Wednesday, 24 March 2010
full-time work is what we want!
there has been some talk recently about MPs working part-time, and some have said that being an MP is a full-time job and no MPs should be allowed to do anything else. I disagree. Although when I was an MP I did not do any other work, for me it was a full-time job representing a (fairly) marginal seat and playing, of course, a full part in the work of the House as a parliamentarian. I believe MPs should be able to do other work if they wish and feel they have the time, but that they should declare publicly what it is they do. It is quite easy to have an office set up so that they amount of clerical work an MP has to do is minimal. It is certainly lnot necessary to visit the constituency office every day and hold the hands of the staff there. If competent staff are appointed and appropriate systems set up it is OK for the MP to turn up on a Friday to sign his or her letters and nothing more, other than the usual constituency visits and events of course. Do readers agree?
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10 comments:
I feel particularly sorry for Doctors who are MPs. Dr Brand (ex Isle of Wight) used to do a surgery every week, and Dr Stoate (Dartford) still does. Their rules require them to keep practicing if they want to keep their licence, and I reckon that a doctor seeing a patient every 7 minutes for two hours would learn a lot more about their constituents' problems than they would accosting people in shopping centres or whatever they get up to when not in Westminster.
But the new rules prevent Doctors from doing this, so in future we will get fewer (if any) medics as MPs. A pity, in my opinion.
I agree with Gus and you. For those MPs who can make the time and as long as they declare it, I think them having another job must surely broaden their understanding of life outside Westminster, therefore aid them to represent the public's concerns.
I agree too
This is perpetuated by "Learned Friend" or "Learned Member" who is a QC, "Right Hon Friend" or "Rt Hon Member" who is a PC, and a "Friend" or "Member" who is neither.
Being cut off from the world is what can make MPs remote......it must be a good idea to keep in touch with real people and their real problems.
What should be outlawed are the lobbyists, whose actions can best be described as corruption.
A great many of the constituency would like full time work too. Not much about though.
which constituency?
The wider constituency dearie, the wider constituency.
Just every now and then it's not all about Reading East.
oh you mean the Salter constituency? the whole of Reading except Caversham and Woodley, but only within Reading Borough, and anywhere else he fancies when there is the chance of a headline. I see.
I think it's a good idea that MP's live in their constituency and return to it as often as practical.
Being a MP should be a full time job, although it's better if they have had another job before that.
They get paid well enough.
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