Parity of Esteem
The last time I heard the phrase 'parity of esteem' it was used by a delegation from COSLA who were trying to persuade SLARC (Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee) that council leaders should be paid the same salaries as MSPs in the Holyrood Parliament.
SLARC rejected these arguments after careful consideration on the grounds that an MSP and a council leader do very different jobs and that the salary comparison was invalid - and the £25,000 salary proposal received even shorter shrift because SLARC took the view that a 'backbench' councillor is essentially a part-time rather than a full-time job.
So I enjoyed this little spat between representatives of central and local government in Scotland, as reported in The Herald, which talks about "ensuring a parity of esteem between councillors and MSPs" without ever explaining what this is supposed to mean.
MSP McAlpine sticks by council attack
By Daniel Sanderson - The Herald
AN MSP has defended an attack she launched on councils as she came under further criticism from a senior figure within her own party for her comments.
Joan McAlpine insisted that some local authorities are "failing their communities" and singled out the Labour-run Dumfries and Galloway and West Dunbartonshire Councils for criticism, claiming the SNP's main opposition want to "empower their council cronies".
MSP McAlpine sticks by council attack
By Daniel Sanderson - The Herald
AN MSP has defended an attack she launched on councils as she came under further criticism from a senior figure within her own party for her comments.
Joan McAlpine insisted that some local authorities are "failing their communities" and singled out the Labour-run Dumfries and Galloway and West Dunbartonshire Councils for criticism, claiming the SNP's main opposition want to "empower their council cronies".
The Nationalist MSP, who served as an aide to Alex Salmond when he was First Minister, sparked outrage after saying in her weekly newspaper column this week that those who supported decentralisation of power from Edinburgh wanted to "bring down" Holyrood.
She also accused non-SNP parties in local government of "empire building" and said they wanted to "channel money back to their cronies".
The comments were condemned by COSLA, which represents Scotland's councils, and opposition parties across the political spectrum.
Calum Cashley, an approved SNP Westminster candidate and former head of media at campaign group Business for Scotland, said her comments showed "a politician out of touch, arrogant and unthinking".
In a blog for Holyrood Magazine, he added: "Her lack of respect for Scotland's councils, the institutions that the SNP Government relies on to deliver an enormous chunk of Scotland's front-line services, stands in stark contrast to the regard in which those councils are held by Ministers and Cabinet Secretaries in the Scottish Government."
Mr Cashley, a former aide to SNP MEP Alyn Smith, rejected Ms McAlpine's claim that other parties supported devolution of powers to councils so they could channel funds to their "cronies".
He wrote: "Using a newspaper column to sneer at local authorities in an attempt to score points against your parliamentary opponents is bad enough; to get it so wrong in the process marks you down as not quite being switched on.
"Perhaps Ms McAlpine's time would have been better spent explaining her vision of the future of local government? She could start with how to ensure parity of esteem between councillors and MSPs."
However, Ms McAlpine stuck by her column, pointing out that she had also praised the hard work of some council employees and local politicians.
She branded the Liberal Democrats "dozy" for referring to her as currently being an aide to Alex Salmond in a press release, and attacked Labour for voting "for continued austerity at Westminster".
She added: "No wonder the SNP are miles ahead in the polls!" but made no reference to her claim that those who backed transferring power to local authorities were motivated by a desire to topple the Scottish Parliament.
I enjoyed Private Eye's take on local politics in Scotland which some folks would have you believe - is as pure as the driven snow.
The reality, of course, is rather different as the Eye explains in its 'Rotten Boroughs' column - essential reading for all good citizens whose heads don't button up the back.
"TAKING THE SLARC"
"Great news! Local politics in Scotland is so unsullied by greed and corruption that a watchdog set up to counter such vices has been wound up because it has "no work'"to do.
The Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee, Slarc (not to be confused with the former Burmese military junta, Slorc), has outlived its usefulness, according to SNP local government minister Derek Mackay.
