POLITICIANS' expenses always cause controversy, so MSPs are prepared for criticism when they debate a proposed new scheme of allowances tomorrow.
The shake-up follows an independent review prompted by concerns about MSPs profiting from selling flats in Edinburgh which were bought with the help of public money.
Politicians of all parties now accept, however reluctantly, that they will no lon
ger be able to get the taxpayer to meet the mortgage interest payments on their second homes. However, the review introduced a new issue of controversy by proposing different levels of staff allowances for constituency and list MSPs on the grounds constituency members supposedly have a bigger workload.
And the cross-party Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body has added to the problem by cheekily increasing the amount of allowances above those recommended by the review. This is on the rather spurious basis that the report was published before April 1 and talked about annual upratings, which the corporate body has decided to act on immediately.
It can reasonably be argued that constituency MSPs do receive more individual cases to look into than list MSPs – but list MSPs can often be kept just as busy pursuing region-wide issues and taking up particular concerns.
There are lazy constituency MSPs and hard-working ones, just as there are lazy list MSPs and hard-working ones.
Treating members differently according to how they were elected is to create two classes of MSP and introduce unnecessary tensions that could undermine the job of representing local people and create a disincentive for list MSPs to get involved in individual cases. The Scottish Parliament was set up on the basis that all MSPs were equal and that should remain the principle on which allowances are paid.
Despite the controversies there have been over the years about those mortgages, the taxi claims and the mileage payments, it is only fair to recognise Holyrood operates much stricter controls over politicians' expenses than at Westminster or in Europe. Politicians have a job to do, the public expects a service and there are inevitably costs involved. But paying nannies for "secretarial" work or channelling money into family firms simply plays into the hands of the critics.
MSPs can set an example by applying the "value for money" test to themselves as strictly as they would for any costly project.
The full article contains 397 words and appears in Edinburgh Evening News newspaper.
