Over the past two years, the problems of parliamentary expenses have tended to be dominated by stories affecting the House of Commons. The Daily Telegraph was at the forefront of revealing claims made by MPs. However, The Sunday Times identified problems with peers’ expenses and this acted as a wake-up call to the House. Since…
Some schadenfreude watching the quarrels of IPSA (the new Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority) and MPs, tempered by the knowledge that IPSA wants to gets its teeth into us too. Many quangos end up bloated and self satisfied, but two weeks after birth is something of a record. IPSA does not need a full time chief…
The Lords has been in the news again over the issue of expenses. The sooner we get the problem sorted the better. As I said on the BBC’s Record Review last week, each House needs a system that is both simple and transparent. The rules and the transactions need to be clear to everybody: transparency is the best…
I have previously written about the long summer recesses. The Times today has an editorial arguing the case for Parliament’s deliberations to be spread more evenly over the year. As it notes, MPs are not on holiday for the period of the recess, but nonetheless the recess means that government goes on with no parliamentary…
Lord Norton’s got an interesting thread going, Lord Soley’s said his bit again and I’ll remind everyone that I gave my view about our Lords allowances system in my blog on 20 July 2008. If we are to avoid the House of Lords being occupied solely by the independently wealthy or those on generous pensions there has…
