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Apologies if this has already been done but we cant have the poor MP's having to be in this with the rest of us......
Daft petition. It's not a gift of a lump sum, it's an accountable allowance to cover any necessary additional expenses to allow MPs (and their staff if necessary) to work safely from home instead of from Parliament. While I expect many wont, any reasonable employer should do the same for their employees.
I'm the first to criticise but this isn't a £10K freebie, it's for necessary expenses.
Now - you can argue that they should have enough in their expense allowances already, and of course there's a responsibility to spend as little as necessary as wisely as possible, and I'll be first to point the figure if it turns out necessary expenses include rehousing the ducks, etc., but this is not the way it is being presented.
Just as a matter of interest, who here has had their employer stump up for wfh expenses, and for how much?
To get the ball rolling, my employer is giving me nothing, not even wear and tear on my personal computer that I'm working on.
Nothing from mine either. This is just free money for mps. I'm sure they all have wfh already.
My employer started by encouraging us all to take monitor, keyboard and mouse home with a form signed by the MD for security to check off. Central office then introduced a blanket ban so people are working off laptops.
My wife works for the council taking calls. She's only been given a laptop so I bought another monitor for her.
Back to the subject, MPs office provision should be done centrally and not shown as an expense. I would like all MPs and their staff to have suitable equipment to do their job - so in this case monitor, keyboard, mouse and possibly office chair and desk. It would also make sense for the MPs offices to be government buildings going forward.
It would also make sense for the MPs offices to be government buildings going forward
Except they wouldn't be open in circumstances such as a pandemic outbreak of course. Oh look, here we are.
Whilst I would agree that £10k seems a lot bear in mind current circumstances dictate that getting the stuff necessary to get set up at home expediently is not going to be cheap, especially for those living in the more remote constituencies. Nor will the presumable setup expertise for those who aren't IT gurus. Plus ongoing consumables etc.
£10,000 is a bit of a piss-take when they already claim a £26,000 office allowance.
Up to £10K, auditable.
And while there are always those who will have family members as their staff and who take the piss over expenses, there are also staffers in London and at constituency offices who will need this. If it can come from their annual stipend it should, but their staff shouldn't be made to struggle if it can't
My employer has agreed reasonable expenses to modify home set ups, FWIW
Mine spent about £5000 on a new mac tower and broadcast monitor.
Nope and I'm using a lot more toilet roll, biscuits, tea, electricity etc.
My commute has gone from 5mins to 2mins.
But my issue is I have a Chromebook and work tells me I MUST use a couple of programs none of which will work on a Chromebook unless I hack it. So work's answer is I buy myself an appropriate laptop/pc.
people are working off laptops
Surely they are working ON laptops?
My employer is giving me nothing to work from home. However I'm not spending money on getting to work which is saving a good amount. I'm just happy to be still working and still getting paid. You know you could retrain to become an MP if you fancy the money.
£10,000 is a bit of a piss-take when they already claim a £26,000 office allowance
Can they get to their office? Can they reasonably move the equipment themselves? Would travelling to their office break social distancing?
I was told to take my laptop home, when I pointed out I hadn't been given one they gave me a memory stick!
While I expect many wont, any reasonable employer should do the same for their employees.
Like the government?
You know you could retrain to become an MP if you fancy the money
Detrain surely.
I'm not against them getting extra money but they can already claim up to £26,000 on office equipment in a year. And I would have imagined most MP's would already have a pretty good home office set up/routine. And why didn't fetch things from their office for home working as a lot of other people have?
I just think £10,000 is a bit extreme.
"We have received queries from staff related to the payment of expenses for items purchased to facilitate remote working.
The position on this is as follows: the expenses policy does not cover the purchase of items such as screens, laptops, desks and chairs. It is important to note that staff making purchases like these will not be reimbursed."
Given that we were chucked out at 4 hours notice on a day when I wasn't even on site, they might as well have just said "Up yours"
I've spent about £120 on a second monitor and a headset for conference calls. NHS employee; I'd be bloody embarrassed to ask for any money - feel bad enough that I've left the hospital and sincerely hope they call me back if(/when) it gets desperate and at least in meantime I can be more productive this way than without the stuff
And I would have imagined most MP’s would already have a pretty good home office set up/routine. And why didn’t fetch things from their office for home working as a lot of other people have?
It's not for MP's, it's for the various staff that they employ to run their offices.
Just as a matter of interest, who here has had their employer stump up for wfh expenses, and for how much?
I work for a national charity. We are all getting our extra £6, allowed by HMRC. Boss has also made it clear that anyone needing help could have it, and the day we left our office my staff took chairs, monitors etc.
How many ****ing staff does an MP have? Genuine question. I imagine most already have mobile phones probably laptops but if not they don't need a computer to do CAD drawings only word processing and emails so I imagine they only need something pretty basic same as a printer.
As I mentioned they can already claim £26,000
"We are all getting our extra £6, allowed by HMRC"
What's this, matt? Some kind of WFH allowance?
I took my laptop, hub and both screens when I left to WFH until further notice. Should have taken the chair in hindsight, managed to get a charity shop one for £5. My £500 coffee machine is still in the factory though 🙁
Genuinely don't understand some of the responses above, can't believe the ****ing nerve of some employers. Ours is pretty much the opposite; I asked to install the VPN client on my home machine, after being told the laptop had to come back with me daily. Not that practical for an off road commute I frequently bin it on! Told that only work supplied machines were allowed to connect.
