Keeping track of expenses

Mark Mardell|11:38 UK time, Thursday, 23 April 2009

STRASBOURG: Today MEPs debate and vote on a plan that has infuriated many MEPs, not to mention those generally critical of the EU. It would mean plugging a potential fall in MEPs' pensions caused by the financial crisis. MEPs voting in Strasbourg

Meanwhile the general row over expenses and the cost of MEPs rumbles on. I will be doing a report on it on the BBC News at Ten tonight.

One Swedish MEP says he gets so much money in expenses that he feels he has to give thousands of pounds away to charity. Jens Holm told me that he gives around 50,000 euros a year away to charity because he thinks that MEPs are showered with money and it is inexcusable.

He says as an example that he gets 2,000 euros for travelling between Stockholm and Brussels, even though he can't find a ticket that expensive. It's not however true that MEPs get first-class travel expenses. What they get is called "YY economy" tickets, but these may be higher than many fares that are available. After the election they should only get what they have actually paid for, on production of a receipt.

The Labour MEP Richard Corbett , an example of a conscientious and hard-working politician if there ever was one, argues that all the allowances work out pretty much the same as Westminster MPs'. Allowances for office expenses are higher for example, but MEPs don't get free postage and computers, staff allowances are higher but British MPs don't have to pay Belgium's swingeing national insurance and pension contributions.

There is a broader question here, and one it is deeply unfashionable to ask. If MEPs and MPs are on a wage and expenses that are seen by the public and press as appropriately modest, how are talented and even experienced people to be persuaded to do the job? No doubt some will do so out of a sense of public duty, but is it a good thing if only the independently wealthy can be politicians and live the lifestyle expected by, say, a senior executive in industry?