Margaret Curran needs to decide – does she want to be an MP for Glasgow East or an MSP. Before anyone even considers voting Labour they should ask very carefully, do they want a full time representative arguing for lower fuel and energy costs or a part-timer sitting quietly on Gordon Brown’s backbenches.
John Mason, the SNP’s candidate for E.Glasgow.
Of course, as I’ve pointed out before, being an MP is a fulltime job and it is showing disrespect for your constituents and the institution of Westminster itself to attempt to combine it with an MSP or local government councillor post.
But I really do think John is forgetting a rather important fact here...
4 comments:
Reminds me of the Holyrood elections last year when Salmond was campaigning for his Holyrood seat and the local MP Malcolm Bruce condemned him for not living in the constituency arguing the best representative for the constituency was someone who lived there.
Salmond lives in Strichen in his Banff and Buchan Westminster constituency.
Mr Bruce however does not live in his constituency - certainly not pre-2005 boundaries anyway. He lives in Torphins in Deeside and has lived there for more than 20 years.
Now if Bruce had argued that the best represntative of a constituency is a full-time one, then he'd have been on much stronger ground.
Still even triple-jobber Salmond is the sole exception in Scotland (to date) unlike his new-found mates in the DUP who seem to find the time to combine three/four/five "jobs"...all in the service of the DUP,their bank balance, er... Ulster and the Union, of course!!
In Irish politics there seems to be penchant for multiple portfolios.
In ROI most TDs and Senators are members of their local councils as well. Usually in these chambers you will also find the Lord Mayors of Cork, Dublin, Limerick etc and the chairmen of the county councils. Also many are members of the local education boards and other local bodies on the side.
As I noted a few months ago, about twenty years ago Bertie Ahern was juggling his TD role, shadow employment minister portfolio (quite a big remit in those days), Dublin councillor and Dublin Lord Mayor.
It says something about ROI politicians that they can juggle multiple roles as a matter of routine.
Having a three jobber First Minister is not unusal in Scotland anyway. Dewar and McLeish both did it.
If you are not aware, Salmond only draws the equivalent of his MSP salary on top of his ministerial salary. He gives rest of the money to charity. So he is not making money out of it compared to lets say what might be going on in NI.
In Irish politics there seems to be penchant for multiple portfolios
I'd like to argue that it's because politicians born on the island of Ireland have a special and unique talent for multi-tasking. I'd like to, but I can't!!
If you are not aware, Salmond only draws the equivalent of his MSP salary on top of his ministerial salary
Yes, I know, but I don't know how much of that is from the goodness of his heart, or the fact that there was a bit of publicity about it after last May.
Whatever the reason, fair play to him and you're quite right about some of the NI MPs- there was a very interesting report last week from the HOC about members of the family employed by MPs. When I get a spare few minute of time I'll do a blog on it...
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