On 18 Jun 2009 at 8:45pm N Parker wrote:
Been looking through the publicly available details of Norman Baker's expenses. Pretty dull apart from the County Computer Services invoices - over £700 for a new hard drive, and some creative writing on the invoice.
On 19 Jun 2009 at 12:30am Tax Payer wrote:
sounds like he bought it in Cliffe then
On 19 Jun 2009 at 12:52am N Parker wrote:
What a brilliant deduction Watson.
On 19 Jun 2009 at 8:02am me wrote:
Can't see why I have to pay for his food?
On 19 Jun 2009 at 8:07am Rozzer wrote:
I agree with Me. Why does Mr Baker need to claim for food at his second house that he would have eaten anyway at his first house. And why do we need to pay for his newspapers at his second house? Having said that, I believe Mr Baker is a decent MP and straighter than most of his colleagues.
On 19 Jun 2009 at 9:18am Mystic Mog wrote:
If you are working away from the office some companies offer subsistance. This is similar in that one's constituency is one's office, it is argued. However proper 'normal' rules that all of us would recognise in our workplace is what is needed so we can put this sorry episode to bed.
£700 for a hard disk sounds a bit steep unless the old went belly-up and the data had to be retrieved and put on to a new one.
On 19 Jun 2009 at 9:50am N Parker wrote:
£700 is ludicrous even if you have to retrieve the data etc.
On 19 Jun 2009 at 11:14am Ed Can Do wrote:
Norm staying in his second home is essentially the equivalent of any of us having to stay away overnight for work. If I have to do that, my employer will pay for the hotel room (But they'll make me take the cheapest available in the area) and they'll pay for dinner which I think is fair enough, if I wasn't working away I wouldn't be eating out, I'd be eating at home which is a lot cheaper. From a tax standpoint, they can also pay up to £5 a night for personal expenses like newspapers without it being taxed as a benefit. You can also be provided with accomodation free of charge and not get taxed on it if it's wholly necessary for your job (Like a lighthouse keeper) or for safety reasons (Like an MI5 agent or something).
The big difference about MPs is that they get to keep the houses when they lose their jobs. If they're claiming mortgage payments then they're essentially getting a house bought for them by the taxpayer which is outrageous, the rules should definitely only allow rentals and they should also limit the value of where you stay. I don't see why an MP needs a huge Knightsbridge apartment to do his or her job better than they could in a Travelodge, especially as they're all saying they just need London places so they can attend early meeting or whatever. There's also no justification for spending a grand on a tv, you can buy tv's from Tesco for about 30.
What's needed is for the government to start paying expenses like any other company, i.e. as little as possible. If an MP really needs a television, get them a 30 set. Make them rent accomodation or stay in a cheap hotel. Certainly don't pay travel costs as everyone else has to pay the ridiculous costs of travelling to work and don't buy them lunch as everyone else has to buy their own.
It really makes me mad when you hear a lot of MPs saying their claims are all within the rules because they don't seem to understand is that nobody cares about the rules, we care about the outrageous amounts of money these people are spending for no reason other than enriching their own lives.
Norm's expenses are pretty bland and there's little to suggest he's buying stuff for himself rather than his job and he's one of the few that seem to largely be follwing the spirit of the system rather than the letter.
On 19 Jun 2009 at 11:34am sashimi wrote:
Was the harddrive the one MI5 allegedly hacked into and trashed when Norman was writing up the Dr Kelly saga? In that case a £700 charge for retrieving the data and supplying a new drive is fairly average.
On 19 Jun 2009 at 12:14pm geoff wrote:
Trying to pick holes in Norman Bakers expenses is truly pointless. he is hardly going to campaign long and hard for his own details to be released if they are in any way dodgy. he would have done what most of the rest of them keep doing, which is to do everything possible to keep details hidden.
Try looking at other MP's and you may have more fun.
On 20 Jun 2009 at 10:05am No Potpourri wrote:
The techie geeks at The Guardian have a "crowd sourcing" experiment running on the MPs expenses documents. That is they have a site designed to examine the collaboratively examine the documents by using the readers ability to work out which bits are interesting and which are not. Its quite clever really. To find it google for "guardian investigate your mp's expenses".
On 20 Jun 2009 at 2:08pm I dont live in lewes... wrote:
Unlike other "Honourable" members Norman can walk on water and is free from guilt.
PhilX
On 26 Jun 2009 at 5:26pm PUSH wrote:
Interesting to see Norman Baker claiming the costs of professional advice from Alderwick James & Co, Accountants, for preparing his tax return.
Isnt this one of the things that got Alistair Darling into trouble?