Slarc was set up in 2005 to keep an eye on councillors' pay and expenses. One of its triumphs was ending a system which allowed councillors to receive extra payments for sitting on "arms-length" external companies in exchange for little if any effort. It found that 40 members of Glasgow city council were trousering such payments.
in February, in answer to a question from Labour MSP Sarah Boyack, who wanted to know why a number of Slarc members who had resigned had not been replaced, Mackay told the Scottish parliament: "There is no work for Slarc to do. I have to ask...what is the point of appointing people to a committee with no work to do? That does not seem to be an appropriate use of public funds."
The three remaining members of the committee were so miffed they quit, too. One called for Mackay to be "held to account" for hi "inappropriate" action in unilaterally axing a statutory body set up by the parliament - and which only met on average once a month.
With Slarc out of the way, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (Cosla) will have the opportunity to press its case for every councillor to receive a minimum salary of £25,000 and for senior members to get the same as MSPs - £56,671 - which Slarc had consistently vetoed.
Trebles all round!"
I resigned my membership of SLARC the other week - an independent commitee which for the last 8 years has been responsible for advising Scottish Ministers - on the salaries and expenses paid to local councillors in Scotland.
Now I think it's fair to say that what happened before SLARC was a a bit of 'dog's dinner' - with councils and councillors just making up the 'rules' as they went along - albeit with some friendly from COSLA (the self-styled voice of Scottish local government).
Because before SLARC came along, councillors received a whole bunch of what were called 'attendance allowances' - which rewarded councillors simply for attending meetings.
So SLARC brought some sense and order to this chaos - but refused to support the stance of COSLA and most councils - that the job of a councillor was essentially a full-time one which demanded a minimum salary of £25,000 a year - and that other senior councillors should have their salaries linked to the salary of a Holyrood MSP.
No SLARC stood its ground - weighed up the evidence and recommended new salary scales, expense and pensions for councillors - in a very detailed report which, rather unusually, commanded all party support - across the board.
Yet the present Local Government Minister seems intent on returning to the bad old days of using his own judgement to resolve these issues - instead of doing business via an external non-governmental body - to which people were appointed for their independence of mind and thought.
Which is why I decided it was time to resign - because there's no point in having a public watchdog if the politicians contrive to keep it in a kennel - or on a very short leash.
28 January 2013
Derek Mackay
Local Government and Planning Minister
Scottish Government
Victoria Quay
Edinburgh
EH6 6QQ
Dear Mr Mackay
Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee (SLARC)
I would like to inform you that I am resigning my membership of the Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee (SLARC) with immediate effect.
My reason for doing so is that under your stewardship, as Local Government and Planning Minister, SLARC has effectively been allowed to wither and die, despite its track record of success in creating an effective remuneration scheme for elected councillors in Scotland - a task which defeated at least two previous Government appointed advisory bodies, i.e. the Sewell and Kerley Commissions.
I have to say that I am very disappointed in your lack of support for SLARC and, in particular, for the committee’s robust and independent role on remuneration issues which, in my view, has been the key to SLARC's success with members being appointed only for their independence of mind and thought, and without any regard to politics or political affiliation.
For example, SLARC was instrumental in bringing the issue of 'top-up' payments to arm's length bodies in Glasgow City Council to the attention of the Scottish Government and this practice, widely regarded as a waste of public money and flagrant abuse of the remuneration scheme, was finally outlawed by the Finance Secretary, John Swinney, after a detailed investigation and report to Scottish Ministers by SLARC.
I think it is fair to say that without SLARC the abuse of the remuneration scheme in Glasgow, which ran to hundreds of thousands of pounds of course, would almost certainly have gone unnoticed and unchallenged.
One of SLARC's greatest strengths has been its practice of engaging in an ongoing dialogue with the stakeholders in Scottish local government, which included regular visits to local councils, to discuss the effectiveness of the councillors' remuneration scheme.
The great majority of SLARC'S visits to local councils were very positive, but the practice of gathering information and asking probing questions of councils played a crucial role in bringing the scandal of Glasgow's ALEO payments to public attention.
