Downing Street yesterday refused to say whether David Cameron will donate to charity the £7,000 rise he will receive in his pay as an MP, insisting that how he spends his salary is “a private matter”.
The British Prime Minister is facing a furious backlash after the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa) confirmed a 10 per cent pay hike for MPs, despite the rest of the public sector being capped at one per cent for another four years.
The Westminster watchdog said the issue of politicians’ salaries could no longer be “ducked” and it is pushing ahead with the increase from £67,060 to £74,000.
But it climbed down on plans to link their pay to UK-wide average earnings in future – a move that could have left MPs £23,000 better off by 2020. Instead they will be restricted to average rises in the public sector.
The Prime Minister previously branded the substantial boost, backdated to May 8 and tied to cuts in pensions and expenses, “unacceptable” at a time of austerity.
Following Ipsa’s announcement, Cameron’s official spokeswoman said: “The PM has consistently opposed this pay increase and the government formally submitted these views to the consultation process.
“He disagrees with their decision today, but it is Ipsa, as an independent body that makes that decision. They have made it and they have made clear it will now go ahead automatically.”
The British Prime Minister previously branded the substantial boost as ‘unacceptable’ at a time of austerity
Asked if the PM would accept the rise or hand it to charity – as MPs including Education Secretary Nicky Morgan and three Labour leadership contenders have said they will – the spokeswoman said: “It is Ipsa that determines MPs’ pay and therefore how much the PM earns as an MP. How he spends his salary is a private matter.”
Confirmation of the boost came just minutes after the government announced that police officers will receive a one per cent increase.
The hike was originally unveiled in 2013 to address complaints that MPs’ pay has dropped behind that for other jobs, but Ipsa last month conducted a review to determine whether there was “new and compelling evidence” that it should not go ahead. In its new report, the watchdog said the additional four years of public sector pay restraint unveiled by Chancellor George Osborne in the Summer Budget represented “compelling evidence”.
It said MPs’ salaries would now go up every April in line with average weekly public sector earnings, rather than those for the whole workforce.
OBR forecasts show UK-wide average earnings going up 3.6 per cent in 2016, 3.9 per cent in 2017, 3.9 per cent in 2018, 4.1 per cent in 2019 and 4.4 per cent in 2020.
On top of the £7,000 bump this year, that would have left MPs receiving nearly £90,000 in 2020 – a rise of £23,000 or 34 per cent over five years.
By contrast, public sector earnings are only expected to go up by around five per cent over the period. As a result of the decision, politicians elected before 2015 – including Cameron – will also see a major boost to their pensions as they are based on final salary.
But Cameron has imposed a freeze on the ministerial element of pay – meaning he and Cabinet ministers will only get an effective five per cent bump in their total remuneration.
Labour leadership candidate Yvette Cooper called on the Prime Minister to intervene to stop the increase, something which would require a change in the law.
“This is crazy. How on earth has David Cameron allowed this to happen? He needs to step in urgently and stop this MPs’ pay rise going ahead,” said Cooper, who along with fellow-contenders Andy Burnham and Liz Kendall has said she will donate any extra cash to a good cause.
“The idea of increasing MPs’ pay by 10 per cent at a time when nurses, care workers, police officers and our armed forces face another five years pay freeze is completely unfair.”
Unison general secretary Dave Prentis said: “If pay restraint is at an end for politicians – who are public servants too – it should also be over for nurses, teaching assistants, hospital cleaners, council staff and other public sector workers.
“The government felt able to ignore the advice of the NHS pay review body, but not, it would seem, the equivalent body for MPs.”
A petition on the change.org website calling for the MPs’ rise to be stopped has now gathered 450,000 signatures.