To think MPs shouldn’t be drinking while at work?

[greywildoceans]

There’s a big debate going on after new Green MP Hannah Smith has come out and said that you can smell the alcohol on MPs after lunchtime.

https://x.com/politicsjoe_uk/status/2048323140804100487?s=46

Of course all the usual lot are coming out saying it’s a British tradition to drink at work and she’s being “anti British”. I’ve worked in the public sector and the private sector and I have never encountered anyone who thought it was appropriate to drink while working. I’m confident that if anyone did, they’d be fired.

AIBU to say MPs should be banned from drinking while working?

And? Why does that make a difference?
I worked on Saturday. Does that mean I should have been allowed to drink at work? No, because I was working.

Looking at that she has a point.

The difference there is that the taxpayer isn’t paying for your subsidised bar. The other difference is that most people don’t want the people who make the decisions about their taxes, health, security or a million other things to be doing while they’re pissed up on cheap Carling.

You were saying that we pay their salaries so they shouldn't drink at work. Taxpayer pays for lots of people's salaries - nhs, civil service, local government, so does that mean we get to dictate what they do at work but not people in the private sector?

It’s similar prices to military messes, although I haven’t been in one for a good few years so they might have gone up now. You could get pissed on a tenner. Not at lunchtime though.

Well, yes? Nobody else will be drinking at work. I work in the NHS, I can’t just walk out of the office of a morning and do whatever I want. I have to adhere to certain standards, which are laid out in a very clear handbook. Why shoild
MPs be any different?

And yet, here you are starting a thread about something alleged by one of their Westminster colleagues, You do know how many MPs there are, don’t you, other than the few who may choose to have a lunchtime drink? You do know that they’re paid in line with other civil servants who don’t have to take such a personal bashing and harassment in the press and social media in general, as they try to do their jobs.

I do hope your MP is working hard on your behalf, as an ‘overpaid arsehole’.

I work in the City. Totally normal to have a drink at lunchtime especially if you’ve got a lunch meeting. I had a glass of white wine at a lunch last week. No one cared and it hardly impaired my ability to sit in pointless meetings for the rest of the day!

The other difference is that most people don’t want the people who make the decisions about their taxes, health, security or a million other things to be doing while they’re pissed up on cheap Carling.

That's a fair point with regard to some politicians in some roles but these days it appears many MPs simply need to be with it enough to vote along party lines/obey a three line whip.

I'm certainly not sure there's any objective reason the rules around rank and file MPs alcohol consumption should in any way shape or form be similar to those that apply to transport workers or in maybe the medical world, which is what some seem to be suggesting.

Can’t believe those prices! I last paid that for a pint in the early 00s I think. I imagine the MPs enjoying their cheap drinks as they laugh at how us plebs have to pay double those prices. Really crap beer selection but I suppose most of them drink wine and spirits.

My local MP is useless. None of them know the meaning of hard work.

If you go to bank at lunchtime you'll see it's totally normal to be at a restaurant or pub and have a drink at lunch. On a Thursday the pubs will be getting busy from 4.

Not every person is drinking at lunch (nor every day). However, in the property /insurance sectors it's about relationships and people from different firms with meet and may well have a drink.

Its definitely not a sackable offence!

I don’t know about MPs drinking on the job, but as others said it is still common in many industries for folks to have a drink with lunch. Have you never walked past a pub in the City of London at lunchtime?

Posted too soon!

There's lots of stories of NHS workers sleeping on night shifts. In fact I think they had rooms set up for this at one point and there was upset about losing them.

I think that's fine but my point is you are being a bit obsessed with MPs being perfect. They don't get paid very much for what they do.

Agreed. I worked in a very small solicitors office back in 2010 for 5 years, and once a week we all went for lunch at the nearest pub which was frequented daily at lunch by the local near estate agents. I had one or two drinks at most always with a meal. Boss paid for it. In fact he insisted on paying. Once as a one off i did have 3 Pimms and Lemonade on a Friday afternoon but was fine. My typing speed improved no end that day!

Don't hate the player....

Sleeping on a night shift is nowhere near the same!!

You don't drink and drive so why would you drink and work. A lot of people's tolerance to alcohol is really low and they'd then make mistakes. Never heard of Friday lemons in the car industry?

In my organisation drinking in working hours isn't allowed and rightly so.

Drinking on the job isn't a bad thing per se (I've had my share of boozy lunches, I'll still occasionally have a glass of wine on a sunny afternoon WFH) but nor is it a necessity and it's a weird, out-of-touch hill to die on for MPs.

FWIW the drinking culture in Parliament is one of the most unhealthy I've witnessed anywhere. I was disturbed by it when I first encountered it (as a hard-partying 20-something myself!) and I'm not surprised that Hannah Spencer is shocked. I would definitely prefer the judgment of my legislators to be a little less impaired.

Most office workers are allowed to drink something alcoholic at lunchtime, it's not banned. Plenty won't bcz it interferes with their job or will keep to just a half / small taste. What if an MP goes for a drink at 5-6pm with colleagues & then goes back to office for a meeting with colleagues, only time they were unavailable was 630-730pm, and there is other work to catch up on from 7:30-930pm? Why ban this esp. when commons can sit until 9pm still I think? I don't want complicated or controlling rules.

I don't want a ban but fine to suggest a work culture change that being as much as tipsy on the job is frowned upon.

I don't agree with MPs being pissed up either. I also disagree with the subsidised bar. They can pay full price thanks.

I just disagree with this pearl clutching denial that people do consume alcohol in a professional setting. It makes people look really stupid and out of touch

If I was drinking at lunchtime in my job, I’d be sacked.

I think they should be not drinking at lunchtime and doing their job, and there should be no subsidised bar or restaurants for MPs.

Being asleep whilst at work is ok then? Got it.

4pm on a Friday it was normal to drink. Any other time I’d have been fired

This ^
And we do fund it as they work for us. Also I remember reading something that prices at the Parliament are kept much lower.