The latest gimmick among MPs of a certain disposition is to loudly announce that they will only take “an average worker’s wage“, rather than an actual MP’s salary which is currently £98,599 per annum. One who has already done this, the far left Labour MP Nadia Whittome, says she takes home* a mere £41,000 of her salary, donating the rest to what she perceives as good causes including (I am not making this up) Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, various trade union strike funds and the Nottingham Muslim Women’s Network. There are moves afoot to encourage, perhaps even demand, that other MPs, specifically those on the far left, like the rising Green Party, do the same thing. Apparently, if Green MPs took “an average worker’s age … and promising to make MPs of all parties do the same would set Westminster WhatsApp groups ablaze“. Would it really, why and would it be a good thing?
Whittome says this: “I give away all that I earn above the average salary. I’m in Parliament to represent workers – why should I earn so much more than them?” I have a very simple answer to that: because £98,599 is the rate for the job. In my long experience as a Labour Party member and supporter, as well as an active trade union activist, I became familiar with a most unpleasant word that is used to describe someone who is prepared to do a job for less than the going rate: that person is called a scab.
Doubtless, Ms Whittome and her pals who are considering undercutting an MP’s salary would take issue with that description, but I feel to see how and why. In the exploitative world of poor workers and unscrupulous managers, there have been numerous instances of people offering to do a job for less than someone else on more money. I find the whole thing appalling, but I suppose I shouldn’t. What separates elements of the hard left from the rest of us is their levelling down attitude, that somehow we make everyone more equal if we drive down the wages of people who earn more than us because it’s so unfair. But is it?
The salary of an MP attracts controversy. And to an extent, I understand it. £98,599 is is about four times more than I ever earned in my best year, albeit over a decade ago. A common perception is that politicians are only in it for themselves, often in order to make themselves richer at the expense of the people they purport to represent. No doubt, there are MPs who fall under that category and I think in particularly of the likes of grifting career politicians like Nigel Farage, who have made not just a small fortune but a large one off the back of sharp political antenna. Most, I genuinely believe, are MPs in order to serve the people who elect them. Given the nature of the job and the responsibilities they carry, I do not believe that the current MP salary is excessive. Indeed, there is an argument to say that they should be paid far more in order to ensure that the job attracts the brightest and the best. If MPs were prevented from holding down lucrative second jobs, as I believe they should be, not least in order to avoid a conflict of interest, then there is the case for increasing, not cutting, an MP’s wage.
These days, it is not as if MPs set their own wages. That’s done wholly independently and quite right, too. We argue that no one should set their own salaries – which MPs used to do – and then when the system changes, we cry that they are paid too much. Why don’t we seek to raise the wages of everyone? The answer to that is that we, the Great British Public, are hooked on the idea of low wages for everyone except ourselves.
Maybe the likes of Whittome should stop claiming so much in expenses and business costs if she really thinks she pockets too much money? According to official records, she claimed around £300,000 in expenses for the year 2024/2025, over three times more than she would have earned as an MP taking the rate for the job. I suppose for some politicians principles only carry you so far.
I can just imagine how things will move on from here, with politicians demanding that they have their wages slashed by more than half. What a unique and refreshing negotiating position that would be. But really, it’s nothing but cynical populism which will do nothing to improve the standing of MPs but, if implemented, it would likely mean that some of the smartest people decided to go elsewhere in order to further their careers and improve their living standards.
I repeat what I said before: someone who offers to do a job for less than the going rate is a scab, regardless of the field of employment. If some MPs believe they are being paid too much, then rather than choose their own pet projects to which they donate public money, then hand it back to the exchequer instead? These people are poseurs, not serious politicians. We shouldn’t encourage them.
- If Whittome does “take home” £41,000, then what’s her gross income? It’s going to be a lot more than the average worker’s wage, isnt it?
