With the Rifkind/Straw ‘debacle‘ surfacing, the ‘great-and-the-good-know-it-all’ have lost no time in airing their views on the matter. Witness: Paul Goodman on ConservativeHome; Douglas Murray in The Speccie; and John Lehal on PublicAffairs.

Goodman writes that: We want MPs who don’t earn outside the Commons and aren’t paid more by the taxpayer and are people of real ability. But it’s impossible to have all three at once – but does not realise that it is not impossible. Douglas Murray believes that MPs have too little to do and aren’t paid enough – and on what I presume he considers a ‘pittance’ they have to run two homes. John Lehal seems either not ‘taken aback’ or ‘surprised’ at quite a lot that most people would be about how MPs ‘load’ their basic salary – even though he does admit that the fact MPs have little to do is due to the fact their predecessors off-loaded most of their duties to Brussels.