Noble Lords

Here's a news report to stop and make you think about what all these noble lords and MPs are really getting up to - when they say they are helping to pass legislation and run the country.

Apparently a former Labour Cabinet minister - Baroness Scotland of Asthal - was paid £125,000 to give legal advice to a repressive regime in the Maldives which has been accused of repression and human rights violations.

Baroness Scotland was Attorney-General in the last Labour Government under Gordon Brown - and she was paid £125,000 for a two-week period of work in the summer of 2012.

Now this turns out to be a daily rate of around £9,000 assuming she worked every single day including the weekends - but a former High Commissioner of the Maldives - Fara Faizal - has called on the Baroness to return the fee after describing it as 'horrifying'.

The £9,000 a day that Baroness Scotland was reportedly paid dwarfs the £12,000 a month that another Labour peer - Jack Cunningham - was caught asking for in a recent sting operation carried out by the Sunday Times newspaper.


But these two incidents, along with others, tenmds to illustrate what the House of Lords is all about - a place for well connected people to exploit past and present links with government - instead of going out into the big wide world and standing on their own two feet.

The fact that so many of them are retired on very generous, final salary public pensions - just adds insult to injury as far as the taxpayer is concerned.

As I've said before the ebst thing to do with the House of Lords is to abolish the place and save the £10 billion or so it costs to run every year - but until then I would stop the £300 tax fee attendance allowance that these 'noble' peers can claim every day and only pay them their legitimate expenses.

I'd wager a bet that if you did that - you wouldn't see half of them for dust.