Ahead of the expected announcement by the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) on Thursday that MPs’ pay should rise by 11% (taking their salary to £74,000), Labour politicians have been understandably keen to distance themselves from the proposal, with several, including Ed Miliband, stating that they will not accept the increase.
In an interview with me for the next issue of the NS, Sadiq Khan echoed this stance, telling me:
I’d be against that [a pay increase]. I turned down and refused a pay rise in 2009. There’s one argument that says professionals doing comparable work to MPs get a lot more and so MPs should be paid the same as them. My response is to say those professions aren’t legislators, they aren’t part of the executive. We are going to have to take tough decisions in 2015 given our financial inheritance from the Conservatives; the idea that we can accept an 11% increase in our salary when we’re asking those in the public sector and others to be disciplined I think beggars belief. And I think IPSA and others should recongise that.
Listen, there are many MPs who took a huge pay drop, like myself, to become a member of parliament because we think it’s a really noble profession and you can do some really important things as long as you recognise that. But an 11% pay rise is ridiculous.
But the shadow justice secretary then went further and suggested that, rather than merely refusing to accept the increase, parliament should tell IPSA, which was awarded control over MPs’ pay and conditions following the expenses scandal, “we reject your advice”. He said:
I think we should tell IPSA that, on this occasion, we reject their advice. I don’t want to be in charge of my own pay increase, I think it’s good having an independent body in charge of that, but I think we should say in the most courteous and polite way, ‘on this occasion we reject your advice’.
While Khan’s position is both morally right and politically astute, others will ask what kind of independent body IPSA is if MPs can pick and choose which of its recommendations they accept.
P.S. Look out for more from the interview on Wednesday.
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