I worry about the anti-politics mood our politicians are fostering  

strapworld

I would suggest you also read the SKYNEWS blog:- This from the Taxpayers Alliance.

My question being, if MEP's get this...do heads of Government get anything in addition to their state salary?

A leaked report has revealed how Euro MPs are becoming millionaires at the expense of taxpayers.

There has been concern about MEPs' expenses for a while

The internal audit of MEPs' expenses discloses "corruption, dodgy dealing and poor financial controls" in the European Parliament.

The TaxPayers' Alliance (TPA) has called for a police investigation into the frauds.

The 92-page report, prepared by EU internal audit official Robert Galvin, shows that MEPs have systematically abused staff allowances and expenses.

Some MEPs claimed money for assistants that were neither accredited or registered with the parliament.

Every member could "easily" save more than £1m from their expenses and pension benefits over a five-year term at the European Parliament, according to the TPA.

What MEPs Can Claim Over 5 Years*

Subsistence allowance: 117,000 Euros (£104,814)

Staff allowance: 489,840 Euros (£438,819)

Office expenses: 243,120 Euros (£217,797)

Travel expenses: 60,000 Euros (£53,750)

Pension: £350,000

*Does not include salary of £63,291 rising to £73,584 in June

The Galvin Report was based on a representative sample of payments made to more than 160 MEPs during 2004.

The investigation discovered a culture of huge "bonuses" being paid to staff members or handling firms at the end of the financial year, ranging from three times to 19 and a half times the employees' monthly salaries.

There was also widespread failure to comply with tax, company and social security laws. Nearly 80% of transactions that should have been subject to VAT displayed no evidence of either VAT payment or exemption.

Matthew Elliott, TPA chief executive, said: "Having acquired the report, the TaxPayers' Alliance felt it was right to publish it so taxpayers across the EU could see the widespread evidence of corruption, dodgy dealing and poor financial controls in the European Parliament.

"It should never have been kept secret, and there must now be a proper investigation by the police."

The existence of the report was kept secret until a Liberal Democrat MEP, Chris Davies, disclosed some of its findings last year.

Mr Davies said the "overwhelming majority" of MEPs used their staff budget honestly to pay their staff.

But, he added: "Honesty doesn't pay in this system and the temptations are great. No-one knows who is cheating and who is not, and it is a disgrace that the Parliament has voted to keep auditors' reports secret."

Ray

For all that I rail against the Labour Party, I have to say 'hats off' to the small group of Labour MPs who (as reported in the Daily Mail today) have discovered that by staying in modest hotels instead they can forsake the need to submit hefty claims for maintaining 'second home' in the capital.

It's nice to know there are still some MPs who appreciate that they exist to secure the well-being of their taxpayers and not the other way around.

Rhoda Klapp

To be accepted as a candidate in a safe seat or put high on the Euro parliament list is to get a first-class seat on the gravy train for life. That in itself is wrong whether they fiddle their expenses or not. It puts them in a separate world from the rest of us. It is inconceivable that the people who pertetrated this system will dismantle it voluntarily, unless we all make clear our outrage.

oldrightie

Bureuacracy = Corruption. Fact!

Mitch

You would almost think they set their own pay and conditions wouldn't you?
I mean that would be stupid and open to abuse from unscrupulous members.

oh !

teledu

Until we have some of these cheating bar-stewards getting a large dose of porridge, I rather think the public opinion of politicians will worsen further - if that's possible.
Jacqui Smith - on the Andrew Marr show -didn't seem to be in tune with public disgust at this sort of thing. (Although neither do most of the press.)
We have an underclass cheating the taxpayer by milking the benefits system at one end of the scale and politicians fleecing the taxpayer via expenses at the other. Both are scum and both are left relatively untarnished by our milquetoast press who lack the gumption to call these cheats for the despicable pigs they are.
Bravo to the first party leader that says he'll cap all MPs expenses and tighten regulations on expenses. (Perhaps they might try limiting expenses to MPs like NuLabour did to contractors via their ludicrous IR35 regs.!)
Cameron would go up in everone's estimation if he were to introduce something like this. Fat chance eh?

Wilhelm

James Forsyth says

''For the small fraction of MPs who tilt the system in their favour''

When I was younger I thought it was a small fraction like you, then I grew up and realised that 90% of British politicians are at it.

yarnesfromhorsham

Its not just the expenses its all the the other perks that go with the job, like copper bottomed pension, subsidised food/bars etc. Can accept subsidised travel and postages.
Makes you wonder what their real reasons are for taking the job.
Unless something is done about it I suspect that eventually the voters will get very p....d off and either take to the streets or join the BNP

Rhoda Klapp

James, as I re-read the post, I realise you still don't get it. Teledu has the right of it. They (the crooks who presume to govern us and the few honest ones) should get no expenses which would not be allowable against tax for any businessman or contractor. They should be treated exactly the same as the rest of us. We care little whether they are meeting the rules or not, because the rules themselves are unacceptable. I still don't think the political class is anywhere near connecting with the public on this. And that means journalists first and foremost, for you possess the power to shame the snouts out of the trough. Maybe.

TomTom

Name an Institution in modern Britain that is not discredited. A pre-revolutionary situation

James

Thank goodness for journalists. Without them politicians would be more corrupt than they already are - difficult to imagine I know! I just hope that these politicians do not start passing more draconian laws stopping journalists from reporting these abuses. We must all fight for free speech and most importantly 'free journalism'!

Fergus Pickering

Teledu, nobody is scumThat's just using the language of the underclass, who, after all, can't help it. Like the Victorian poor, Dickens' brickmakers and such, they were born into it. And the MPs are just Dickens' Veneerings and Coodle/Boodles. They are all behaving the ways the system alows them to. And you? Doyou cheat on your taxes/ And if you don't is it because you can't (you are on PAYE) or because you have a moral objection. My stepmother had a moral objection, but then she was quite well off and knitted socks for the Nationalists in the Spanish Civil War and all that kind of thing. We needto fix the syste,m, and cameron CAN fix it if he wants to, just as Mrs Thatcher could, and did, face down the unions, in particular Arthur Scargill, not an evil mann (though a pretty stupid one) just doing what the system told him to. In the USSR miners earned more than doctors and there were plenty of apologists, there and here, who reckoned that was all right. Miners were noble workers and doctors were... just women. Nowadsys lotd of people say that doctors (seven years training)are overpaid. And who say that? Businessmen (zero years training) and bankers (oh lordy), they say that.

Chris lancashire

The Political Class and, in fact, the whole of the public sector is out of control. The problem is I can see absolutely no politician anywhere who has the moral authority and the will to do something about it.

Rex Burr

I don’t support the self-serving corruption in public life but I think they take their inspiration from the corruption in big company boardrooms of the country.
Most directors in these places did not found the company but are just employees who have the opportunity to set their own level of remuneration. And set it they do, often beyond all reason. And don’t tell me about ‘remuneration committees’ and shareholder power. Who sets the remuneration of the ‘remuneration committees’, the directors, and the influential shareholder representatives are doing the same in their own companies, so will not rock the boat.

Geoff Harrop

Why is the BNP described as an unsavoury group? Many British Nationals died in the last 100 years defending this country; should they be described by us as unsavoury? Why should anyone who tries to stick up for this country immediately attract insults?

Napoleon III of France

The faster we move toward plutocracy the better. I want to be governed by those that have most succesfully exploited the weak, vulnereable and uneducated members of society. And, Geoff, couldn't agree more. Beating up black people is what made this country great. Vote Conservative.