Thursday, May 21, 2009

No more (not so) free dinners, being an MP will become a full-time honour

England manages without them, Scotland (with exception of guess who) manages without them, Wales manages without them.

So, what makes Northern Ireland's political elite so superhuman that they can perform not one, but two and in some cases, three full-time political jobs?
Nothing and the next government is going to do its damnest (as any true Unionist party should) to bring Northern Ireland in line with the rest of the United Kingdom.

David Cameron in today's Belfast Telegraph:
Our new electoral force as Conservatives and Unionists has explicitly stated that "the holding of joint mandates will not be permitted". I would prefer all the Northern Ireland parties to respond to the public’s justified anger over politicians’ failures and reach a similar voluntary agreement to end all dual mandates before the 2011 Assembly elections.

However, if we cannot persuade other parties to work with us and bring double-jobbing to an end by mutual agreement, a future Conservative Government would consider introducing legislation to prohibit dual mandates. I am determined that when voters in Northern Ireland go to the polls in 2011 to elect MLAs, the era of dual mandates and double salaries will have been brought to an end.

David Cameron is bringing Cameron Direct to Ballymena this afternoon, work permitting, I'll be doing my best to cover it.

Update
The Telegraph's editorial agrees with DC!

Update 2
Cameron Live (with the man himself) will be broadcasting live from Ballymena this afternoon.
Chekov's twittering it here.

4 comments:

Owen Polley said...

I'm going to the event this afternoon. Trying to decide whether it's worth taking the laptop and doing a Coveritlive or just sticking with twitter via text.

O'Neill said...

Let me know and I'll link in to either.

Owen Polley said...

Twitter it is. Apparently there's not much call for the internet in a Dupe council facility.

O'Neill said...

"Apparently there's not much call for the internet in a Dupe council facility"

Understandable, tricky thing to control the internet.