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Members' Salaries, Pensions and Allowances

I will leave it to my hon. Friend to convince the House that the Committee should be given that task, too. I think that our burden will be fairly heavy as it is. There will also be a heavy burden on our officials, who will have to help us untangle some of the allowances difficulties created by the SSRB report. We would probably be at maximum capacity if we took on the responsibility that my hon. Friend mentions, in addition to having to reach a view on a mechanism for determining MPs' pay, so that we did not have to vote on the issue every other year. I have not set out terms of reference. I would say to the House, ““Trust us.”” We on the MEC and the House of Commons Commission do not need to tie our hands with terms of reference. We want to bring forward proposals on an independent mechanism for the House to consider. We would not tie our hands with principles that I think are wrong. The right hon. Member for Warley commented on some of the principles that the SSRB set out on page 7 of volume 1 of the report. The SSRB says that it is tied to the fundamental principle that"““Pay should reflect levels of responsibility rather than workload””." On page 16, the SSRB reassess MPs' work load, which it says has increased steadily. We accept that that is the case. Expectations of what MPs can achieve for their constituents are rising, and e-mails come in all the time. The work load is increasing. It goes on to say:"““To some extent the problems of workload are within MPs' own control.””" With all due respect, it has confused work load and hours. Our work load is increasing all the time, but our hours have stayed fairly static, at 60, 70 or 80 a week. I could reduce my work load. I could, on Armistice Sunday, refuse to go to the service in Carlisle in the morning and the one in Penrith in the afternoon. I could refuse to do Saturday surgeries, and could refuse to go to council meetings on a Friday night. We could reduce our time commitment to 40 hours a week, but would that be the responsible, sensible thing to do? Would it be serving our constituents if we refused to do all the things that we have to do that take us 80 hours a week when the House is sitting and 60 hours a week when it is not?