MPs’ expenses shock: IPSA losing its hero status

Public anger over MPs’ expenses is still bubbling away, it must be a sign of something else, some referred pain - because in the matter of expenses this is the Pure Parliament. The new intake are untouched by the previous culture and the older MPs daren’t cross the line – in truth, daren’t put a foot near the line any more.

Nearly all MPs say they underclaim what they are due. One MP told me this. ”Constituents come up for an award. It’s lunch time. I ask them to stay. There are quite a few of them When it comes to the bill, I pay it. It’s the best part of £300. And I can’t say ‘But I’m not claiming it!’ ” This anecdote was repeated to another MP who commented: “It’s the look on their faces when you pay. Contempt. “That’s our money,” you can see them thinking.”

They’re in a bind. The public see figures of £150,000 a year and assume that’s what they’re getting – but a backbench MP’s take home pay is about £3,000 a month.

The payment body IPSA still doesn’t make this distinction strongly enough in MPs’ judgement.

IPSA has been a success to the extent that it pays expenses and scrutinises bills fiercely. Fair play, up to a point. The National Audit Office praised them. And yes, things are improving, it’s true.

But the bitterness of the launch period is still alive – and in some important areas growing. That is a management failure of IPSA.

The IPSA has had a good press so far – they have satisfied the media demands for reining in MPs. Their punitive attitude towards MPs has chimed with the public mood.

On the other side, MPs feel IPSA

* actively compromises their reputations by publishing claims in the way they do.

* refuses to give advice or rulings on what is or isn’t allowable.

* is in many ways uncontactable. Questions go in by email and useful answers may or may not be received within days or weeks.

* treats them in a way only an unaccountable body can. Arbitrarily and contemptuously.

The IPSA rebuttable of these points is not entirely convincing.

The fact that MPs will not allow their names to be attached to criticism of IPSA shows they are  afraid of them. And before we get too judgmental about that – which of us would publicly complain about the tax inspector dealing with our tax return?

Having looked into it, I’ve started a little website www.ipsa-shadow.com which collects MPs’ experiences of IPSA, to show the other side of the story.

PS: The Taxpayers’ Alliance – not a notably pro-MP organisation has published its response to the IPSA consultation. It’s a scorcher: ” . . . IPSA has shown itself to be one of the most inefficient monsters of a quango ever to have been created and it ought urgently to be reviewing its processes . . . As we set out in this response, the introduction of procurement cards for MPs akin to those used in government departments  would go a long way towards massively decreasing the bloated IPSA bureaucracy.”

http://www.taxpayersalliance.com/ipsaresponse.pdf

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