M.Ps Expenses.

[northwestman]

www.opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-investigations/parliament-expenses-scandal-mps-lords-claim-180m-flights-hotels-and-photoshoots/?utm_source=oD%20Daily%20SEGMENT&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=%C2%A3180m%20for%20MPs%27%20photoshoots%20and%20business%20class%20flights&_kx=ZMsy5x0sLTg5DdF4Qh6UUAgVynS_AvwBO6ueBQnO5BoGs4V3CxMmH-P7J_jOJAIw.YjCYwm

MPs and peers have claimed almost £180m on expenses in just three years, charging taxpayers for business class flights, hotels, iPads and professional photoshoots, analysis by openDemocracy has found.

[kenwood]

Not again.
I’m getting sick of this. We have been here before , scandal after scandal from bloody duck houses built at our expenses, heating for stables, trips abroad to achieve f.ck all except top up their sun tans , jolly boys outings which involves luxurious stays in high end hotels and so on.
Our beloved MP Conway was a master of getting value for our money by appointing his kids into jobs within his parliamentary office or suchlike , I don’t really care what it was, it was a fiddle.
This will die down, everyone will be shaking their heads saying oh no what a disgrace , how can they do such things and them on we go .
Time after time we are taken for bloody fools .
Serious offenders should be deselected ,horsewhipped and tar and feathered .

What with CEO’s of major companies being awarded massive bonuses , the latest MP’s expenses row , people like Hancock buggering off to take part in a tv prog. and being paid thousands , Johnson deciding not to bother attending the House because he’s raking it in elsewhere , the list of greedy chancers grows and grows .

We get what we deserve , if you don’t believe me just look at Private Eye , that much maligned publication and turn the pages to Rotten Boroughs .It’s an absolute nightmare, we laugh at despots in third world countries milking it for all that it’s worth from charities to foreign aid and yet we have our own greedy barstewards in both local and central government .

I’ve not even started on our Royal Family , what a disgrace they are , they deserve a whole books worth of s**te thrown at them.

No, I’ve decided, best to keep head down, pretend it doesn’t happen and if that doesn’t help put your name forward as a Councillor . Doesn’t matter what party, chose one likely to see you elected and if that doesn’t work change your allegiance under some utter ballocks of an excuse like our ex Labour Mayor.
Not saying he did anything wrong mind but bloody hell, all those people who worked hard for him booted in the gonads because he suddenly decides the Labour Party doesn’t meet his needs .

Rant over , still waiting for the PPE scandal to surface ,Madam Mone to get her comeuppance and the COVID inquiry thing to be published. Maybe this year, maybe next year maybe never .
One things for certain, Johnson will ride off into his own sunlit uplands . Perhaps that’s what he meant after all, it was for him , not for us.

[northwestman]

When Parliament was rocked by the expenses scandal in 2009, politicians pledged to clean up their act. But 14 years on, how much has actually changed?

This week, an investigation by openDemocracy revealed a £180m spending bonanza, with politicians charging taxpayers for a litany of controversial claims.

Among them, we found that a peer had claimed £18,000 just for turning up to the House of Lords, despite not speaking or voting in the chamber, and that MPs have been billing us for huge sums to heat their second homes, while ordinary Brits struggle with spiralling energy costs.

We found that, over the past three years, MPs have splurged £1.1m of taxpayer money on private PR firms offering to boost their “personal brand” and “incumbency”. Politicians also claimed for business class flights and personal photo shoots, while others claimed tens of thousands of pounds on London hotels rather than simply catching the train.

In some ways, we have actually gone backwards. For instance, before the expenses scandal, there was an explicit ban on using taxpayer money for “advice for individual members on self-promotion, or PR for individuals”. But this line is not included in the current rulebook. Indeed, our investigation suggests that spending on PR services is rife and that IPSA does not even check the content created – using our money – by private contractors.

And when expenses are used to pay consultants or businesses, there is no obligation for MPs to award this work in a fair or competitive manner. We found dozens of cases where money was being handed to companies run by friends or political allies. The rules only ban payments to family members or businesses that an MP has a direct financial interest in.

Meanwhile, the rules governing the House of Lords are still written internally and don’t even fall under IPSA’s remit. Peers can claim up to £332 a day for simply turning up, regardless of whether they contribute to proceedings. In fact, they can claim this even for attending a ‘virtual meeting’ online.

[ssshrew]

It will never change. To quote a phrase this country is rotten to the core and o one really gives a damn any more.

Nothing, absolutely nothing, surprises me or upsets me any more. I’ve got beyond caring. There’s nothing I can do about anything. Even if I vote to get them out, there are still far too many others who won’t.

I’d like the chance for Starmer to prove he’s either better than this lot or as bad. At least we’d know one way or the other. If he’s as bad then we’d know for definite that there really is no hope either way.

[martinshrew]

Mar 4, 2023 15:24:17 GMT 1 ssshrew said:

It will never change. To quote a phrase this country is rotten to the core and o one really gives a damn any more.

Nothing, absolutely nothing, surprises me or upsets me any more. I’ve got beyond caring. There’s nothing I can do about anything. Even if I vote to get them out, there are still far too many others who won’t.

I’d like the chance for Starmer to prove he’s either better than this lot or as bad. At least we’d know one way or the other. If he’s as bad then we’d know for definite that there really is no hope either way.

Quite agree, surely there won't be any Labour scandal after all the noise from those on the left of the spectrum? We'll see, I'll keep my opinion, they're all as bad as each other.