Peers reject catering plans over champagne

MrMoonX

MrMoonX

MrMoonX

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http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/dec/07/champagne-house-of-lords-reform-taxpayer


It would appear that yet again those in power are not even remotely in touch with reality and the gravy train continues. After all peers are just friends and allies of the government of the day, appointed in a corrupt system.

Why in the first place should the tax payer subsidise alcohol for peers and MPs?

Also why aren't we cutting these sorts of budgets, when instead essential services are being butchered.

These people are making decisions about citizens lives day in day out, but they share none of the reality. This just highlights how utterly broken our political system is. We need reform and we need it now, politicians of all parties have totally undermined democracy in the bent lords system for long enough!
 
We live in a so called democracy yet have an unelected second house full of cronies of various governments. We are promised change during each election campaign yet absolutely nothing changes except the House of lords gets ever bigger costing us ever more of the public purse.

Cost of unelected peers has surged 17% since the Coalition came to power up by £42m they earn on average £73,470 each – more than a backbench MP. The latest figures show that the operating costs for each peer – which includes their daily allowance and staff wages – increased from £97,725 to £114,721 between 2010 and this year.

But hey we are all in this together, right?
 
I agree we need to have an elected upper house, we need to cut the rot out of parliament. How to do it is another matter, there's the guy Fawkes approach or personally I'd start with dissolving the monarchy and start wholesale reform of our political system
 
Kronos said:
The latest figures show that the operating costs for each peer – which includes their daily allowance and staff wages – increased from £97,725 to £114,721 between 2010 and this year
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In fairness, that's almost exactly in-line with RPI inflation over the period. There could be a legitimate grievance that most people employed by the state haven't enjoyed compensation that tracked inflation, but there's nothing to suggest largesse or costs that are out of control.
 
Seft said:
In fairness, that's almost exactly in-line with RPI inflation over the period. There could be a legitimate grievance that most people employed by the state haven't enjoyed compensation that tracked inflation, but there's nothing to suggest largesse or costs that are out of control.
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In fairness to whom? I do not see it as fair that cronies of various governments should enjoy well paid jobs in an un-elected house at all.
 
MrMoonX said:
I agree we need to have an elected upper house, we need to cut the rot out of parliament. How to do it is another matter, there's the guy Fawkes approach or personally I'd start with dissolving the monarchy and start wholesale reform of our political system
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Do you ever complain about the elected MPs that we currently have? If so then why would a second set of elected officials make it a better situation? Doesn't that just give the electorate two chances to elect someone you disagree with?

Admittedly the electorate might manage to elect two sets of people you like and will do a good job but then you've still got the issue that those elected will have to re-run for election every X number of years so there's a definite incentive to act in a populist manner. I don't think it's entirely unfair to say that many actions taken because they are judged to be popular are short-termist at best and don't necessarily link well to a coherent longer term strategy for the country. Having an unelected second chamber does mean that they can afford to be generally unswayed by what is popular - this does naturally have its own problems where some peers will undoubtedly be out of touch but any system you suggest will have issues. It just happens that this one has been broadly successful for centuries, that's not reason enough to keep it but we'd better be absolutely sure whatever we think about replacing it with is going to be better.

Incidentally did anyone else do the calculation based on the stock costs in the cellars there.
As of 31 March this year, the House of Lords, which currently has 780 peers, had 380 bottles of champagne in stock, worth £5,713, held in its main cellar and at individual stores on site.
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Unless I'm mistaken that means each bottle of champagne costs around £15 - I don't know what cost price is on bulk orders of champagne but if I'm in a supermarket and wanted champagne then £15 doesn't seem entirely unreasonable.
 
I did work that out, but I still don't see why they get it subsidised. You could argue that price is low enough for them to just buy it for £15 when they want it.
 
semi-pro waster said:
Do you ever complain about the elected MPs that we currently have? If so then why would a second set of elected officials make it a better situation? Doesn't that just give the electorate two chances to elect someone you disagree with?

Admittedly the electorate might manage to elect two sets of people you like and will do a good job but then you've still got the issue that those elected will have to re-run for election every X number of years so there's a definite incentive to act in a populist manner. I don't think it's entirely unfair to say that many actions taken because they are judged to be popular are short-termist at best and don't necessarily link well to a coherent longer term strategy for the country. Having an unelected second chamber does mean that they can afford to be generally unswayed by what is popular - this does naturally have its own problems where some peers will undoubtedly be out of touch but any system you suggest will have issues. It just happens that this one has been broadly successful for centuries, that's not reason enough to keep it but we'd better be absolutely sure whatever we think about replacing it with is going to be better.

