General Chat

I'm still trying to get back (I'm sure I'll never get it) some money I overpaid in tax in summer 2006.

I was a supermarket shelf-stacker, working anywhere between 16 and 37.5 hours a week, on £5.20 an hour. The wages department - bless them - misread my contract. I'd gone back to work for my holidays at uni (so, 4 months) and was on a temporary contract, guaranteeing me 10 hours work minimum per week.

Wages read it incorrectly, thought I was only working 10 hours a week and it didn't get sorted till I'd been back four weeks. So they put all my backpay into one week's wage slip - it was about £500, but minus £120 in tax and NI.

I got my "you may have paid too much tax" letter back the next April, sent off a letter explaining etc and never heard anything back from them since.

And that summer, I read in the papers about a woman who had three daughters - 12, 14, and 16 who had all given birth - and this woman was complaining that the £10,000 p.a. she and her family were claiming in benefits wasn't enough to keep them. It felt like such a kick in the teeth.

At the moment, I'm working freelance as a photographer so I haven't got a vast amount of income, or anything regular till I get going but it would truly never occur to me to claim for anything because I'm financing myself from what savings I had left from my supermarket summer job.

It's not their money................it belongs to us, the taxpayers and voters!!

We work hard and earn less than any MP's and have just one home which is getting more and more expensive to run every year..........................mostly thanks to tax increases!!

They have to be accountable to us for wasting our money on luxuries most of us can only dream of.

*gets off soapbox*

xx

Let's face it, MP's aren't claiming this money as a necessity. As has been said, they earn enough - if they can afford to buy a second house, they should be able to afford to furnish it. They get travel allowances - Business class of course.
They sit in their Ivory towers, stealing this money, then declare that many people on incapacity and other benefits - who need the money for survival - are defrauding the government!! The hypocrasy of it!!
I'm sure the percentage of benefit defrauders is a lot lower than the percentage of MP's who defraud the system - especially MEP's who have been found to be claiming for being in parliament when they're not, and routinely claiming travel expenses when they haven't gone anywhere!!

maggie

It's about time they were held accountable, I agree.

I think this country is doomed.
We have Michael Martin, the Speaker of the House of Commons, appointed to sort out the M.P's expenses fiasco.
An old saying comes to mind here, Set a thief to catch a thief.Then we have Margaret Beckett, a woman who never had much holding her ears apart, appointed as Chairperson of Parliament's INTELLIGENCE and SECURITY Committe. Ye Gods.
Yes, we are doomed.

I think your a little harsh on our honerable members

failing another Oliver Cromwell, then there about
all we have.
Why i think its better as is--tis simpley, the
alternative would be paying them what they
percieve to be a living wage and since and unlike
us O A Ps--they get to set their own wage--WELL
it doesn@t bear thinking about--DO IT?

colin F

Honerable! Sorry i think not

Colin - do you have family/friends as MPs?
I'm really struggling to understand your viewpoint, though I respect your right to have it....

Laura

I'm with you Laura - fabricating expenses is theft in my book and from what I have heard of MPs of late, Honourable is the last word I would use to describe them - dishonourable more like!

Nothing changes does it.It seems that all the m ps are looking after their own interests with huge pay rise and allowancies,and to hell with the general public,an attitude from the prime ministers down over.
It dosn't even matter which party gets in,we get screwed.
Maybe it's time we had the american system,where the public ,being unhappy with a senator ,can quickly do something about it by raising their voices.
Fred.

As Badger mentioned, if the american system of finance and control was applied in the UK then the fiasco of MP'S draining the country dry would not exist.

I worked for an american company, based in the UK.. one of my duties was auditing expense reports submitted by employees. We had policy, procedure and guidelines relating to what could or could not be claimed..no receipts then no claim, mileage was set at so many pence per mile, petrol receipts had to be produced, hotel billing and meals taken had to be itemised, with receipts..dry cleaning was allowed if your business stay was longer than two weeks duration, receipts again. Purchases of basic things like toothpaste,hair cream, nylons or even umbrellas (yes, I heard all the excuses) were not chargeable..
After audit I could pay out monies due if expense report was correct, if not they were returned to employee with a official letter requesting that only a corrected report would be acceptable. Not even the manufacturing director was allowed to break the rules set down.. he did on a couple of occassions but knew I had the backing of my accountant.... maybe he was testing me, who knows.

So what it really comes down to is a set of rules laid down, management to ensure they are carried out, a quarterly audit in- house, then an outside company of auditors to audit the company auditors.


We have no control within the great halls of power..each person is only looking out for themselves... anything goes wrong then they blame the other... One only has to listen to the media to know what a mess the UK are in and have been in for many years due to total lack of leadership
and greed.

No wonder so many of our younger generation are opting to live abroad.


JoyceP

To all those in Parliament and in positions of higher authority I would say
'salus populi supreme est lex'.

My experience of expenses procedures is the same as Joyce. Strict controls over what can and can't be claimed. In my company, you were expected to have receipts for everything, mandatory for items over £10.

Many people may not be aware but good old uncle Gordon introduced very strict rules over the way certain expenses were to be treated as perks and therefore subject to tax.

Did you know that if you employer provides free coffee, or a free meal for its staff at your normal place of work then the cost is taxable? Expenses for working away from home are also subject to limits, before they become liable for tax. Are MP's paying tax on any of this? I doubt it.

What has also shocked many of us is the sheer scale of these expenses. We are not talking hundreds or even thousands of pounds, but tens and tens of thousands of pounds.

I do think the public has a right to know exactly what MP's are spending our money on and to know that there is a proper audit procedure in place to ensure the rules are being followed.

They cannot be called "Honourable" if they're on the fiddle can they?

When I claim anything - I need the receipt. No receipt, no money. Simple.

Jill

If all the MP's in parliament which i think is 650 claimed the full £23,500 they are allowed that would be £15,275,000 that's every year.