MPs Expenses - A New Hero Emerges
MPs expense figures have just been released.* Philip Hollobone (Con, Kettering) is the least expensive MP coming in at under £44,551. Liam Byrne (Lab, Birmingham Hodge Hill) is four times as expensive at £178,116.
Guido called Hollobone's office to try and figure out the anomaly:
According to data from TheyWorkForYou.com, Philip Hollobone
Guido called Hollobone's office to try and figure out the anomaly:Guido Fawkes "Is Hollobone there?"It turns out that the reason he is some £23,340 cheaper than even Dennis Skinner (£67,891) is that he doesn't employ any office staff. He answers his own correspondence (he can type) and he says dealing with constituents is his favourite part of the job. So it is no surprise that he is rated in the top decile for responsiveness by WriteToThem.com, whereas Liam Byrne, despite all his staff and great expense, comes 158th.
Office "Yes."
Guido Fawkes "Can I speak to him?"
Office "Yes."
Guido Fawkes "Thanks."
Guido waits patiently.
Office "It is me."
According to data from TheyWorkForYou.com, Philip Hollobone
- Has spoken in 105 debates in the last year — well above average amongst MPs.
- Has received answers to 194 written questions in the last year — well above average amongst MPs.
- Is a member of 2 select committees.
- Replied within 2 or 3 weeks to a very high number of messages sent via WriteToThem.com during 2006, according to constituents.
- Has voted in 87% of votes in parliament — well above average amongst MPs.
*Thanks to Bloomberg for doing the number crunching.
97 comments:
A straight M.P at last!!Love to shake the man by the hand,and throttle some of the others.
@ ken
Do you mean shake them by the throat?
I'm in agreement with you.
Also, I noticed that it was a whole hour since Guido's original post before someone commented. Is there some shame out there after all, or are the excuses/smears being prepared?
Would it be unwise to suggest that the lamp posts in Westminster may provide a permanent answer to the free loading MP's?
The answer is that he is doing his job, and gives a monkey's about that job.
Well done Mr Hollobone I say.
you cant realy feel too much for them , the meps are even worse.
and then they go and vote themselves more and wonder why public think there is cyniscysm .
hats off to mr hollobone and i will even give skinner the same (as he has consistantly spent the least over the longest time)although he would probebly not want my thanks.
thanks
red despot spotter
Crikey ! Answering his own correspondence from constituents !
Put a stop to that now, or they'll all be wanting this personal service.
And where will MPs have time for all that gadding about, running companies, sitting on boards of directors and editing magazines ?
It does provide such a refreshing contrast to Sir John Bourn, whose early retirement is surely sending an earthquake through the London restaurant community as we speak..
It seems Hollobone believs his job is to represent his constiuents to the best of his ability, while Byrne seems to think he is there to line his pockets - which he does quite well to give the little cunt his due.
Why don't you ask him some questions Guido, like who in his family he employs, for how much, and how onerous are their duties.
If MPs don't employ staff, they're clearly not providing their constituents with as good a service as they could be. Most have fulltime caseworkers who work flat out helping constituents with problems.
Only in parliament could your staff be counted as part of your 'expenses'!
Kevin,
We just don't want to hear it!
Yawn
Would it be unwise to suggest that the lamp posts in Westminster may provide a permanent answer to the free loading MP's?
Very unfair for the poor buggers whose job it would be to cut down the bloated corpses after a few weeks. Think of how unhygenic a dead Prescott would be - you would have Elf and Shafty on you in a trice.
P.S, well done Mr Philip Hollobone MP - nice to hear of at least 1 MP who doesn't deserve to be publicly crucified in the new Wembley stadium.
I've no idea what his policies are, I'm not even going to botherfinding out.
He gets my vote in those statistics alone. A man Obviously fighting for his constituents, just like the rest ought to be..
He deserves a salary increase.People like that are few and far between, they should be apllauded and rewarded before they yake the stance, well If I can't beat then I may as well join them...Our Democracy and Sovereignty depends on People with integrity just like him.
http://thebestronpaulvideos.blogspot.com/
http://www.ronpaul2008.com/issues/
Christ, you have found an MP who knows what he is paid to do...and does it.
