Moonlighting MPs
I don't read the Daily Record of Sunday Mail that often as I find them too partisan - as relatively uncrtitical cheerleaders for the Labour Party in Scotland - instead of posing sensible questions of the great and good.
Here's a good example which appeared in the Sunday Mail at the weekend - the news that Gordon Brown is allegedly going to stand as an MP again at the next general election - despite the fact that the former Labour leader spends a lot of his time outside the UK.
Now someone like Nadine Dorries - the Conservative MP - gets roundly attacked, quite rightly in my opinion, for heading off to Australia for a month to appear on 'I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here' - which meant that she was not avalaible to do her 'day job' at Westminster.
Yet the same standard does not seem to apply to Gordon Brown despite the fact that he is out of the country on a much more regular basis - and for longer periods - for example, Gordon is committeed to spending 70 days a year at the Abu Dhabi campus of New York University.
The fact that the money earned from such enagagements goes into a charitable body - the Office of Gordon and Sarah Brown - cuts no ice with me because the job of an MP is a full-time responsibility and Westminster MPs get paid accordingly.
I can't think of any other jobs - funded with public money - where a person is free to decide for themselves whether to take up other well-paid remunerated work which involves spending a lot of time out of the country.
And that's the kind of point that the newspapers should be putting to Gordon Brown - if he really is serious about standing to be a Westminster MP for another five years in 2015.
Former PM Gordon Brown set to stand again at the next General Election
By Danny Lawson
The Labour statesman, who has earned more than £1.4million from speeches and writing in the past year, has told friends he won't stand down.
Gordon Brown is ready to stand at the next General Election, we can reveal.
The Labour statesman had been widely expected to stand down as an MP.
But the former Prime Minister, who has been at Westminster for 30 years, has told friends he could serve another term.
Other former PMs have quit the Commons or been elevated to the House of Lords after their time at No10. But Brown, who will be 64 at the next election, wants to stay on as MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath for at least one more term.
He has earned more than £1.4million from speeches and writing in the past year, but all the money goes to a charity he and his wife Sarah run.
Ex-PM Tony Blair has earned £80million since quitting No10. A Labour source said: “The 30th anniversary of Gordon becoming a MP has led to questions about whether he’ll stand down, but there is no question of that.
“His involvement with Kirkcaldy is greater than it has ever been and he has been taking up issues like radiation at Dalgety Bay and factory closures.”
According to the They Work For You website, Brown has spoken in just two debates and voted in 13 per cent of polls in the Commons in the past year.
