THE REAL question on the 80 per cent "pay claim" by more than 230 backbench MPs is not whether they are worth the rise, but whether the voters would wear it.

To begin with, the public is traditionally cynical towards politicians; the "They're in it for themselves" sentiment being a frequently expressed view of those who would order our lives.

And, alas, with instances like the cash-for-questions scandal and the marked reluctance of many MPs to give up or disclose their outside earnings, they have done little to dispel that outlook.

Additionally, public sympathy for this pay demand will be hard to find when, in a still insecure job market in the world outside Westminster, wage rises have been confined to tiny percentage increases.

And in the public sector, over which MPs rule and to which their salaries are linked, pay is currently subject to stringent controls.

Thus, outside Parliament, both the public's instinct and its mood is hostile at the outset to the MPs' case.

It is, however, a case that deserves to be heard and one which is not without validity.

And we would give it a sympathetic ear while remaining determined to attach strong strings to any increase of this nature.

For consider how vital the MPs' job is.

It is a task which has an impact on the lives of everyone in the country.

By its very nature, then, the job demands that it be carried out by people with high-calibre abilities and integrity.

And it is arguable that the current MPs' salary of £34,085 is no longer sufficient to attract the best brains away from more lucrative fields and professions outside the Commons.

Furthermore, there is some justification for the actual size of the increase which MPs want since, while their pay has stood still in real terms over 30 years, average incomes in other sectors have gone up by more than 80 per cent.

That yardstick would make an MP worth £61,000 a year.

However, if MPs want and deserve such a salary - and, as we believe, the job warrants it - it ought not to be left to Parliament to decide on it.

Such a move would only feed the already-prevailing public cynicism that MPs are more concerned with looking after themselves than their constituents.

The issue should be delivered to an outside body. And the Nolan Committee on standards in public life, having shown itself to be an assiduous foe of sleaze, would be the ideal body that the public would trust to rule fairly on this or future pay demands by MPs.

But we would expect a string of conditions attached to any increase, all designed to make our legislators as removed from corrupting external influence as, of necessity, the judiciary, which applies the laws they make, already is.

Thus we would have well-paid, full-time, professional politicians, barred by law from outside employment or income - so they can be devoted wholly to the task of serving the voters who elect them.

There would be no sponsorship by interest groups of any kind and no belonging to such bodies.

Nor would there be any keeping-it-in-the-family system at work in Parliament whereby, as happens considerably at present, MPs employ their wives or children as secretaries and so retain for themselves much of their £42,754 office allowance.

Out, too, would go the perks and fiddles - as with massive mileage allowances many currently claim.

All expenses would be made legitimate through them being reimbursed afterwards and only on proof of expenditure.

Only those without integrity would object to such conditions and if they were put in place, much of the public cynicism which now stands in the way of a proper rate of pay for MPs would vanish.

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