Come the revolution, I think we might let this Hollobone bloke off, even if he is a Tory.
Bastard cheapskate. We'll get him.
What I like about this blog is that you can call someone a cunt and no one starts squealing. Also, it doesn't take 55 hours before your abusive post appears.
Now that, chaps, is how to run a blog.
Meanwhile, back on the perfumed planet where Ordnung muss sein....
I am pleased that Mr Holloborne can cope and there are so few constituents wanting his attention.
However, in most constituencies this is not the case. Most MPs get at least 50 or so individual letters from their constituencies on all manner of subjects. The staffing budget for most MPs is no where enough to dal with their needs.
Maybe the time has come to realise that it is horse for courses. In London, most MPs and that includes Conservative MPs have one caseworker just dealing with immigration cases.
There are many staff working in Westminster and in constituencies who are paid just above the minimum wage because there is not enough money in the pot.
There is always a fuss about the so called expenses that MPs get, of which it all goes on staffing, equipment, toner, etc. No one ever talks about the support staff for Councillors or Asembly Members, only MPs.
One London council employees a secretary/researcher to be shared between three councillors. No one is adding those costs up.
This man is a saint. How's he get on with the healing of the sick stuff? He'd be a bit useful in Maidstone.
Anyway no doubt all those other MPs will be feverishly thinking of ways to bring him rapidly into line.
Fuck! and Fuck Again!
Is that tosser @ 7:37 trying to say MPs are hard done by?
Are these the same sponging cunts that just had their capital gains tax more than halved on their, tax payer funded, 2nd, third, fourth (and in the case of one cunt) 9th house?
Crawl off somewhere and die painfully you bag of shit.
Yours etc
Wogs
Well done Philip Hollobone, it really is good to see an MP taking his job seriously, yet thoroughly enjoying it at the same time and having no wish to exploit the Westminster Gravy Train.
I hear Quentin Davies is in deep shit.
Oh dear!
What a shame!
Never mind.
Give the man a knighthood!
How does Gordon Brown justify claiming £17,000 for his living away from consituency allowance when he has accomodation provided for him?
There is a chap called Eric Joyce MP whose travel expenses run to £32,000.
he claims £8,000 for car mileage (which at the allowed rates equates , to 26,000 miles - and he has a geographically small constituency) PLUS £22,000 in air fares (which even if he took expensive flights from London to Scotalnd and back implies that he made over a hundred round trips a year (twice a week even during parliamentary recesses) AND rail fares of £2,800
How does he do it? I think we should be told
"In London, most MPs and that includes Conservative MPs have one caseworker just dealing with immigration cases." Er, can we add that to the cost of immigration?
Anon at 7.37pm
I am wondering if you work for my MP and are the author of the standard reply to constituents which she has recently sent out quite regardless of what they have asked her.
If so, your job could be immediately cut with no loss to the constituency and we might also be spared the endless local residents surveys which are full of leading questions.
And he's bio reads a damn sight more "real world" and any of the Nu Lab think-tank non-job wankers:
served in the TA and then in the paratroopers.
industry reasearch analyst in water, gas and electricity companies across the uk
8 months as volunteer teacher for a Baptist Mission in Honduras
School governor for his local school
Very involved in Neighbourhood Watch schemes in his local area.
Volunteer advisor at Kettering's Citizen Advice Bureau
Secretary of STOP - non-party pressure group to stop the overdevelopment of Northants.
Is a volunteer church bell ringer.
Member of the Kettering Book Society
Member of the Kettering Civic Society
Occasional player for Kettering Rugby Club
Married locally
and it goes on and on and on and on...
Sounds like a thoroughly decent, hard working bloke who is VERY involved in his local constituency.
Profile here
That's one less lampost to get ready , come the revolution.
"most MPs and that includes Conservative MPs have one caseworker just dealing with immigration cases."
yeah. i know. its hard work handing out all that social welfare and free housing. why dont you refer them to the Home Office?
Hollobone is my mother's MP. I can confirm that he is a very likeable chap, gets round the constituency very thoroughly, and indeed sends personal responses (and follow ups too) to constituents' correspondence. He was very reponsive to a problem that mother and her neighbours had a little while ago, effectively solving the problem in a day. He is, in short, an excellent constituency MP.
