Daily Chat! Saturday 16th of May***Happy Saturday!***

beanielou

All Im going to say is when my dad was on the local council he got no wages & no expenses.

Doomcow

skint_spice wrote: »

I wouldn't claim for a mortgage I didn't have - EVER!

no, no, no. if you could have a house and have it mortgage free and it was yours to sell afterwards... you'd be mad not to take it.

Toto wrote:

MPs are supposed to be serving their constituents and the country, not fleecing it for every penny they can get

in reality the cost of expenses to the parliament wage or security bill will be pennies.

skint_spice wrote:

did you hear the MP the other night trying to justify his trouser press? it is apparently important that he looks smart for work...

would you more trust a politician if they turned up in a t-shirt and scabby jeans? apart from roman abramavich.. to get taken seriously, you have to look the part - if you can get a free trouser press, why not?

Buffythedebtslayer

Doomcow wrote: »

well, if you could claim for a free house in london which when you sold it would net you hundreds of thousands of pounds - wouldnt you do it too?

Nope.

I really don't think I would. I don't know tho. I guess if it was the way everyone else was doing it? ?

I just get don't get what happened to the idea that they were public Servants??

Toto

Doomcow wrote: »

true, and for that they need a slap on the wrist, repay their debt if you wish - handle it in much the same way as any other internal dispute.

because they are MPs, doesnt mean that things should come down on them any more harder than on normal people.

I have got to respectfully disagree with that. As I've said, claiming for a paid off mortgage is the same as claiming benefits when you aren't actually entitled to them. These people are supposed to be role models, they are in positions where they should be leading by example. How can they throw the book at someone who does a bit of cash in hand work while on the dole when they are fiddling their 'expenses'. Neither is right obviously, but it they are going to pass laws which say you can not claim for something you aren't entitled to, they should live by those rules.

beanielou

On that happy note Im off to bed.
Night all xx

Doomcow

beanielou wrote: »

In short~no actually.
Hard as my life is I still have some morals.

its not a moral question though.

its a fact that they get the allowance, its available because we the people allowed it to happen, and im sure its been happening since the dawn of parliament.

if my company moved me many miles away from home, id expect help to relocate - this is much the same.

skint_spice

Doomcow wrote: »

no, no, no. if you could have a house and have it mortgage free and it was yours to sell afterwards... you'd be mad not to take it.

it's not mortgage free - it's only the interest thats paid and I would have less of a problem with it if they accepted it was their second home and paid capital gains when selling it. I think they should remember that anything they do is open to public scrutiny and not do anything that they can't justify.

Doomcow wrote: »

would you more trust a politician if they turned up in a t-shirt and scabby jeans? apart from roman abramavich.. to get taken seriously, you have to look the part - if you can get a free trouser press, why not?

I am not saying they shouldn't look smart but in most professions it's taken as a given! no one else gets to claim to send their ironing out or buy a trouser press so why can they?

Doomcow

Toto wrote: »

I have got to respectfully disagree with that. As I've said, claiming for a paid off mortgage is the same as claiming benefits when you aren't actually entitled to them. These people are supposed to be role models, they are in positions where they should be leading by example. How can they throw the book at someone who does a bit of cash in hand work while on the dole when they are fiddling their 'expenses'. Neither is right obviously, but it they are going to pass laws which say you can not claim for something you aren't entitled to, they should live by those rules.

but its not benefits - its internal expenses - company benefits - not benefits by law.

yes they are "role models" but before this expenses row, how often did you look to MPs are "role models"?

beanielou

Problem is they see it a gravy train~rightly or wrongly.

Buffythedebtslayer

Doomcow wrote: »

its not a moral question though.

its a fact that they get the allowance, its available because we the people allowed it to happen, and im sure its been happening since the dawn of parliament.

if my company moved me many miles away from home, id expect help to relocate - this is much the same.

Actually I don't think it is the same. If my employer told me out of the blue I had to move to keep my job then yes I would expect them to fund or at least support the move.

However if I took a job that invovled a huge amount of travel and I knew that from the start, yes I would expect to be reinbursed for travel and over night stays and a possible "food" allowance but I would not expect to be able to charge my normal living expenses (moating cleaning, dog food, trouser press etc) to an expense account. That is just ridiculous when they get paid SO much in the first place.