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Parliamentary Standards Bill

I must admit that parts of this Committee have reminded me totally and utterly of the wireless programme "I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue". Perhaps the Woolsack ought to be rechristened as Mornington Crescent. Another thing has amused me somewhat. Normally one gets furious with Governments for resisting perfectly sound amendments with intellectual back-up. Now we have a Government who cannot stop accepting amendments. The noble Baroness, Lady Royall, is shaking her head, but she protests too much. The noble Lord, Lord Bach, has said "I haven’t a clue" at least twice, while both the noble Baroness and the noble Lord have been accepting amendments. It is a novel experience. The point I make in my amendment is important. It goes back to what my noble and learned friend Lord Lyell was saying about Harold Wilson and the allowances business. A Member of your Lordships’ House, whose name escapes me for the moment, said to me earlier that he remembers the late and much loved Lord Mellish, when he was Chief Whip in the House of Commons, saying exactly the same thing: "The allowances will make up your salary". My amendment tries to take away from the Executive. I believe that David Cameron has said that they should not get the recently recommended award, and the Prime Minister has said that he is not going to take his ministerial pension. With respect, that is gesture politics that stops people being intelligent about what salaries should be. My simple point is this. If IPSA recommends that the pay should be X, that salary should come in after the next election so that the temptation for the Executive to go down the fiddling route, for want of a better term, is taken away. As we all know, the late and much loved Mr Harold Wilson said that a week is a long time in politics. So this provision would surely enable a divorce from the shenanigans and ensure that there is no temptation towards greater shenanigans.