🚨Last week, I revealed how taxpayers spent £17m on subsidies for bars & restaurants in parliament.
But that was just the House of Commons.
@openDemocracy now reveals the Lords also got £8m subsidies for food & drink, bringing total costs to almost £25m. opendemocracy.net/en/taxpayers-f…
Parliamentary officials try to excuse this, citing the parliament's unpredictable opening hours - and the fact the catering is for thousands of staff.
BUT, the single biggest loss-making restaurant in the Lords is the Members' Dining Room, which is only accessible for peers.
Nov 11, 2021 • 14 tweets • 2 min read
It's time to talk about the Register of MPs' Interests.
The most pathetic, archaic and misleading attempt at "transparency" by Parliament... 🧵
Let's start with the format. Given that there's lots of data, you'd expect it to be a spreadsheet so you can filter & search easily. You might want to quickly find where your MP ranks in terms of outside earnings. But that's not possible, because it's published... as a PDF file!
1) Today, a joint investigation with the Sunday Times revealed how Tory Party treasurers who donate £3m are almost always offered peerages. opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-…
It's the latest in our work exposing Dark Money in politics... 🧵
2) Last week - amid the Owen Paterson scandal - we revealed that MPs have earned at least £6m from second jobs since the start of the pandemic. opendemocracy.net/en/dark-money-…
Sep 29, 2019 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Lots of fun to be had searching for the words “surrender” and “betrayal” in Hansard. Here’s a few highlights.... (THREAD)
“That we are leaving is settled. How we are leaving is not. This Bill invites us to surrender all power and influence over that question to the Government and to Ministers.” - Kier Starmer