So, I find it difficult to understand your evident lack of support for an independent body dealing with remuneration issues which has, in recent times, meant that the members of the committee have not been replaced as they finish their terms of office, preventing valuable experience and expertise from being passed on and used, in future, to good effect. But the long, slow process of appointing new Members to SLARC has not even begun, as you know, which in my view tells its own story about your future intentions.
I know that you have stated in previous correspondence with SLARC that you are considering a different approach, albeit without explaining exactly what this new approach entails. In my view any departure from having an independent body deal with remuneration issues will be a retrograde step, especially if Government policy is changed without initiating a proper debate in the Scottish Parliament, which established SLARC in the first place.
Kind regards
Mark Irvine
As Scotland counts down the days to next Thursday's independence referendum, the Westminster Parliament has shown just how out of touch it is with the news that IPSA (Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority) is going to award MPs a 10% pay rise - whether they like it or not.
Now I quite agree that an independent body should deal with MPs pay - because we can't go back to the bad old days when Westminster MPs decided their own pay and rations, and controlled their own expenses regime.
And I know what I'm talking about because for years I was a member of an independent body in Scotland (SLARC - Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee) which advised the Scottish Government on the salaries and expenses paid to local councillors.
A few years ago SLARC carried out a review of councillors' pay and while it concluded that councillors were due a pay rise, the Committee also recognised that this could not proceed against the background of pay restraint in the public sector.
How could elected councillors get a big pay increase if the pay of council workers was being held down? - and so the proposal was effectively put on the back burner until things returned to some kind of normality.
Although it has to be said that COSLA (the self-styled voice of Scottish local government) submit evidence to SLARC arguing for all councillors to receive a minimum salary of £25,000 and for senior councillors to receive the same salaries as MPs - £56,671.
So if you ask me Westminster MPs must have some kind of 'death wish' if they allow this 10% play increase to go through and I imagine that voters in the Scottish independence referendum are likely to be deeply unimpressed.
Driven Snow (8 April 2013)
I enjoyed Private Eye's take on local politics in Scotland which some folks would have you believe - is as pure as the driven snow.
The reality, of course, is rather different as the Eye explains in its 'Rotten Boroughs' column - essential reading for all good citizens whose heads don't button up the back.
"TAKING THE SLARC"
"Great news! Local politics in Scotland is so unsullied by greed and corruption that a watchdog set up to counter such vices has been wound up because it has "no work'"to do.
The Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee, Slarc (not to be confused with the former Burmese military junta, Slorc), has outlived its usefulness, according to SNP local government minister Derek Mackay.
Slarc was set up in 2005 to keep an eye on councillors' pay and expenses. One of its triumphs was ending a system which allowed councillors to receive extra payments for sitting on "arms-length" external companies in exchange for little if any effort. It found that 40 members of Glasgow city council were trousering such payments.
in February, in answer to a question from Labour MSP Sarah Boyack, who wanted to know why a number of Slarc members who had resigned had not been replaced, Mackay told the Scottish parliament: "There is no work for Slarc to do. I have to ask...what is the point of appointing people to a committee with no work to do? That does not seem to be an appropriate use of public funds."
The three remaining members of the committee were so miffed they quit, too. One called for Mackay to be "held to account" for hi "inappropriate" action in unilaterally axing a statutory body set up by the parliament - and which only met on average once a month.
With Slarc out of the way, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (Cosla) will have the opportunity to press its case for every councillor to receive a minimum salary of £25,000 and for senior members to get the same as MSPs - £56,671 - which Slarc had consistently vetoed.
Trebles all round!"
Independent Scrutiny (14 February 2013)
I resigned my membership of SLARC the other week - an independent commitee which for the last 8 years has been responsible for advising Scottish Ministers - on the salaries and expenses paid to local councillors in Scotland.
Now I think it's fair to say that what happened before SLARC was a a bit of 'dog's dinner' - with councils and councillors just making up the 'rules' as they went along - albeit with some friendly from COSLA (the self-styled voice of Scottish local government).
Because before SLARC came along, councillors received a whole bunch of what were called 'attendance allowances' - which rewarded councillors simply for attending meetings.
