Figures show the start-up cost for the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority will be £6.6m. Anyone who can add up will therefore know by now that this new breed of Parliquango (things set up to stop MPs from nicking the pens) will cost six times more to run than the ailment it wishes to cure did in the first place.

This is normal, as the French say. The Child Support Agency collected £14 million of paternal contributions during its short and ill-starred life…..but cost £93 million to run and then wind up.

The FSA (vast offices in Cabot Square) has a frightening budget, but no teeth. It costs a fortune to fail to control the industry that has just cost us all several hundred fortunes.

Last week, MPs were told to pay back £1.12m of their second home expenses after an audit of their claims dating back to 2004 by Sir Thomas Legg. Surely all we need now is the cost of printing a new form, on which is a warning in small type at the bottom: ‘Anyone fiddling will be shot as a dog’.

We do not need more and more wasteful jobs-for-the-boys organisations monitoring bad behaviour. We need to re-engineer the ethical culture in order to stop it happening.

This is what we need; but it won’t, of course, be what politicians set out to do.

One thing you’d have thought it was easy to do is remind corporates that stealing employee pension funds is wrong. I do understand perfectly well that technically, not bothering to make the required contributions amounts to what accountants call ‘hierarchising costs’; but if you were saving for your kids’ education, and decided to buy yourself an Aston Martin one year in lieu of signing the Schools Plan cheque…..I think you take my point.

The BT pension fund hole is now £9 billion. To put that amount into perspective in these days of ten trillions equal a zillion, that’s what the UK’s public sector borrowing requirement used to be in the days before we temporarily nationalised all the banks. That amount of cash could provide a very nice little monthly cheque for life thank you very much for 36, 000 BT workers at today’s prices. But it won’t, because it hasn’t been invested on the employees’ behalf.

Now you might think that a borassic government desperate to offload as much State pensioner demand as possible in the future would keep an eye on such misdemeanours. But if so, you didn’t factor in the Lord Mandelson As Business Minister effect.

Mandy, I’m reliably informed, is far too busy persuading Piers Morgan’s new best friend to make his sick mind up about the election date.

Copyright John Ward.

1
Saul February 13, 2010 at 14:02

Just pay them a fixed salary and get rid of the expense account. This is the 21st Century. Modern technology means a presence in the House is no longer required. The days when local constituents needed to send their representative on a 2 week journey on horseback to London are gone. The shambles that is PMQ’s demonstrates what a waste of time sitting in Parliament is. MP’s should stay in their constituencies doing the job they are paid to do. At the risk of repeating myself, all ministerial appointments should come from the private sector, thereby ensuring that the job is done by someone with the correct credentials.

2
Marchamont February 13, 2010 at 14:41

Don’t worry about the BT pension fund, the workers can’t lose out as it’s all underwritten by the taxpayer.

3
Mike Spilligan February 13, 2010 at 16:56

I was hoping that someone would comment on the IPSA costs / benefits. How can this be happening now? Don’t Kelly and all the Kennedys understand simple arithmetic and realise that tips the imbalance between the public cost and private sector taxation further, when we can’t even afford what we’ve got now?
As to the FSA – around 6 months ago Sants was calling for an increase of 1,000 in staff numbers, and of “higher quality” – meaning we’d be having to pay them all more, incuding the existing ones who’ve failed. On top of that there was no explanation as to why many more, higher paid staff would produce better performance. Are they mad; or are we? Even if Cameron has his way and abolishes it, that won’t be done overnight and the unions will insist on them being “absorbed” by another quango.

4
Fabian the Fabulous February 13, 2010 at 18:16

I could never figure out why the Legg audit cost what it did. I used to pay an accountant £250 a time at most to do my accounts. Multiply that by the number of MPs and you get a figure well short of Legg’s cost.
I presume it’s because , being on the side of the angels, he knew he could charge what he liked.

5
Roue le Jour February 14, 2010 at 02:44

All that is needed is to repeal the legislation that exempts MPs expenses from Revenue scrutiny. HMRC will then be happy to do the job for ‘free’.