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Members' Salaries, Pensions and Allowances

Let me carry on for a minute. I might come to a natural point at which the hon. Gentleman can intervene. I support the Government's recommendation on pensions. Other Members might want to elaborate on that subject, but I do not propose to do so now. My final point is on staffing, offices and allowances, and I shall start where the right hon. Member for Maidenhead started. I want to say, as explicitly as she sought to do, that this does not involve money that we are given to allocate either to ourselves or to others. It is not an allowance that I can choose to spend or not. Money goes from the taxpayer into the Fees Office, and from the Fees Office directly into the bank accounts of our staff, without our touching it. All that we do is agree how much of the total amount available should go to them. The sum that we are talking about is currently £90,505 a year, and that is meant to pay for the salaries and national insurance contributions of three people. Some of us employ more than three people, however, and it does not take a genius to work out roughly what people are paid. They are not paid huge sums for the job that they do, given the importance of their job of looking after constituents such as yours, Madam Deputy Speaker, and mine, who come to us with evictions, housing and benefit crises on a daily basis. They need to be decently looked after. That is why I absolutely support going down the road, as the Government recommend, of an increase of half a person in the potential number we can employ—taking it to three and a half people, as it were. As it happens, I employ four people at the moment and others who assist. Let me add another postscript. It is not proposed that the three and a half people should be paid at the same rate as now, because the increment provides for a few thousand pounds extra over the current arrangements. For the record, the recommendations are that for three and a half staff employed outside London the total staff bill should be £96,630, which would go up to £102,650 when all the staff are in London. I hope that colleagues will vote for my amendment (b). The Leader of the House was good enough to say that she intends the proposals to come into effect from the beginning of the new financial year, which I accept, but I want us to lock that in so that we can plan ahead, knowing that in the new financial year we will be able to pay for three and a half staff with funds provided from the taxpayer via the Fees Office. That is not unreasonable—[Interruption.] For London, yes.