I will say also that Kettering Conservatives seem to be a very well organised and motivated lot. I doubt if Hollobone is superman personified - I think he does have quite a bit of practical support in the constituency. They may very well be - sharp intake of breath - volunteers!
Johnfromcamberley..Mr Hollobone may well have lots of volunteers. BUT it takes a very special person for people to volunteer to help!
Volunteers do not grow on trees.
Instead of the cheap and snide attempt to denigrate a hard working MP. We should all demand that he be honoured in some way. IF other MP's saw that the way for a Knighthood etc. was to 'Get back to basics' then perhaps we shall all benefit.
I thank Mr Hollobone for his attempt to put the service back into public service.
Northern Rock have now "borrowed" £20.6 billion from the Bank of England just in the course of the last few weeks.
How much longer is our increasingly ludicrous government going to tolerate this increasingly ludicrous situation which is making the financial management of the UK look increasingly ludicrous in the eyes of foreign governments and investors.
The chickens are coming home to roost for UK plc and it ain't going to be nice.
A lesson everyone in Government and big business should learn - "you can get a lot more done if you cut the bureaucracy" Also it means you can see the big picture and can maybe make a sensible descision. Foreign prisoners maybe?
He is also a member of the "Better Off Out" campaign. What a hero!
is wba calais some sort of cunt? - anon 7:37 is rightly suggesting MPs staff are a GOOD thing.
its easy enough in Kettering - well done to Hollobone for managing - but most big city/deprived area MPs need caseworkers you hateful home-counties silver-spoon-fed fuckwit.
How is an MP meant to deal with 30 or 40 phone calls AN HOUR as many city MPs offices receive unless they have staff?
Most deal with 5-10,000 pieces of casework a year and pay their staff lower than they would get for the same job in the private sector.
No doubt, Calais, you would rather their poor constituents fucked off and died in the workhouses like the poor are meant to. No?
And contact the home office, Trenchard? You muppet, you might as well write a letter to Father fucking Christmas.
You hateful southern fuckers.....
who PAY for all the fucking immigration case workers which us hateful southern fuckers wouldn't need to if you slimy northern sponging cunts got off the gummint tit for a moment and got productive jobs.
You utter cunts remind me of the ignorant (talk about spoon-fed!!) denizens of N'Awleens, just waiting for the taxpayers to deliver their free shit. Maybe you should invite THEM over so your digusting perverted bunch of arse bandits you call a gummint can get more votes, and your useless freeloading MPs can hire MORE immigration case workers.
You ignorant haemorrhoid.
With apologies to the man up North who doesn't draw a state salary.
If Southerners would do a better fucking job of protecting our borders we wouldn't need so many immigration caseworkers. Cock.
We (Liverpool, Manchester, etc) built this fucking country in times of Empire.
We paid our taxes 20 years ago while Tories closed down our half of the industrial heartlands of our country.
And we still pay our taxes up north, even though most of them end up paying for the Olympics and Crossrail while we sit around on shit fucking buses privatised by southern Tory shits weeping into our faggots, pie and chips that we've all no doubt purchased with our dole money before going home to enjoy some whippet racing and wife beating.
Meanwhile Londoners and commuterbelt cunts swan about on cushy TFL services, complaining about bendy buses and not realising how much of a lucky scum sucking son of a sloane you are
Er... the southerner protecting our borders is a fudge-packer from Fife. The one before him, wotsisname, another Scots cunt, as was the Glaswegian thug in charge for some time.
Other than that, not having tried the southern commie prick's TFL services, I feel we may have some common ground!
Hateful @11:55
Temper, temper.
Losing it, like the useless Gord, is counter productive.
But then, productive isn't you , is it?
