Moonlighting MPs

Here's an interesting article from the Financial Times which details the extraordinary extra-parliamentary earnings of David Miliband - the Sunderland Labour MP and brother of Labour leader, Ed Miliband.

Westminster seems to be the only parliament in the world where MPs - once elected - are free to swan about diverting much of their energies into other ventures - which must be far more enjoyable, and sometimes profitable, than simply representing the interests of their  local constituents.

David Miliband no doubt believes he is accountable to local voters since they elected him in 2010 - and I imagine Gordon Brown thinks exactly the same way, i.e. - that if their constituents don't like what they do - they can always throw them out next time round.

But this is of course a very cynical attitude for any serious politician to hold - particularly a Labour politician from whom you would expect better behaviour. 

The honest step for both men to take is to resign their seats and give someone else a job - if they are too busy to act as an MP on a full-time basis.

Spotlight cast on David Miliband earnings

By Jim Pickard, Chief Political Correspondent

David Miliband has made just short of £1m on top of his MP’s salary since he failed to win the Labour leadership in the summer of 2010 and retreated to the backbenches of the House of Commons.

Speculation has been growing that Mr Miliband, foreign secretary in the last Labour government, could be poised for a comeback before the next general election. That theory was bolstered by an impressive Commons performance in a recent debate over benefits.

Ed Miliband told the FT this week that he would welcome his brother’s return to the shadow cabinet. “With his talent, what he has to offer, it would be wrong for the door not to be open,” he said.

The Labour leader said his older sibling had spent the past two years “on the front line, not on the front bench”.

But much of Mr Miliband’s time has been spent on his lucrative directorships and speaking roles, which he would be expected to give up if he returned to frontline politics.

Mr Miliband’s jobs include advisory roles with VantagePoint Capital Partners, a Californian group; Oxford Analytica, a UK advisory company; and Indus Basin Holdings, a Pakistani agrochemical group. He is also a member of the advisory board to the Sir Bani Yas academic forum, which is hosted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the United Arab Emirates. Despite supporting Arsenal, Mr Miliband is vice-chairman and a non-executive director of Sunderland football club. As a speaker he commands a fee of up to £20,000.

His earnings since leaving government total £985,315 including travel and accommodation for himself and his staff, according to the most recently published Commons register. That amounts to more than six times his earnings through his salary as an MP.

Despite being one of the top earners among the senior alumni of New Labour, Mr Miliband is not in the same league as Tony Blair, his former prime minister, who now runs a successful advisory company. Lord Mandelson, former business secretary, has also set up a consultancy, Global Counsel, although he does not disclose his clients. Gordon Brown, who succeeded Mr Blair as prime minister, has earned in excess of £1m, although this goes to the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown to fund his and his wife’s charitable and public service work.

Mr Miliband missed out on becoming Labour leader in September 2010 after getting 49 per cent of the votes against his brother’s 51 per cent – having in effect been blocked by the trade unions for his Blairite views.

The South Shields MP was offered the shadow chancellor job at least twice in the early days of his brother’s leadership, only to turn it down.

However, the Labour leader said recently that Ed Balls would “absolutely” remain shadow chancellor right up to the general election.

It is not clear what other position Mr Miliband would want, given his determination not to overshadow his brother. One possibility would be shadow foreign secretary, although he has not shown any overt appetite to shadow the role he once held.

In the domestic political arena, Mr Miliband has restricted himself mostly to a handful of issues including youth unemployment. But on January 8 he made one of his biggest contributions in the Commons since the election, arguing against a 1 per cent cap on benefit increases.

Strikingly, Mr Miliband did not dispute the need to make cuts to the welfare budget, saying only that he wanted a “priorities debate” rather than an “affordability debate”.

Mr Miliband has refused either to rule in or rule out a return to the shadow cabinet.

Financial interests include:

● Vice-chairmanship of Sunderland Football Club, involving up to 15 days a year for an annual fee of £75,000;

● Speeches via the London Speaker Bureau. For example, he was paid £20,000 to address Apollo Infrastructure Projects in Chennai, India, in January 2012. Last June he received £14,000 to address a dinner at Claridge’s Hotel for the law firm Cameron McKenna;

● As senior adviser to California’s VantagePoint Capital Partners’ ‘CleanTech Advisory Council’ he receives £90,000-£95,000 a year;

● One week’s teaching at Stanford University in September 2011 saw payment of £25,027;

● As a member of the advisory board to the Sir Bani Yas Forum, run by the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Chatham House, he receives £64,475 a year;

● £7,560 a quarter as senior adviser to Indus Basin Holdings, an Islamabad-based agrochemicals company in which Mr Miliband also owns shares.