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'Half of Lords' clock in to claim expenses
TardisSteve
Posts: 8,077 Forum Member
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-25411182
disgusting, people on benefits are treated like crap by politicians but a lot of them are the biggest scroungers going
disgusting, people on benefits are treated like crap by politicians but a lot of them are the biggest scroungers going
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This. They only get their seat at HL as they are appointed by the biggest Scrounger of them all, the Queen.
I thought it was good how, when asked about this, one lord blustered something about how we should take into account the work they do from home, answering mail and doing admin' work etc.
So, erm, how do expenses incurred as a result of visiting the HOL have anything to do with being payed for working from home?
That's kinda like me claiming travelling expenses for all the days I work from home because I think, somehow, it's owed to me.
None put forward by the political parties then?
So, it looks as though current rules allow them to just clock in for a short time to collect the £300. For that money I'd travel to, and spend a few hours a day, in London. How do I get to be a peer?
Kinda the same sort of thing as with the MPs expenses, where it turned out that MPs who live within a few miles of the HOC were taking the opportunity to buy a 2nd house etc...
Pretty much every company I've worked for operates a policy whereby you don't get any travelling expenses at all unless you have to commute more than, say, 30 miles.
Dunno why the civil service should operate differently to the private sector.
The vast majority of those people aren't being employed in the public sector to work, supposedly, on behalf of the people of the country.
If an employee of a private company is fiddling his expenses it's up to his boss, and nobody else, to decide whether it's acceptable behaviour.
When the person involved is working in the public sector every taxpayer in the country has a right to be critical of such actions.
It might be better to keep the Lords and abolish the Commons.
I wouldn't, on the whole The House of Lords does a good job, its a safeguard and has often kicked things back to he HoC which may be good ideas but are ill thought out and need refining.
The problem with getting rid of the HOL as is is that the second chamber would just become a HOC part 2 and be in constant conflict with the HOC. Also if it is done on a PR voting basis as has been suggested it could be seen to be more legit than the current HOC .
A good thing about the current HOL is that it has many senior people, people of vast experience who can see the faults in bills that are so often missed or not even thought about by the HOC and can be ammended before being passed .
The ones that do should maybe try to become an MEP, they are well known for their love of SISO ( Sign in Sod Off ) £304 per day they sign in, a salary of around £ 95,000.00 per annum after deductions, office costs of £4300 per month, staff costs of up to £21,000 per month, all travel costs on production of receipt and personal annual travel allowance on top of £4200.00 per year.
"It's a disgrace.... £300 for 40 minutes work"
"You get sacked if you clocked in like that at work"
"Get rid of the House of Lords"
etc etc
Basically all of the same kind of opinions as expressed in many posts here. What a lot of narrow-minded peevish old bollix.
When those of you who are so outraged take a job with no wages, then come and complain.
Unfortunately Lord Hanningfield is a bit of a tosser, so they picked their victim well. By all accounts he joined the Lords in '98 and according to the Hansard records doesn't seem to have done a great deal until this year. He hasn't sat on any committees and has made only a few written and spoken contributions in debates. He doesn't seem to have many topics of interest apart from the Dartford Crossing and agriculture.
By and large most peers are far more active. Their role as oversight for the activities of the HoC is important.
I wasn't aware that it was compulsory to accept an invitation to sit in the HOL.
Lords not wishing to abide by the conditions of service, or have their actions scrutinised by the public who pays for them to do so, are fully entitled to f**k off back to whatever they were doing previously.
Well let's just break that down shall we....
Let's talk about scrutiny for a start: What jobs have you done that require you to declare all of your financial, business and personal interests like Lords have to?
Next, how far up the corporate ladder are you? Do you already sit on the boards of several companies? Are you active in the governance of charities? When you are at the sort of senior level of some peers, then what you so eloquently describe as the something they "are fully entitled to f**k off back to whatever they were doing previously" quite often pays a damned sight more than a piddly £300 appearance fee.
I doubt you or many others here would be so happy to submit to the level of public scrutiny that Lords have to accept. Nor would you be willing to give your time for the public good in the same way as a Lord. The problem here is the media portrayal of the activity of a selected Lord. For those Lords heavily involved in committee work then the expenses is unlikely to act as any sort of incentive. The rules state that expenses are paid. So the Lords are abiding by the letter of the Law. To condemn the whole lot without fully understanding the work they do and what's involved beyond the appearances at the HoL is rather shortsighted.
Benefit claimant who just signs on and does not look for work = Vile Scum
PMs or Lords who just signs in and does no work = Here have free expensive money and a 11% pay rise.
What's that got to do with anything?
The simple fact is that these people choose to take on a role in the HOL.
If they don't like the idea of being scrutinised or criticised by their employer (that's me and you) they shouldn't take the role.
Which kind of begs the question of why they're so keen to take the money and attempt to justify their expenses if it means so little to them.
Again, nobody's forcing them to do the job. If they don't like the scrutiny they should leave and allow us to find people who ARE prepared to do the job.
You're just flat-out wrong about that.
If I was doing a similar job I'd be quite happy to allow my finances to be scrutinised.
If I didn't like the idea of that, I wouldn't have accepted the position.
Kind of ironic that you're suggesting we shouldn't "tar them all with the same brush" when the guy who's been criticised responded by suggesting that there are a heap of other lords who're "worse than he is".
Which apparently makes it okay. Or something.
I also agree that on the face of it, Lord Hannington doesn't appear to be a particularly effective member of the HoL. However, tarring all with the same brush works no better here than it does in tarring all Benefits Claimants.
(Housing / Accomodation)
300 a day isn't even enough to live there now
Trouble is, it seems like the culture that exists within the civil service allows chancers to take advantage of the system.
Stuff like the "no receipts for anything under £40" and "pay travelling and housing expenses to anybody, regardless of how close to the HOC/HOL they live" policies have absolutely no place in any kind of business in this era.
It's all very well saying that MPs (and lords) don't get paid an amount commensurate with their responsibilities but the simple fact is that if the civil service wasn't leaking money like a rusty sieve they'd probably have the money to pay them a better wage.
To take my own MP as an example, his annual expenses miraculously came in at just a couple of hundred pounds under the limit and around half of those expenses were for things under the magical £40, which means that he claims roughly £12k per year in expenses he has no means of justifying.
That simply wouldn't fly in a private industry.
I don't care who you are, if you can make the effort to claim for cab fares, food and sundry items then you can make the effort to provide receipts as well.
I know people who wouldn't get out of bed for an MPs wages (myself included, at certain times) and they aren't too important to ask for a taxi receipt every morning after a journey to the office.