I have to admit that I really dislike the Commons Speaker Michael Martin, but in one of those irrational ways that everything he does irritates.
However it turns out my irritation wasn't so irrational, as he's been caught doing a "Hoon". While living in a grace-and-favour apartment, he claimed a second-home allowance for his constituency home and rented out his actual second home. He has continued to make annual claims of up to £17,166, though he doesn't have a mortgage claiming for basically living costs, bills, decoration and furniture. You would be forgiven for thinking a salary of £141,000 would cover living costs in Glasgow and a home that's allegedly hardly being used. Alas no not to Martins standards, and these standards don't just apply to his home, he's run up bill of £148,657 for just 11 trips aboard between May 2005 and September 2008.
He isn't alone though, 65 other MP's that's 1 in 10, have raised eyebrows by not living within their means and using tax payers money to subsidies buying homes and renting them out. Interestingly 65 is the amount the Conservatives plan to cut from the total number of MPs in Westminster.
Writing these kind of posts is getting really repetitive, to the point that reading them and writing them is becoming an effort. Yet the alternative is we turn a blind eye and I'm not prepared to accept that. There is something so fundamentally wrong, when MPs think it's fine to use tax payers money to subsidies their income and living standards. As every penny they take to line their pocket is robbed from people who actually need and deserve it, from our nurses, fire fighters, schools and hospitals. It's disgraceful, particularly for the Speaker of the House of Commons whose role is to keep order.
However it turns out my irritation wasn't so irrational, as he's been caught doing a "Hoon". While living in a grace-and-favour apartment, he claimed a second-home allowance for his constituency home and rented out his actual second home. He has continued to make annual claims of up to £17,166, though he doesn't have a mortgage claiming for basically living costs, bills, decoration and furniture. You would be forgiven for thinking a salary of £141,000 would cover living costs in Glasgow and a home that's allegedly hardly being used. Alas no not to Martins standards, and these standards don't just apply to his home, he's run up bill of £148,657 for just 11 trips aboard between May 2005 and September 2008.
He isn't alone though, 65 other MP's that's 1 in 10, have raised eyebrows by not living within their means and using tax payers money to subsidies buying homes and renting them out. Interestingly 65 is the amount the Conservatives plan to cut from the total number of MPs in Westminster.
Writing these kind of posts is getting really repetitive, to the point that reading them and writing them is becoming an effort. Yet the alternative is we turn a blind eye and I'm not prepared to accept that. There is something so fundamentally wrong, when MPs think it's fine to use tax payers money to subsidies their income and living standards. As every penny they take to line their pocket is robbed from people who actually need and deserve it, from our nurses, fire fighters, schools and hospitals. It's disgraceful, particularly for the Speaker of the House of Commons whose role is to keep order.
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