Yours etc
Wogs
whilst i hadnt heard that quentin davis is in the crap (although its the fate of anyone who swaps loyalties) , i am picking up that new you gov poll giving cameron due reward for his efforts. is causing concern in backbench lab mps , apparently the polite term of brand contamination , is now being thought of as future liability.
i have thought the tufty club is chronically dysfunctional , it seems as though as iam not alone.
all hail the "posh undertaker" they are considering a lawyer again.
on leading question time tonight seemed to applaud stanislav (the polish plumber). i thought galloway was like a rotwieler , sucessfully even savaging the audience. maud sounded like he wasnt sure what era he was in. faulkener took a spectacular hit from galloway , "on never being elected for any thing in his life"
cash for peerage question was lightly handled.
on this week , ex army chief sir mike jackson seemed to show just how crap polticians in sorting the mess out they create.
my info says clouds are gathering for broon, expenses looks like showing a few more porkers and wasteful mps.
£20 million of whose money exactly is helping northern rock? did darling have light ride in select commitee ??
thanks
red despot spotter
Philip Hollobone is a stand up guy of much integrity. Doug Shaw
Nuke him.
I once saw Hollobone serve on a Select Committee. He was intelligent and constructive.
His all-roubnd excellence is a wonderful rebuke to all the puffed-up time servers.
It's a pity MPs are not like footballers. Constituencies good put in a bid t see if they could get the good ones in the transfer window.
Bloody typical Tory toff and I bet he went to Eton! The selfish bastard is destroying the hard work of the vast majority of MPs who struggled to get the maximum ammount of money we could out of the taxpayer and this evil Tory goes and does this? Doesnt this Tory toff realise that we MPs have to provide well paid jobs to our friends and families? AND we have to provide for our rent boys/girls?some of us have more than one each you know! Its about time you people realised how essential we are to your survival and its high time you common people started acting with a lot more deference to your superiors and betters!
duh!!! could not good
45 12.10am
"With apologies to the man up North who doesn't draw a state salary."
errr...do you actually know this person, or are you just being kind?
word verify: a baw guv w
Guido -
Any idea what the average expense figures are Conservative v Labour?
Check out the MPs expenses: raw data on the timesonline.
Siobhain McDonagh, Labour MP for Mitcham & Morden who has spent £50k on stationary and postage!!!
Well at least there's one thing we (and I speak presumptuously for all northerners here) seem to agree with 45govt on, and thats the excess of bloody Scots that stick their noses into running/ruining England...
The sooner the will of the people is heard the better: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/11/26/nunion26.xml
Having worked with Philip on the Better Off Out campaign I can confirm he is both tireless and extremely effective
Also, in addition to the list of things someone posted above, I understand he is also Deputy Chairman of his local Conservative Association and a very active local Councillor. When he spoke at The Freedom Association's fringe event on the EU Constitution in Blackpool this year he had to leave straight afterwards because he wanted to get to the Council meeting in Kettering that evening! A great example of what an MP should be.
Also to be published soon is the Senior Salary Review report into M.P.'s pay. Expect usual phrases such as:
"...proper remuneration for the work they do..."
"....relatively modest salary in relation to comparable professions...."
"....significant additional expenses...."
"....need to attract sufficiently qualified candidates....."
etc. etc.
The whole process exactly follows the Yes Minister program on M.P.'s pay.
He probably doesn't claim for a second home either; to do all that he'd need to be in his office 24/7, so no chance of going home anyway.
In our office we have the MP, a researcher and a secretary, all of whom do full-time jobs. Have to agree that Liam Byrne's expenses beggar belief, though...
hangemall said...
@ ken
Do you mean shake them by the throat?
You're just so funny, and original with it.......never heard that little gem before. First posting is it ?
Tuscan Tony said...word verify: a baw guv w
Always the highlight of your postings I feel Tusky.
11:06am you are too kind.
I once had the satisfaction of dismissing a useless fellow by the name of Sturgess; it was after (but not related to) a particularly awful lunch he bought me at the City University club - any relation?
Cripes -- have you seen how much Balls and his missus have claimed?
45govt said..."believs" ? "constiuents" ?
Tuscan Tony said...
it was after (but not related to) a particularly awful lunch he bought me at the City University club - any relation?
I wish, staff canteen the best I could ever have done Tone, sorry. I'm Labour you know, we don't do lunch, dinner and tea though, perhaps you came round for chips once ?
mitch said...
Always a pleasure to see one of your postings Mitch, any luck on the job front yet ?
