Before I start............ fantastic interview with David Leigh regarding the BAE Scandal a couple of weeks ago. Corruption beyond belief.

Well in comparison to the BAE bribes, and back handers running into the billions of dollars, the revelations this week that there is official list of expenses that British MP’s can claim for having a second home close to London, seems like loose change. But on Thursday this week, in part as a result of ongoing investigations by many newspapers into MP’s expenses, it was revealed that MP’s can claim for all sorts of household expenses or ACA’s as they are known; from individual items such as recordable DVD players to complete refits of their Kitchens and Bathrooms all at the taxpayers cost. We’re not talking small sums either, the equivalent of $20,000 for a new Kitchen, $13,000 for a new Bathroom all paid for by Joe public.

Now, I’m a pretty lucky man, I work for a big US electronics company in the UK, I am employed full time and get paid reasonably well, however there’s one thing our Financial Director, and the UK tax office wont let me get away with and that is putting in dodgy expense claims. I don’t recall ever being allowed to claim for a new HiFi, a TV, a washer dryer or a new bed on my expenses, for the simple reason listening to the radio, watching Family Guy, doing my laundry and sleeping has nothing to do with me competently carrying out my job, so why the hell are we allowing our MP’s to claim for gas cookers, food mixers, coffee makers and dinning room tables, I don’t recall making dinner in any party manifesto.

So what you might say, it’s not a big issue it’s a few extra quid, everyone is on the make; How about if I told you that as long as the items they are claiming for are less than $500 each they don’t even have to produce a receipt, or that in addition to making their 2nd homes nice and comfy we even let them claim $800 a month towards feeding themselves.....and yes it all comes out of our purses.

Lets put this into perspective, last year MP’s claimed almost $22Million ACA’s. That’s on top of the average pay they receive of around $125,000 a year, an incidental allowance of a further $40,000 for sundries such as security and accommodation, a communications allowance of $20,000, IT equipment to the value of $10,000, A London supplement of $5000 and should they use a car, motorcycle or even a push bike we give them an allowance for that as well ! And do you know what’s the icing on the cake, when they get voted out for not being good enough we give them a further $75,000 winding up allowance to help them finish their duties, and a resettlement grant of up to 100% of their salary so they can come to terms with life outside of parliament. It must be tough deciding how to spend such a handsome handshake.

So, I make that around $250,000 a year, for representing the views of the people, or put another way, a million dollars every 4 years for taking other peoples ideas, and re-presenting them as your own. The average Brit would have to work for almost 21 years to make a million dollars, and if you are one of our million people on the minimum wage, some 40 years, or almost your entire working life.

So this week when Alistair “Stability” Darling, announced in his first budget that spirits would be going up by 55p per bottle and that there would be additional green taxes on air travel, you would have thought that your average Bit would have been a little fed up. After all, in reality most Brits only look forward to 2 things in life, their summer holidays abroad and getting drunk at the weekend with their pals, and it seemed that Darling was going to ruin both of them for us. But in fact, no one batted an eyelid, and that I thought spoke volumes about how little most of us listen to, or are interested in, these people who we pay so handsomely.

So as I sign off, from the bottom corner of the little island to your right all I ask Chuck is that you spare a thought for our poor beleaguered MP’s who as I speak are probably sat in a comfy leather chair somewhere with a large vintage brandy and a cigar, smoking my hard earned cash