So SLARC brought some sense and order to this chaos - but refused to support the stance of COSLA and most councils - that the job of a councillor was essentially a full-time one which demanded a minimum salary of £25,000 a year - and that other senior councillors should have their salaries linked to the salary of a Holyrood MSP.
No SLARC stood its ground - weighed up the evidence and recommended new salary scales, expense and pensions for councillors - in a very detailed report which, rather unusually, commanded all party support - across the board.
Yet the present Local Government Minister seems intent on returning to the bad old days of using his own judgement to resolve these issues - instead of doing business via an external non-governmental body - to which people were appointed for their independence of mind and thought.
Which is why I decided it was time to resign - because there's no point in having a public watchdog if the politicians contrive to keep it in a kennel - or on a very short leash.
28 January 2013
Derek Mackay
Local Government and Planning Minister
Scottish Government
Victoria Quay
Edinburgh
EH6 6QQ
By e-mail
Dear Mr Mackay
Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee (SLARC)
I would like to inform you that I am resigning my membership of the Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee (SLARC) with immediate effect.
My reason for doing so is that under your stewardship, as Local Government and Planning Minister, SLARC has effectively been allowed to wither and die, despite its track record of success in creating an effective remuneration scheme for elected councillors in Scotland - a task which defeated at least two previous Government appointed advisory bodies, i.e. the Sewell and Kerley Commissions.
I have to say that I am very disappointed in your lack of support for SLARC and, in particular, for the committee’s robust and independent role on remuneration issues which, in my view, has been the key to SLARC's success with members being appointed only for their independence of mind and thought, and without any regard to politics or political affiliation.
For example, SLARC was instrumental in bringing the issue of 'top-up' payments to arm's length bodies in Glasgow City Council to the attention of the Scottish Government and this practice, widely regarded as a waste of public money and flagrant abuse of the remuneration scheme, was finally outlawed by the Finance Secretary, John Swinney, after a detailed investigation and report to Scottish Ministers by SLARC.
I think it is fair to say that without SLARC the abuse of the remuneration scheme in Glasgow, which ran to hundreds of thousands of pounds of course, would almost certainly have gone unnoticed and unchallenged.
One of SLARC's greatest strengths has been its practice of engaging in an ongoing dialogue with the stakeholders in Scottish local government, which included regular visits to local councils, to discuss the effectiveness of the councillors' remuneration scheme.
The great majority of SLARC'S visits to local councils were very positive, but the practice of gathering information and asking probing questions of councils played a crucial role in bringing the scandal of Glasgow's ALEO payments to public attention.
So, I find it difficult to understand your evident lack of support for an independent body dealing with remuneration issues which has, in recent times, meant that the members of the committee have not been replaced as they finish their terms of office, preventing valuable experience and expertise from being passed on and used, in future, to good effect. But the long, slow process of appointing new Members to SLARC has not even begun, as you know, which in my view tells its own story about your future intentions.
I know that you have stated in previous correspondence with SLARC that you are considering a different approach, albeit without explaining exactly what this new approach entails. In my view any departure from having an independent body deal with remuneration issues will be a retrograde step, especially if Government policy is changed without initiating a proper debate in the Scottish Parliament, which established SLARC in the first place.
Kind regards
Mark Irvine
Death Wish 2014 (9 September 2014)
As Scotland counts down the days to next Thursday's independence referendum, the Westminster Parliament has shown just how out of touch it is with the news that IPSA (Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority) is going to award MPs a 10% pay rise - whether they like it or not.
Now I quite agree that an independent body should deal with MPs pay - because we can't go back to the bad old days when Westminster MPs decided their own pay and rations, and controlled their own expenses regime.
And I know what I'm talking about because for years I was a member of an independent body in Scotland (SLARC - Scottish Local Authorities Remuneration Committee) which advised the Scottish Government on the salaries and expenses paid to local councillors.
A few years ago SLARC carried out a review of councillors' pay and while it concluded that councillors were due a pay rise, the Committee also recognised that this could not proceed against the background of pay restraint in the public sector.
