Results tagged “Michael Martin” from Birmingham Mail - Is It Just Me

Anyone see The Speaker's statement on the great MP's expenses fiddle in the Commons today? Michael Martin gives a new dimension to the word obnoxious.

This is the man, remember, who spent a fortune of our money in a legal bid trying to prevent the release of expenses documents showing how MPs have been coining it in for years and used libel lawyers Carter-Ruck, again paid for from the public purse, as his personal attack dogs if anyone dared criticise him.

This time around he seemed much more concerned that the information on expenses was in the public domain and finding out who was responsible for letting us all know how bent our ministers and MPs are than showing any hint of shame at being found armpit deep in the public trough.

So, where any other organisation would hold an internal inquiry to discover the source of leaks, Speaker Martin tries to deflect the flak peppering the somewhat less than honourable members by calling in police - MPs must just hope it is not the fraud squad who turn up. The Speaker seems to be under the impression that the real offence is people finding out about the fiddles rather than the fiddles themselves. He even indicated that applying for an injunction to stop publication had been considered.

His rudeness to Labour's Kate Hoey, who I was as uni with incidentally, for suggesting that the police had better things to do than be The Speaker's personal enforcers was spectacular, an explosion of red faced bluster and bad manners - this from a man who is supposed to be neutral and who sets the tone of the House. He also laid into the Lib Dem's Norman Baker who seemed to think that it was not the Press who should be blamed for all the public fury over MP's expenses and that the problem might just be closer to home.

For daring to question the rambling statement both found themselves subjected to the sort of personal attacks on MPs that a Speaker half worthy of the name would be expected to frown upon rather than engage in.

Meanwhile the statement from The Speaker, who has a responsibility for expenses, is suggesting that a new independent body, with a new increased budget of course, along with targets and performance and monitoring units no doubt, will be set up to police MP's claims

The independent body will of course be appointed by Parliament, which will also set the rules, the terms of reference, and, for good measure, will also decide on the continued employment of members of the new unit, so we can all sleep easy in our beds now that that one has been sorted to everyone's satisfaction.

There is of course a much simpler way around it though. While the police are in there investigating any leaks they could also investigate any breaches of the already lax to the point of laughable rules and prosecute any MP who has made an "honest mistake" in his expenses claims and wishes to pay the money back - a realisation that usually seems to coincide with being found out.

That should give us a flurry of by-elections to be going on with until we can get rid of the rest at the next General Election when it would be nice to see spoilt ballot papers winning every seat.

Next they could simplify the expenses system. There are only 646 less than honourable members so like most firms with that number of employees, two or three people in accounts should manage that standing on their heads using the same system that seems to work in the real world - that is the world where the likes of me and you live.

The rules are straightforward. If you have a receipt and can justify the expenditure as necessary to do your job then you can claim the cash back. No receipt or not necessary and you pay for it yourself. And if you try to fiddle your exes . . . it's a warning if they like you or the sack if they don't. Simple really.