During Saturday’s “Faith in Politics” event two strong statements were made which were barely challenged and which I feel need further exploration.
During Saturday’s “Faith in Politics” event two strong statements were made which were barely challenged and which I feel need further exploration.
The first, in a panel discussion about the news of the week, was made by the vicar and Guardian columnist Giles Fraser when he stated that he’d be happy to see MPs earn more if it stopped them taking two jobs. The second came from Colin Bloom of the Conservative Christian Fellowship. During the discussion about whether Jesus would vote, he stated that changes in government rarely affect anyone’s life, except for the poorest in society. I’d contest both these statements, which I feel are linked by a somewhat Westminster-centric view of the world.
The first comment was made during a conversation about the recent ‘cash for access’ scandal. Giles Fraser’s fellow panellists tended to agree with him (or at least think that MPs salaries were reasonable) as did the audience when polled. I found this somewhat dispiriting. MPs earn £67,000 per year. This is over twice the average salary of the country and significantly more than people on the lowest salaries or claiming out-of-work benefits. I was surprised no-one noted this fact, nor that MPs are in the top 11 earners, so any increase would push them further up the scale. Nor that MPs regularly award themselves pay rises whilst the public sector endures endless pay freezes and zero hours contracts and low paid jobs are on the rise.Nor did anyone reflect that Malcolm Rifkind’s statement “I want to have the standard of living my professional background would normally entitle me to have.” is a huge insult to the thousands of people who struggle daily to have enough to eat, sufficient heating and adequate housing.
Instead the panel all agreed that MPs have tough jobs and extra expenses the rest of us don’t have. The consensus seemed to be that their salaries were reasonable for the job, and need to be high in order to attract good people. I wanted to ask them, what about the concept of public service? I am a professional worker committed to using my skills for the common good. I have worked in many jobs every bit as complex and stressful as an MP’s. Yet the highest salary I’ve ever earned has been just over half an MPs. And I’ve been grateful for every penny I’ve earnt, because I know it’s vastly more than that of a care worker, administrator or cleaner, whose work is just as important as that of an MP. Furthermore, I don’t buy the idea that higher salaries attracts better candidates, as this article indicates, it is likely just to attract more candidates from the same background which would make the House of Commons even less representative than it is at the moment.
I was also surprised to hear Colin Bloom’s comment, that whichever party is in power only affects the poorest, also went unchallenged. Because the more I think about it, the more patently untrue that is. Politicians make decisions all the time about matters that affect all of us who use public services whatever our income bracket. Decisions such as the academisation of schools which impacts on every family whose children are receiving a state education. Decisions such as the outsourcing of NHS services to the highest bidder, which touch everyone who uses public healthcare. And decisions like making 30 per cent cuts to local government which has consequences for every road, library, social care service in the country. In short, anyone who uses any state funded service of any kind will feel the difference between a government intent on a programme of outsourcing and austerity and a government committed to building a society for the common good.
The reason I have linked both these statements is that they seem to me to reflect a rather insular view of the world. One that starts at the Palace of Westminster and goes no further than Portcullis House. In this world, the average salary is such that £67,000/year doesn’t seem excessive. In this world, what happens in public education or the NHS has less personal impact because many of the participants send their children to private school or have private health insurance. And so it is easy to claim that the colour of the party in power makes no difference.
Is high time we changed the assumptions of the Westminster bubble and listened to the wisdom of Uruguayan President Jose Mujica who said in a recent interview , “We invented this thing called representative democracy, where we say the majority is who decides. So it seems to me that we [heads of state] should live like the majority and not like the minority.” Wouldn’t I love to live in a democracy like that.
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© Virginia Moffatt is chief operating officer of Ekklesia. Before working for Ekklesia, she spent 30 years working in services for people with learning disabilities, most recently for Oxfordshire County Council.
*More on the issues in the 2015 General Election from Ekklesia: http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/generalelection2015