How could elected councillors get a big pay increase if the pay of council workers was being held down? - and so the proposal was effectively put on the back burner until things returned to some kind of normality.
Although it has to be said that COSLA (the self-styled voice of Scottish local government) submit evidence to SLARC arguing for all councillors to receive a minimum salary of £25,000 and for senior councillors to receive the same salaries as MPs - £56,671.
So if you ask me Westminster MPs must have some kind of 'death wish' if they allow this 10% play increase to go through and I imagine that voters in the Scottish independence referendum are likely to be deeply unimpressed.
Watchdog vows to award MPs 10% pay rise
Tony Grew - The Sunday Times
Tony Grew - The Sunday Times
Marcial Boo says parliament is right not to set MPs’ pay rates (Jeff Moore)
A PAY rise of 10% will be awarded to MPs next year, the Commons expenses watchdog has said, despite objections from party leaders, including David Cameron.
Marcial Boo, the new chief executive of Ipsa, said he intended to raise MPs’ pay from £67,060 to £74,000.
In his first interview since taking charge of Ipsa in June, Boo said: “We want to have good people doing the job and they need to be paid fairly. Not paid in excess, but not being paid a miserly amount either.”
Ipsa was created in 2009 in the wake of the expenses scandal. Its first chief executive, Sir Ian Kennedy, was often at loggerheads with MPs, whom he accused of finding it “difficult to come to terms with the notion of independent regulation”.
Boo has refused to change the watchdog’s stance on a pay rise for MPs after the next election, despite comments from Cameron and other party leaders that such an increase would be “unacceptable” and “wholly inappropriate” while other public sector workers faced a pay freeze.
Boo, who previously worked in counterterrorism planning in the Home Office, says MPs’ pay has fallen behind comparable public salaries.
The row over MPs’ expenses was reignited last month when the Tory Mark Simmonds announced he was standing down next year, blaming “intolerable” expenses rules. He said the “second home” allowance of £27,875 “doesn’t stretch anywhere near the cost of renting a flat in Westminster”.
Ipsa was set up to end the problem of MPs setting their own salaries, so parliament would have to abolish the watchdog in order to stop the pay rise.
Boo told The Sunday Telegraph: “We have gone through the process in a really rigorous way. It is not an arbitrary figure.
“Obviously, it is for parliament to decide whether they want to take back responsibility for setting their own pay. I don’t believe that’s right. I think we are in a better position as a country now.”
A PAY rise of 10% will be awarded to MPs next year, the Commons expenses watchdog has said, despite objections from party leaders, including David Cameron.
Marcial Boo, the new chief executive of Ipsa, said he intended to raise MPs’ pay from £67,060 to £74,000.
In his first interview since taking charge of Ipsa in June, Boo said: “We want to have good people doing the job and they need to be paid fairly. Not paid in excess, but not being paid a miserly amount either.”
Ipsa was created in 2009 in the wake of the expenses scandal. Its first chief executive, Sir Ian Kennedy, was often at loggerheads with MPs, whom he accused of finding it “difficult to come to terms with the notion of independent regulation”.
Boo has refused to change the watchdog’s stance on a pay rise for MPs after the next election, despite comments from Cameron and other party leaders that such an increase would be “unacceptable” and “wholly inappropriate” while other public sector workers faced a pay freeze.
Boo, who previously worked in counterterrorism planning in the Home Office, says MPs’ pay has fallen behind comparable public salaries.
The row over MPs’ expenses was reignited last month when the Tory Mark Simmonds announced he was standing down next year, blaming “intolerable” expenses rules. He said the “second home” allowance of £27,875 “doesn’t stretch anywhere near the cost of renting a flat in Westminster”.
Ipsa was set up to end the problem of MPs setting their own salaries, so parliament would have to abolish the watchdog in order to stop the pay rise.
Boo told The Sunday Telegraph: “We have gone through the process in a really rigorous way. It is not an arbitrary figure.
“Obviously, it is for parliament to decide whether they want to take back responsibility for setting their own pay. I don’t believe that’s right. I think we are in a better position as a country now.”