Stanislav mad like fucking hatter. On question time with Lord Dimbleby three Scotch cunts but not one Polish plumber is. Sweaty fat cunt Falconer, useless stuttering jock retard nancyman Fraser Nelson, pretending that scribble shit in Spectator is proper job, like plumber does, and popular entertainer, man about town and faux socialiste, Sheikh George Moneybags al Galloway, all dress-up like arab playboy. Is need only Lord Neill of Wapping and SuperDad Doctor Gerry McCann and is full fucking house of lying, poisonous Scotch cunt parasite. Maybe sack stooge Dimbleby and have shrieking, hunchback, transexual Kirsty Wark sit in chair and all sit round and slag English. Scotch is like fucking Albanians; idle, thieving , lying, drunken, wife-beating, cave dwellers, eat porridge with fingers, shit in corner, bite nails, pick nose, masturbate like chimp all day long and come in nice country and spread like fucking bubonic plague. Is time for Stanislav invite on question time. Show Scotch cunts what’s fucking what.
Great Polish king, Edward Wenceslas Plantagenet have right idea, show proper spirit, slaughter like fucking vermin, chop in bits and post off all around country,head in London, arse in Bristol, arm in Peterborough and so on; coin immortal phrase of Royal Family: See you Jimmy? You is toast, innit?
Mark Wallace said...Also, in addition to the list of things someone posted above, I understand he is also Deputy Chairman of his local Conservative Association and a very active local Councillor.
Bit of a smart arse then Mark, milk monitor at school and now an annoying little plonker who obviously pisses you off.
stanislav a young Polish plumber said..
Get a job.
young Stanislav.
Erudite and to the point.
A pleasure, as always.
W
Dennis said...
Nuke him.
Mornin' Dennis, you're looking well today, new hairstyle ? definitely something different about you, just can't put my finger on it.
Alex said...Siobhain McDonagh, Labour MP for Mitcham & Morden who has spent £50k on stationary
It's scented.
mike - no luck on jobs so far. See you beat me to that 'village cunt' post. Well done.
Noticed this on Al Beeb- it would be nice to know if it isn't a NuLab MP or even a minister - but given recent problems with cutting and pasting images from Photoshop - one can never be too sure. So which female MP isn't adverse to misquoting the Electoral Commission?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7062530.stm
Anyone noticed the very high incidence of Celtic names in the top echelon of troughers? Must be some connection surely, and as someone pointed out, the need for rentboy expenses probably comes high on the list.
What about a list Guido of the correlation between known Scotch/Irish kilt-lifters and their costs to the taxpayer?
To Sturgess of the canteen staff - yes, I do make typos. Your point is what exactly? If you are getting paid by the gay government to come and troll at this level, you have obviously exceeded your abilities. Go back to serving chips, you'll be safer.
45govt said...I do make typos,and inane comments, and postings which are not complete without obscenities and filth, and libellous comments which may one day yet come back to haunt me.I am a really loathsome little individual, who goes way beyond what is deemed acceptable even in this dark place.
True.
mitch said...
mike - no luck on jobs so far. See you beat me to that 'village cunt' post. Well done.
Thanks.
Thank you Mike. I labour not in vain!
Mike@ 1222
"45govt..who goes way beyond what is deemed acceptable.. "
Thought '45 was a bit of a moderate actually.
@ Anon 7:37 pm
So is that '50 letters' per day, per week, per year or per decade?
And what is this 'dal' that MPs are having? Some sort of curry meal?
Your assertions may be right, but personally I'd never accept the assurances of an illiterate and incoherent Anon.
Bloody hell, an MP I really trust And he's hard working.
Hollobone for Prime Minister!
Auntie Flo'
Fuck's sake, I've spent all week listening to English twats dripping on about how they 'nearly' won the Rugby World Cup, they 'nearly' qualified for Euro 2008 and their driver 'nearly' won the Formula One championship.
Now I've got to read pages of tripe from English wasters with a chip on their shoulder because they 'nearly' hold power in their own country.
Face facts, you are a nation of losers, of nearly men, second-best whingers who cannot come to terms with the fact that the Jocks are simply better at politics than they are.
With success in politics, comes a deserved redistribution of your hard-earned money - to us. Tough shit.
