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Members' Salaries, Pensions and Allowances

My hon. Friend makes her point well. I thought that she was going to make a comparison with the salaries to which our staff often move on quickly in the world outside Westminster—and rightly so. Just as there is no shortage of people queuing to become MPs, there is no shortage of people queuing to work for us in Westminster. Nevertheless, the gap between what our staff do for us and what we are able to reward them with, and what they should be able to attract, is considerable. If we are to argue that we ourselves should have automatic increases, at the very least we should say the same about our staff. If any hon. Members argue otherwise, I suggest that the system be put the other way round for them, so that they would be notified of what the salaries would be increased to—unless they intervened to have them reduced. We would see what would happen then. I said that I would be brief. I hope that in winding up, the Minister will join other Members in saying that MPs should be praised by the media for arguing that their hard-working staff should be fairly rewarded; the concept of being on the gravy train and inflating some personal allowance is ridiculous. The hon. Member for North Southwark and Bermondsey (Simon Hughes) clearly outlined the fact that the money does not pass anywhere near our personal pockets, and rightly so. I am sure that MPs' pay and associated issues will continue to be a cause of lively public debate even if we successfully implement some of the proposals that we have been discussing. Nevertheless, they will provide a much better framework around which to have that debate.