Parliamentary Standards Bill

I am glad that the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, got in before me, because he has said that the Government Front Bench cannot stop accepting amendments. Well, now is the time to stop accepting amendments. I urge my noble friends not to accept the amendments tabled by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lyell, and the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, for a whole variety of reasons. One was brilliantly put by the noble Lord, Lord King, in a very short and sharp intervention. When we were in the cloakroom earlier, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lyell, encouraged me to participate in this debate. When I get that kind of encouragement, it is difficult to refuse, although I think that he might regret his encouragement. However, I agree with the noble and learned Lord’s analysis of what happened over the years that he and I were in the House of Commons. Successive Prime Ministers from both parties said to Members, "Don’t accept the increases". We must remember that those increases were proposed by the Senior Salaries Review Body. It is meeting regularly at the moment under the munificent chairmanship of Bill Cockburn, and we all have faith in it. The body has done us proud in the past. But when recommendations were made, Prime Ministers would say, "Oh no, the time is not right to accept salary increases. The public won’t accept it". The pay rises were voted down. I can say that I was one of the people who always voted in favour of an increase, because if it has been suggested by an independent body, you should accept it. That is right and sensible. The review body looked at the comparisons and made recommendations. When I and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lyell, were in the other place, we got ourselves into this fankle—if noble Lords will excuse the Scots word—of salaries that were too low. Sixty-four thousand pounds is a ridiculously low salary for a legislator. It is about time that we said that and, even more important, it is about time that they said it. It is about time that they stood up and said that they are worth more than that. I say to some of my ex-colleagues that they should start doing that. After all, a general practitioner is now paid over £100,000, and head teachers are paid similar amounts. John Humphrys gets paid hundreds of thousands of pounds for going on and undermining our whole democratic structure with his gurning and his awful—