Mr Smith reads that Labour MSP, Lord George Foulkes, thinks that the average Member of the Scottish Parliament, “works harder” than a Westminster Member of Parliament.
What’s the catch I hear you ask, given that Lord Foulkes isn’t exactly renowned as one of the staunchest advocates of devolution? Well Lord Foulkes’ comments are probably not totally unrelated to the fact he was giving evidence to the Holyrood inquiry considering MSPs allowances, and that he advocated, during his evidence, increasing Regional MSPs’ expenses. He is of course one these himself.
Now Lord Foulkes has hardly been in the Scottish Parliament five minutes, spends a lot of his time in the House of Lords and runs his own government affairs consultancy, which probably doesn’t leave him with a lot of time to do any of these jobs properly, but Mr Smith thinks that it will take a lot of convincing to persuade the lumpen proletariate in Scotland that some MSPs deserve even higher expenses than they already receive.
Now Lord Foulkes has hardly been in the Scottish Parliament five minutes, spends a lot of his time in the House of Lords and runs his own government affairs consultancy, which probably doesn’t leave him with a lot of time to do any of these jobs properly, but Mr Smith thinks that it will take a lot of convincing to persuade the lumpen proletariate in Scotland that some MSPs deserve even higher expenses than they already receive.
1 comment:
This story is completely factually inaccurate. George Foulkes did not suggest that salaries should be increased. He argues that Allowances should be increased - that's a very different thing.
His point is that regional list msps in the far flung corners of scotland - not his constituency incidentally - need more money to effectively represent their constituents.
Tackle the issue and you might contribute something positive to teh debate.
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