Incidentally did anyone else do the calculation based on the stock costs in the cellars there.Unless I'm mistaken that means each bottle of champagne costs around £15 - I don't know what cost price is on bulk orders of champagne but if I'm in a supermarket and wanted champagne then £15 doesn't seem entirely unreasonable.
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I think the issue is that both lords and MPs only serve their own or their mates interests, perhaps breaking the current rich Oxbridge standard that has developed would help, take the money out of politics to encourage true lay people!

£15 is very cheap, but we shouldn't be paying for it in the first place. £5k on drink for rich people or a foster placement for a vulnerable child, puts it right into perspective, none of the tax payers money should be going on food and drink for the rich when others are going without in a modern democratic country
 
Seft said:
In fairness, that's almost exactly in-line with RPI inflation over the period. There could be a legitimate grievance that most people employed by the state haven't enjoyed compensation that tracked inflation, but there's nothing to suggest largesse or costs that are out of control.
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Did nurses, police, fire fighters, social workers etc get an RPI increase, did we ****
 
MrMoonX said:
I agree we need to have an elected upper house, we need to cut the rot out of parliament. How to do it is another matter, there's the guy Fawkes approach or personally I'd start with dissolving the monarchy and start wholesale reform of our political system
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Disagreed!

While I don't believe the system works at the moment I don't think having more politically elected members of parliament is the way to go. The lords is there to scrutinise acts and laws so there need to be people who know what they are talking about.... Maybe there should be some kind of independent (ie non MP or party affiliated) commission set up to "elect" members of the House of Lords based on their success and work/activity history. We need more people who have spent 40 years in industry, not more people that have spent 40 years campaigning for election from Oxbridge.

The house should be filled with people who have spent 40 years as doctors, engineers, police, scientists and teachers that actually have an idea how the real world works.
 
MrMoonX said:
I think the issue is that both lords and MPs only serve their own or their mates interests, perhaps breaking the current rich Oxbridge standard that has developed would help, take the money out of politics to encourage true lay people!

£15 is very cheap, but we shouldn't be paying for it in the first place. £5k on drink for rich people or a foster placement for a vulnerable child, puts it right into perspective, none of the tax payers money should be going on food and drink for the rich when others are going without in a modern democratic country
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Can anyone clarify whether these costs are related to drinks and food the peers can eat and drink at any time... OR... Is it stuff that is brought out at events and evenings when peers are entertaining "Clients" and "VIPs". There is a very big difference there...
 
Amp34 said:
Can anyone clarify whether these costs are related to drinks and food the peers can eat and drink at any time... OR... Is it stuff that is brought out at events and evenings when peers are entertaining "Clients" and "VIPs". There is a very big difference there...
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who cares about such finer points when we can get a bit of the old 'class-war' going,eh? ;)
 
Ryan-3 said:
I did work that out, but I still don't see why they get it subsidised. You could argue that price is low enough for them to just buy it for £15 when they want it.
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Call it a benefit in kind then - if you remove it then the fairest alternative is to raise the salaries and I think I can guess how popular that idea will be amongst vast amounts of the populace.

MrMoonX said:
I think the issue is that both lords and MPs only serve their own or their mates interests, perhaps breaking the current rich Oxbridge standard that has developed would help, take the money out of politics to encourage true lay people!
Click to expand...

When you say take the money out of it do you mean make it an unpaid position? You might get some wonderful people who are doing it just because they think they can better society but effectively you're making it a career option only for the very rich or those who lives as ascetics - in either case you might well find problems with those in that category.

While the salary for an MP or a lord can appear to be high compared to an average salary I'm not always convinced it pays well compared to the level of responsibility that they have (or should have if they're doing it properly). That there are MPs who probably don't do much for their money is perhaps an argument for a better method of holding them to account but not necessarily an argument that all MPs are overpaid. There's also a distinct risk that if we don't pay rewards commensurate with experience and ability that we won't get the best people except for those who see it as a civic duty and would do it almost irrespective of recompense. There's also a chance that higher salaries won't attract better politicians but removing financial reward is only likely to attract those who are already independently wealthy and they appear to be the category that you want to avoid anyway.

MrMoonX said:
£15 is very cheap, but we shouldn't be paying for it in the first place. £5k on drink for rich people or a foster placement for a vulnerable child, puts it right into perspective, none of the tax payers money should be going on food and drink for the rich when others are going without in a modern democratic country
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Would you remove it without compensation? If so then that's a level of unfairness as well.
 
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