My employer is pretty awesome, I have a new laptop and 2 x 22” monitors.
We are all getting extra in our pay to cover extra costs like electricity, tea/coffee/milk (that the company normally pays for)
And also the offer of covering upgrades to broadband if not fast enough or to upgrade to an unlimited Package.
Interesting thing to me is, everyone can claim a[url= https://blog.moneysavingexpert.com/2020/04/martin-lewis--working-from-home-due-to-coronavirus--claim-p6-wk-/?utm_source=MSE_Newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=07-Apr-20-50601139-2869&utm_campaign=nt-hiya&utm_content=9 ] £6 per week tax relief[/url] for being made to work from home. Why should MPs be different? How long does this £10K cover them for?
Seems like they are also using the situation to make a bit of free cash.
laptop £350
Desk 60.00
Printer 60.00
Chair 60.00
all available same day delivery from argos.co.uk
now wheres all the 10.000 quids going to be spent on then
How long does this £10K cover them for?
They're not getting £10K. There's an extra allowance being made available for legit auditable expenses. Let's wait and see who abuses it before deciding who needs burning.
now wheres all the 10.000 quids going to be spent on then
IDK but I would guess running an MP's office and constituency office would be maybe 5-10 staff, maybe more depending on the role (backbencher vs minister/shadow, etc.). Admin, researchers, etc., and if they all need assistance to homework it soon adds up. Not saying they will spend it all either.
I see only one way to right this wrong: Give us all £10k! Take it out of the quantitative easing jar.
Just as a matter of interest, who here has had their employer stump up for wfh expenses, and for how much?
My employer changed their procurement policy to stop countless claims going through Finance, they just changed the expenses policy to allow basic WFH expenses to go straight through the normal (much simpler) expenses policy.
Doubt they'd be too impressed if I put through £10,000 though!
Actually I struggle to think of what home office stuff requires £10,000, I could quote happily redecorate most of the house for that!
I was given a memory stick and told to copy all the files I needed!
Hidden away there is a relaxation of normal procurement rules and need for receipts
It's utterly disgraceful. Snouts in the trough again
£10000 is an absurd amount. How divorced from reality are They?
£10000 is an absurd amount. How divorced from reality are They?
Probably not as much as we are divorced from the costs involved in running a constituency office and staff and suddenly decamping everyone to work from home.
And it’s not £10,000 for free, it’s a cap of £10,000 to set up what’s needed, and must be evidenced and justified.
Why not wait and see what gets spent before heading into orbit?
Because of past history and the lack of receipts
It's an indefensible amount
There is no way they can legitimately need to spend that much. You just know it's going to be £1009+ chairs and designer desks. No argos for them
It would also make sense for the MPs offices to be government buildings going forward.
I meant after the current unpleasantness is over. MPs offices should be like council offices - government not particular party. That takes the expenses (in normal times) out of the control of the MP and will depoliticise it.
But what are MPs actually working on at the moment? National crisis, everything closed, people are only concerned about health/money/food etc.
well, according to the Reuters link I posted:
"a huge increase in workload from distressed constituents as a result of coronavirus issues"
I guess they have to keep paying the cleaner.
To be fair. It’s not your average office is it. If they are dealing with matters of national security and the like then a £350 laptop from pc world wont do. It will need a secure vpn for starters plus all the other things like phone lines and so on.
I work for a large medical company and our IT system is huge. I can’t imagine the cost and expense that went into it. So for this instance I would say its a fair amount.
I don’t think anyone would take the piss after the last hoo ha. But then again they are MP’s.
They never stopped taking the piss at Westminster and this is just another opportunity to do so.
All our staff are WFH with their Mac laptops and we’ve asked them to tell us whatever else they need to work effectively. For some it’s been a desk, others an office chair and second monitor. We’ve bought everything that we’ve been asked for. It would be stupid as an employer to do any differently IMO.
johndoh - I bet yo have not come anywhere near £10 000 per employee tho have you - and you will be checking what its spent on unlike Westminster
The VPN is back end infrastructure, they just need a suitable laptop with the client installed. All the cost for setting up IT systems is in the backend that users don’t see. I’ve worked in IT for Min of Justice, they had to be secure, they were running standard desktops and laptops, security/hardening was in place, but it’s clients running on the laptops and being managed by the back end infrastructure (centrally managed and licenced)
Why wouldn’t a £350 PC world laptop do? They may need Disk Encryption software if they had to go and purchase this on their own at zero notice, they may need to purchase anti virus and Office, but any reasonably laptop will do.
I work from home, have done so for a long time, I’ve set my office up for approx £4K (I still work in IT so do need high end devices).
With the level of distrust with regards to expenses, Id have thought they should be clearer with breaking the £10k down. X amount per staff member, maximum of x per laptop, desk etc. With the amount of people losing their livelihoods, possibly their homes, I can see how this irks.
TJ, it's not £10k per employee. It's up to £10k total, for an MP and all their staff.
I now you don't like them but you can't just ignore the facts.
I never said it was £10 000 per employee ( but I can see why you thought I said that). But realistic costs are under £10 000 per employee if you go argos. No mp has 10 employees. Many employ family members and have one or two part time mps.
they have £26000 for constituency office staff and costs. You do not employ many folk on that
Surely every MP has the internet and a computer at home already.
Is this announcement a dead cat? It does seem preposterous.