Member News
By John Brooks - 2nd March 2010
Parliamentary researcher John Brooks argues that plans to covert a Commons bar into a nursery shows a lack of consideration for the public purse and for many of the most hard-working and often unpaid people in Parliament.
When Tory MP Christopher Chope’s email graced the inbox of every member of MP’s staff last Friday, there were sure to be mixed reactions across the parliamentary estate.
The email asked workers to sign a petition opposing the decision to turn a parliamentary bar into a crèche for kiddies.
My own first thought was that when the country is busy worrying about threats to jobs, policing, healthcare etc. this safe-seat Tory hasn’t got anything better to do than make sure he has some post-election variety in where he chooses to drink his celebratory pint of port. This was just another sad symbol of the so-called ‘Westminster bubble’.
But look more carefully: Bellamy’s Bar is little more than a year old; it cost £480,000 to be refurbished in the first place and now will again be refurbished to the tune of more than £500,000. Get your calculator in gear and you’ll find a figure of around £1m worth of public money.
The argument against the decision goes further, to quote Chope’s email: "Bellamy’s Bar is the only one available, without membership, for staff on the House of Commons Estate and…other locations are available now".
In other words, why get rid of one treasured staff facility for another, when you can have both? It is hard to answer this question when you learn that there are several empty premises across Parliament, and a number of other useless areas that would be more suitably replaced – one of which being the Common’s shooting gallery.
The dispute isn’t over whether or not Parliament needs a crèche – as John Bercow said back in December of last year, "Our Parliament has sadly been behind the times in providing practical support to parents who work here".
The problem, it seems, is that our Parliament is also sadly behind the times in its lack of consideration for public money – is it okay to waste £480,000 on a bar with an 18 month lifespan?
Parliament is also behind the times in its attitude towards its hundreds of often unpaid interns and underpaid staff – why take away a valuable meeting place from these people when you can take an unused space?
Although Bellamy’s Bar is described by one columnist as ‘one of the favourite watering holes for backbenchers in Parliament’, I think they will find that the ratio of staff to MP is about 50:1.
And the cost of the crèche facility will mean that it is not financially viable for most members of staff – I am told around £1200 per month - which would swallow the entire income of many workers across Parliament.
There is a wealth of good reason to be suspicious of the crèche decision, and this explains why Chope delivered his petition in the House of Commons last night with more than 400 signatures.
This decision by the parliamentary authorities doesn’t show "modernisation of the House", it shows a lack of consideration for the public purse and for many of the most hard-working and often unpaid people in Parliament.
Dods Parliamentary Communications Ltd