Perhaps banning second jobs allied to a larger salary would be a better solution.
Does that become the 1st job?
Cricky that is wishful thinking.
Dont think such people have ever existed even though an individual might think they fit such criteria.
Unless you can name one?
Skeletons exist in everyone’s cupboard.
One might argue pay them less as it shouldn’t be about the money. Some of them think that about the NHS after all - public service as a vocation, rather than for profit. The living wage should do 'em!
The original reason for paying MPs was so more “ordinary” people who were not sufficiently wealthy to not need to work, could stand for parliament.
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I’m not saying they should be poor, though I did joke about the living wage which seems to be acceptable for other public servants - civil servants didn’t get much in the way of payrises for years. I’m sure there is a balance to strike. Their not regularly voting themselves payrises above inflation would also be welcome. Austerity, eh.
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Maybe tie the MP salary to whatever %age rise they allow pensioners?
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Perfect solution!
So do you think it is business and usual if everything is a free for all? No rules or norms apply?
I think you have been no fan of Johnson and co?
I think you’re tarring all MP’s with the same brush which is wrong as most enter politics to help and improve the lives of the electorate, they don’t give themselves pay rises it’s calculated by an independent panel just like the nurses and many MP’s gave away their latest rise to charity.
Did I say that, no.
What I said was
Of course they do but human nature dictates that people are not whiter than white but as long as they give more than they take we have to live with them.
Johnson and co have always taken and given nothing back, as you say I am not a fan but I suppose it depends how thier actions relate to your own situation and time in life.
Many slate Margaret Thatcher but not me.
I was in the right place at the right time during her reign and grateful for it.
There are winners and losers under every government but it seems to me that the current UK government has created many more losers than winners.
Interesting that you try to back up your view that we shouldn’t expect out leaders to have exemplary standards of honesty, etc, by appeal to
I highly ecommend Rutger Bregman’s book Humankind. It’s a forensic examination, by an acclaimed historian, of exactly how the myth of a weak and brutish human nature arises, and is moreover propagated by those with power and privilege.
The actual evidence - throughout history, in fact - is that most people are generally good. But of course it suits those with power and privilege to make you think that most people are weak and brutish, and therefore must be controlled, managed led - by (it goes without saying) those with power and privilege.
Oh - and he also examines the idea that believing most people are basically good is ‘wishful thinking’. Turns out, the opposite is the case - seeing most people as basically good is the more realistic perspective.
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I agree that corruption/mistakes will take place across the political spectrum, but that doesn’t mean if people fall short of the required norms there should not be consequences.
I am not saying you said there should not be consequences- I think to paraphrase what you wrote that it is just wishful thinking to imagine everyone should be squeaky clean.
The second part of your reply is harder to respond to because it combines different elements. You didn’t break the law by benefiting from Thatchers politics.
Boris Johnson lied and actively worked to weaken laws and legislations. So it’s a different matter…
Yes, the point about Thatcher is interesting, isn’t it?
Does that mean we shouldn’t criticise a politician whose policies, by all the evidence I at least know of, made the country and most of its people poorer in the long term, just because we have happened to benefit personally from them?
Or should we try to rise above our narrow personal interests, and take a more objective view?
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I’m all for it
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yeah right… independent only to the extent that all the members of the “independent” panel are appointed by the Government 
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If they can give the money away, presumably it’s been overcalculated.
Quite.
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That’s good enough for me, time to close the thread. 
I have a bridge you might be interested in buying… 
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