On Sunday 9 May Andrew Marr interviewed Sir Ian Kennedy, Chairman of the new parliamentary watchdog. Please note 'The Andrew Marr Show' must be credited if any part of this transcript is used. ANDREW MARR: Well MPs - some returning, many newly elected - will start arriving at the Commons this week to find their coat pegs, to bag an office and start learning the traditional ways of Westminster. Well let's hope not all the traditions because there's going to be big changes in MPs' expenses - how much they can claim and for what. And the man in charge of devising and policing the system is Sir Ian Kennedy, Chairman of the new parliamentary watchdog, and he joins me now. Welcome, Sir Ian. SIR IAN KENNEDY: Welcome. ANDREW MARR: So what's going to be different? When they come back this time, what are they going to find that people coming back five, people coming to the Commons for the first time five years ago wouldn't have? SIR IAN KENNEDY: Well a clean break from the past; a fundamental change in how we're going to operate the system, how we're going to police the system. We've got a clear set of rules, we've got very detailed guidance. All transparent. You, the electorate, everybody else will know what's going on. It'll all be online. And we'll have a way whereby if anything goes wrong, if any abuse takes place, we'll be able to come down like a ton of bricks on those who would try to do so. ANDREW MARR: (over) So this time round, the newly elected MP for Little Whittering who decides he is going to give himself five plasma televisions in his house on expenses, that goes straight online and people can see whether or not it's accepted? SIR IAN KENNEDY: He won't be able to do that because he'll have to indicate first that this is an area he wants to spend money on and he'll have to have some kind of indication that that's an appropriate expense. Then he'll have to produce the receipt and then he'll get paid for it. ANDREW MARR: No more mortgage expenses, no more flipping, none of that? SIR IAN KENNEDY: The whole idea of a second home has gone. You will be entitled to nominate where you're going to live and then you'll have accommodation in London if where you're going to live is different from London. And that accommodation is basically a one bedroom flat, and if you've got a family, young children, then you'll have slightly more. And you'll get a certain amount of money and that's going to be declared. ANDREW MARR: So MPs are actually going to be less well off than they would have been? SIR IAN KENNEDY: Well that's a matter of salary, which we're not responsible for. But in terms of expenses, which we are responsible for, we're going to have a system that you and I are quite used to - namely receipt money. The amount of money will be slightly less because the old system was somewhat more inflated. ANDREW MARR: And will this produce further pressure for salaries to go up, do you think? SIR IAN KENNEDY: An entirely separate question. ANDREW MARR: Right. SIR IAN KENNEDY: It's an important question, but we'll have to come back to it. We now - IPSA, the body I chair - has been given responsibility for pay. In the last throes of the last parliament, it went through that we will have to look into that. It's settled for a while and we don't have to act quickly, and of course therefore we've got time to consider and consult and take people's views. ANDREW MARR: One of the traditions of Westminster that carries on is that you're able to employ your relatives, however, or at least one of them. You can employ your wife or husband or lover or son or whatever it might be. SIR IAN KENNEDY: Some of those don't apply. I don't think lover is within the category, but... ANDREW MARR: Well you can employ whoever you like, no matter whether or not they're qualified to do a job. SIR IAN KENNEDY: Well this is an area where we took a lot of advice and it goes both ways. There are some … there's one particularly egregious case which we all know about where two sons were employed and so on and so forth. But, on the other hand, there's lots of MPs up and down the land who we were told by the constituents and others this is a very good way of keeping contact with the constituency, the taxpayer got a lot of value for money out of the party who is related. We've come in and said you can do that, but with significant safeguards. You can only have one. It's not just a family member but anybody with a financial interest is called a connected party. You're only allowed to have one. The contract must be on the website. We must know what you're being paid, there must be a standard contract, no bonuses. All those sort of things which means that you get good value for money for the taxpayer. ANDREW MARR: But no contract, no training, no qualifications for the job as such. And then Speaker of the Commons, John Bercow, was on the other side of this argument and you've overridden him, haven't you? SIR IAN KENNEDY: Well we're not in the business of overriding people. We're in the business of … ANDREW MARR: You've trampled the Speaker. (laughs) SIR IAN KENNEDY: We've done what the Speaker and indeed parliament asked us to do - namely we behaved independently. ANDREW MARR: Yes. SIR IAN KENNEDY: We make our own mind up. We listened to the evidence and we've decided. ANDREW MARR: Yes. And you think that over the next few years, we will look back on the era of the expenses scandal as something fading into history; that there's no danger that we're going to get back to these terrible headlines which have done so much damage to politics? SIR IAN KENNEDY: I would very much hope that the system we're bringing in and then the way we implement it in public, to your gaze and everybody else, will begin to restore some confidence in democratic institutions, such that I hope we wouldn't have this conversation a year from now. ANDREW MARR: Alright. Sir Ian, thank you very much indeed for joining us this morning. SIR IAN KENNEDY: Not at all. Thank you. INTERVIEW ENDS
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