welfare reform bill and proposed cap on benefits.

I agree with some of the reforms and I strongly disagree with some of the reforms, but I don't think they are relevant to what MPs get paid for doing their job.

MP's agree to pay freeze

MP Pay rises to be blocked

I've not seen any evidence of a £20k payrise. Do you have any links?

"I just find it infuriating that they are pushing through the £26k limit to benefits despite knowing that it will push thousands into poverty and homelessness, yet they recently voted to award themselves £20k payrises."

Why should a family with no disabled people be paid 26K TAX FREE!! for sitting on their fanny and doing nothing. Especially when there many single mothers who work full time, pay tax and have far less money. Working people also have to pay for childcare, travel and clothes for work.

Why is it a major hard ship to be forced to move out of an expensive area. Its utter bullshit to say you are being made homeless or pushed in to poverty. People move areas all the time for one reason or another.

MPs work hard for their money,

I thoroughly believe that those that work hard should get more money than those that don't. sounds logical

Valar you still haven't answered my question asking how an income of 26k per annum would lead anyone, let alone the "thousands" you refer to into to poverty and homelessness.

No need to direct me to the threads, have been following them all with interest thanks.

I would be happy for them just to pay their taxes in the country they all claim to love. Before, during and after office. And get their friends to do the same.

Yes Tony Blair, this is directed at you too.

I'm not sure where it came from, but dh said that he heard today that Tnoy Blair paid £300,000 in tax last year. That is more than enough in my opinion, Ben for someone who earns millions.

What Really Tired said.

And after you've answered Irishchic, I'm dying to know when the MP's awarded themselves a £20k payrise (which would be the equiv of about a 30% payrise).

If true I wonder how they managed to get it through without any of the press making a HUGE hoohah about it. In the current climate I think it would probably go down even worse than when the expenses scandal became public.

I'd like to see MP's earning far, far more than they currently do. I'd like the brightest and best to be our politicians. At the moment it's getting to the stage where only the independently wealthy are interested in going into politics, resulting in the gaggle of public schoolboys now inhabiting the Houses of Parliament. The brightest and best can't afford it, they go into business.

Tony Blair did pay £300.000 in tax last year, He earn over 12 million though. He paid tax at 2.6% rate, where most people pay 20% of their wages. Some people would Tony Blair a tax cheat. I'd call it theft.

apologies, they are trying to bid for the payrise, rather than having had it awarded here

irishchic - if you have been reading the other threads you will have had i explained to you many times already

But it's ridiculous to say that someone doing bugger all should be paid the same as an MP who works mental hours, away from home, with loads of pressure and responsibility.

this is just a really silly thread and I'm off to bed.

what i was trying to portray is the fact that they are attempting to sell the cap as a liveable amount. It isn't. For many many families either with high rents or large families.

People like Ian Duncan Smith are happy that £500 is perfectly adequate to live on yet he earns £145,492. Yet he still feels it necessary to claim a further lord only knows how much wrongfully in expenses.

And still he has the cheek to spout off about the "scroungers"

£26,000 is a liveable amount though.

not if you are living in a high rent area

Move to a low rent area then. Plenty of people who've fallen on hard times have to do exactly this.

Agree with those on the thread who suggested a move to a lower rent area.

No, because the majority of MPs would end up being those with a private income and we need representation from all sections of society, not just the very wealthy.

Excluding those who claim benefits because of illness or disability I think the cap is absolutely reasonable. Benefit should only ever be treated as a temporary measure, not a way of life.

I don't understand why people think they are entitled to live in particularly expensive areas and get housing benefit to pay. I would like to live nearer to my work but I can't afford it. I also can't afford to live where I was born. I work bloody hard and earn a good salary and just accept that there are things in life I cannot afford.

I don't understand this sense of entitlement at all. Live the life you can afford to live. If you need help then I'm happy that my taxes contribute to your welfare. If you can't be bothered to work then I'd rather you didn't get a penny in benefits.