LETTERS MPs' greed
Sir: With allowances, an MP has an income equivalent to not less than an untaxed £30,000 a year. If he employs members of his family in secretarial or research posts he can add another £10,000 — £15,000. To Mr Hastings (Diary, 25 July) and his friends this is 'peanuts' (his word) and they refuse to stand for election. That is prob- ably our gain.
But this is not the underlying problem.
Although jocose about it, he admits to sharp disagreement with the leader written by Bill Deedes which advocated no in- crease in MPs' pay. The difference be- tween them is not one of opinion on agreed fundamentals, however, but symptomatic of an ever widening gap in apprehension.
Bill Deedes, and he has proved it in his life, sees service as a means of service. We have, fortunately, had many like him in the past. Mr Hastings sees service as a means towards a 'decent lifestyle' (his words) unreachable by 99 per cent of his fellow citizens.
The law is being driven back by a media, including the newspaper edited by Mr Hastings, almost united in support of a man who has sold his word, and the security of his country, for personal gain.
As on the question of MPs' pay, Bill Deedes sees betrayal, Mr Hastings, in his newspaper, ridicules the law for refusing to accept defeat in its efforts to prevent future betrayal of our country's security for money.
We have come a long way indeed.
A. R. Wythe
5 Hurrell's Row, Harston, Cambridge
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