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Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority

I think there is a lot in what the hon. Gentleman says. This debate has produced many ideas and suggestions, and I hope IPSA will take them on board in deciding how the system might be changed. We must also take into account that setting up IPSA was a very big task. We all acknowledge that there were bound to be teething problems, and hon. Members should recognise that a lot of hard work in a very short space of time has gone into establishing the organisation. I, for one, would simply want to say that in my experience all the IPSA staff I have met—I have visited the offices—and all the IPSA staff to whom I have spoken on the phone have been unfailingly helpful in trying to assist. The problem that brings us here today is clearly not the staff; it is the system itself—how it was designed and the ways in which it does not work. If we ask Members, ““Do you think IPSA is helping you to do your job,”” which ought to be the real test, the clear answer we get—we have heard it today—is, ““No, it is not.”” It also seems that Members are not entirely sure that IPSA fully understands the work we do as Members of Parliament.