Raise your game and do something about it - or alternatively you could just keep whining about it forevermore.
Sliante!
Scots "success" in politics is simply because they lie, cheat and steal so much better than the English, and have the time to do it because in between vomiting on street corners and deep-frying mars bars, they are filling out benefit forms to get more English cash to enable themselves to have more free time to ensuring that the status quo goes on.... well you get the drift.
Not for much longer, now you have that genius kilt-lifter in charge. We can then privatise Scotland and give it to stanislav.
Interns, and lots of 'em.
Mr McGoo - a nation of "brave Sir Robins" - yep, thats us. At least we are self-funding. Hard to remember any of the other members of the Union that are so (post 1916 anyway)
What does "stationary" actually include? I'm guessing you could buy alot for £49,107...
Could someone tell me what it actually includes?
45govt has a picture of a big gun next to his name, that makes him heterosexual.
What a goodie two shoes - and, as the photo shows, he can even clear the House when he gets up to speak; there is no end to his good works.
anon 1:30
"Stationary" includes standing still and not moving. So £49K is rather steep, although would have probably better in the long run if these numpties had just left well alone and done nothing at all for the last 10 years. **Such a declaration would at least have been honest for most.
I've worked with Philip on a number of campaigns. Despite having no secretarial support, he is unfailingly efficient, helpful and reliable. Far from boasting about his record, he is also exceptionally modest about it. On top of all that he's one of only a handful of MPs with the honesty and courage to say that Britain should leave the EU. I just wish we could clone him.
Stanislav the Polish plumber
You have given me an idea, on how to beat PC.
We must all learn to speak Polish English. Then we can hate anyone we wish and not even our mums will know what the bugger we are saying.
I am English and I LOVE SCOTTISH PEOPLE as I love all ordinary people until they rob or lie to me.
However I hate with differing degrees of intensity, ALL politicians, because their job IS robbing and lying.
I am therefore a 100% confirmed unrepentant, discriminatory, highly politically motivated, bullshitaphobic.
Making the best of it, before it becomes a thought crime punishable by 'radical re-education' and or death.
I used to work with Philip H when he was in the City. Nice bloke, but had the ability to clear the dining room whenever he came in - spectacularly boring, with no small talk whatsoever. But a thoroughly good chap, albeit a Tory. Quite a good Water Industry analyst as well.
Before Kettering, he was candidate in Lewisham in 1997, and recorded the greatest swing against a Tory in the country. Quite an achievement!
Is Stanislav another name of the Hitch?
Hollobone doesn't really exist and Kettering is not a real constituency. This has all been got up by people who want a Hollobone figure to be real.
And it's a good job he is a figment of all you saintly do-gooders' imaginations. The last thing we want as an MP is some superannuated councillor getting on with tedious constituency jobs at a fraction of the cost. MPs are there to talk ad infinitum about national and international issues. They are there to entertain us by throwing abuse at each other and their expenses. They are there to make us feel just that little bit more superior.
If 'St. Philip' likes constituency work so much, he should become a social worker and stop grabbing national attention at Westminster.
Oh, and Simon Richards, "he's one of only a handful of MPs with the honesty and courage to say that Britain should leave the EU" is he? I must have misheard all those other fascist Tories say much the same thing over the years then!
Stanislav agree with nearly everything from Mr Atlas Shrugged - Freemasons, common purpose, Illuminati, church, banks. All cunts; political party no difference makes.
Is just that live in Scotland too much and grow weary of racist, wife-beating, cross-dressers pretending to be martyrs, done down for centuries by the English working class, when truth is that Scotch are all fucked up arse by their own rulers. Is only one enemy innit?
Also, Scotch music is shit. Proclaimers is ginger Everly Brothers from Hell. In my country put in hospital for facial reconstruction and voice coaching. Don't know if Mr AS see transatalntic session on al Beeb but is gruesome gang of bearded nonces play same miserable fucking tune over and over for fucking hours, fucking fiddle sound like cat torture; smirking fucking McPonce nod grey head like is violin concerto of great Polish maestro, Beethoven.
Just go and watch this shit, Mr AS, and then come back and say love all Scotchmen. bet you fucking don't.
