MPs Set for Significant Pay Rise in April2 min read

While austerity measures are being taken to cut the funding of our public services such as the NHS, Policing and Community Centres, politicians still manage to find an excess of money to put into their own pockets.

The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) confirmed last week that on April 1st, MPs will have a 1.8% pay rise; taking their basic salary to £77,379.

Many who work full time would agree that over a period, there should be some sort of pay rise equally for anyone who has been employed for a long time.

However, consecutively in the last eight years, members of Parliament have gained a significant rise in salary by a total of 17.7% while cuts have been made to jobs and services around the country to reduce the ‘economic deficit caused by the recession’.

It’s a whole lot of hogwash if you ask me.

To think that in the last couple of years, we’ve exposed MPs with the Panama and Paradise Papers linking them to offshore tax havens.

Do you really think that politicians need the extra money while the rest of the country runs into the ground?

The cuts in our health services has meant that the quality and efficiency of the NHS is in decline.

While the cuts made in Policing and Community Centres has seen a sharp rise in knife crime perpetrated in Minority neighbourhoods.

Young people are not only being victimised to stabbings, but to acid attacks as well Moped theft and battery.

More needs to be done in insuring the streets are safe for everyone, making cuts and increasing MP salaries isn’t going to do it.

Another problem we’re facing, especially in the Capital, is the long-term problem of overcrowding.

There are not enough affordable housing spaces in a City that is already expensive.

Private housing and real estate is slowly destroying the identity of the working class that have built the very foundations of this City.

A cap needs to be implemented to Government salaries until we can figure out how to sustain ourselves not only as a City, but an entire nation.

Photo by abigail low on Unsplash