Is anyone else sick of hearing about MPs expenses and how absolutley CORRUPT it is that MPs are sticking their hands in the "public purse"? Everyone loves a good scandal and especially when it has, apparently, personally affected them, but this is just ridiculous. Like anyone who goes on about theiving MPs would choose the moral high ground. Here is a little case study. You have to travel for your job and you are given the ability to claim back the expenses for your trip. This includes cost of travel, accomodation and all other things necessary for your upkeep while on the job. Say the small print is ambiguous, and it doesn't state that you can't book the more expensive hotel, it doesn't mention anything about which class you should travel in, and it doesn't say you have to eat cheap takeaway rather than a pricey restaurant.... am I going to find you sitting in the Travel Lodge eating Burger King after a 12 hour journey on Megabus? Didn't think so.
You see, the people who get all up in arms about this expenses scandal are hypocrites. They forget the one fact of human nature that really can't be ignored - greed. Human beings are GREEDY. I'm sure as Thomas Hobbes wrote of the right to self-preservation he knew this would end up applying to both self defence against the knife weilding maniac and sneaking those extra couple of apples from your neighbours tree. I mean, come on, who isn't greedy? Who doesn't want more? Especially if it was handed to you free?
MPs claiming expenses is no different to anyone working in a job with the benefits of having to travel or even just dining out, and you don't see anyone complaining about buisness meals racking up tabs of thousands of pounds. No of course not, because that didn't steal money from your own pocket, did it? Get a grip. Firstly, did it actually come from your pocket? Do you actually pay taxes? ponder that if you will politically reactive students of government. If you do pay taxes, why the hell should you be allowed to decide that those in the private sector can squandor money in anyway they please just for the sake of it but that MPs can't own a second home? I mean, take a random company...Tesco, for example. You buy groceries at Tesco (lets say). You give them the money that contributes to their profit in order that the shop remains open and continuing to provide you with the products and prices you like, am I right? So is it then right that Tesco management could allow it's higher up employees to waste that money in the above mentioned ridiculous ways when MPs can't even have a decent commute?
Basically my point is that people will take all that they can. The only thing stopping them is their own conscience, and even though people have different levels of how much is added benefits of the job and how much is exploitation, the only way to stop them taking is to make regulations. THERE WERE REGULATIONS. How would you like it if you read up on law and saw that it was ok to let your dog poop in the park as long as you scooped the poop, only to find out that a change of heart decided dogs arent allowed to poop in parks and a retrospective fine will be levvied for all who have ever done so. You were acting withing the law when you did it weren't you? So why are you being fined?
Leave the MPs alone. 1) it is futile, money spent by MPs is nothing compared to the amount tax payers lose funding junkies and the lazy "underclass" who refuse to get a job (note: this does not apply to all on benefits, just the ones who don't deserve it) 2) it is a media spaz attack. the uneducated mass find it far easier to engage with politics when the papers can make their cartoons and put up pictures of gordon brown wiping his forehead in a manner not dissimilar to those found in the gossip magazines 3) I seriously doubt that you would neglect to collect your free house if offered it in a completely legal way merely for doing your job consistently.
I'm sure your outrage makes you feel better about the small ways your greed manifests itself, for lack of bigger opportunities.
I have to agree with what you're saying here. The world is full of said hypocrites who love to rail against "those and such those" who do better than them. In all honesty, there is a bit of a culture in Britain that makes people viciously jealous of people who do actually do good for themselves. Possibly a relic from 100 years ago when the big class gap meant less chances for the common folks, but it doesn't really fit into the "upperupper-upper-morethanmiddle-middle-lessthanmiddle-lower-lowerlower middle class" society we're in now. It's a consitutional problem that led to the MP's stretching the expenses as much as they did, so now we have the uproar, and all the parties wanting to show who hates greed the most. But, once all the dust settles, how many of the turkeys will be voting for christmas?
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