Sean Connery, he's another one, is better acting in children school nativity play. Silly old cunt live on bonny bonny bank of Lake Geneva and beat wife up like good Scotchman, fly in Scotland now and then with big magic sword, have tantrum say Scotland greatest place ever and fuck off back to Switzerland and live with the arms dealers and bankers. Cunt.
What a great MP. The thing with expenses is that you can milk it. Some MP's clearly do, others dont.
Replied within 2 or 3 weeks to a very high number of messages sent via WriteToThem.com during 2006, according to constituents.
That isn't actually the data being measured. It measures the number of constituents who feel their query has been dealt with satisfactorily. Inevitably, constituents with unrealistic expectations will say no irrespective of the time it took for them to receive a response.
And, having worked in an MPs office for a number of years, I can tell you that writetothem.com accounts for, at most, a 20th of incoming correspondence.
Realistically it is said,
"most MPs and that includes Conservative MPs have one caseworker just dealing with immigration cases."
Accordingly, wouldn't UK plc. be a much better place for immigrants and MP's if Rector Brown wrote another red-bulletin to guide all concerned in the most expedient and efficient means to hose the treasury....surely the wanker is eminently qualified for this?
The average MP has 70,000 voters to deal with regardless of the location of their constituency. Most of us right to our MP once every 10 years. It should really be a simple matter to handle the 20 odd letters a day that an MP receives, especially as they are likely to be along the lines of "I hate ID cards, what are you doing about it?"
Caseworkers just cut and paste government approved response into emails - what the hell use is that to anyone? It would at least be more honest to say "Sorry, I'm too busy to respond to this".
Hollobone is obviously a top bloke who believes being a representative for his community is an honour. He should be the poster child for "Caring Conservatives". I'm tired of socialist twats lining their pockets and then saying the Tories are evil and selfish. Can't say that about Hollobone, can they?
I you want your immigration/asylum/csa/taxcredits casework done properly you need good staff in MPs offices, hence the expenses.
Guido - this is extremely misleading. Kettering is a "semi-rural constituency" and is "predominantly middle-class." Birmingham Hodge Hill "is one of the most deprived in the region and contains very few middle-class residents." (Wikipedia)
Low-income groups are more likely to have problems which require an MPs assistance (housing/immigration/benefits/etc). Hollobone can answer all of his constituent's enquiries himself BECAUSE HE GETS FAR LESS OF THEM.
Hollobone gets far fewer letters to answer because he lives in a Tory area and thus there were far fewer problems caused in the first place. Now in Labour run areas, that is where disaster strikes....
Guido has asked me where he has been misleading in this post.
It is misleading to suggest that all MPs should just follow Hollobones' example and dispense with their staff and write their own letters. That choice is not open to most MPs and if Hollobone represented Birmingham Hodge Hill he wouldn't be able to go to any debates or select committees at all without staff because he would be answering all of his casework.
All MPs get the same expenses allowance (albeit slightly higher for London MPs)-If Guido wants to get really investigative - why not look into the countless MPs who use taxpayers money to employ their wives as 'secretaries' and also have a real secretary in the office doing all the work!
Anon 4:39. A lot of twaddle. Your local MP is not the citizens advice bureau. If an MP is getting too many letters to answer it is because they are being sent to the wrong person and it is a simple matter to re-direct them to the proper authority.
In any case a caseworker can only respond with some cut and paste fob off letter - they have no power to do anything for the constituent that has a problem.
Finally, where is your evidence that Kettering has fewer problems directed to its standing MP compared to a Birmingham constituency? People in those areas are just as likely to write to their MP, and for the same reasons, as anybody else.
Anon @ 11:06,
I didn't write the post to which you're referring but I would say two things.
1. Caseworkers often do make a difference and solve problems, much like an MP can. That doesn't mean that they aren't often essentially post-room workers but to suggest that they make no difference, or one substantially greater than that of an MP, is basically false
2. You say "where is your evidence that Kettering has fewer problems directed to its standing MP compared to a Birmingham constituency?"
Now, it is impossible to know but most MPs from poor urban areas beset with social problems employ more staff and split their allowance more. I know of one Labour MP who employs so many people (out of necessity) that he pays caseworkers as little as 10-11k.
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