Opinion of the Committee
123. In addition to running offices at the House
of Commons to support their work in Parliament, the costs of which
are borne by the House administration, the vast majority of MPs
also now operate and staff professional offices in their constituencies.
With the ever-growing workload and the increasing expectations
of constituents, these local offices have grown in importance
as the first point of contact for many members of the public.
124. Typically the constituency office will handle
much of an MP's casework and correspondence on behalf of individuals,
the MP's constituency diary, local communications, media relations
and local issue management; it will organise and often accommodate
MP advice surgeries, host local meetings, and even when the MP
is away in London in the week local staff will receive and help
members of the public in person and on the phone. House of Commons
offices, by contrast, typically handle MPs' research and the preparation
of their parliamentary and committee work and their involvement
in national and international issues. When an MP only has an office
at Westminster, this covers both constituency-related work including
casework and preparation for parliamentary business and committees
etc.
125. In its 2001 report the Senior Salaries Review
Body recognised more explicitly than previously the need for MPs
to resource a constituency office and recommended a reshaping
of allowances to that end. Despite that, the quality and suitability
of accommodation being used as constituency offices varies enormously,
depending in no small part on the commercial property market in
the particular constituency. MPs with seats in and near London,
and in other cities or economic hotspots, need to expend much
or all of their office allowances just to cover rent and business
rates. The support of the MP's local political party, for example
offering space in its offices, is sometimes necessary just to
make a constituency office possible. In other areas, by contrast,
the IEP budget goes much further.
126. In the Hay survey of Members, we were told
that the IEP is the allowance which MPs find to be the most under
strain, and we note that 45% transfer money into the IEP from
their Staffing Budget to meet necessary costs. 78% rent constituency
offices, either commercially or through their local party—55%
are tied in some way to party-affiliated bodies. Twenty two per
cent of Members do not claim for a constituency office—either
using their home or having no constituency office, whether from
choice or because they cannot afford one.
127. The 2007 SSRB report recognised the anomaly
of MPs facing widely differing rental costs from a "one size
fits all" allowance, and recommended as a solution that constituency
offices should in future be procured directly by the House at
their actual cost to a common standard of accommodation. We welcome
and endorse this proposal. We note their recommendation that 800
square feet is an appropriate size and believe they have got this
about right, but we do not believe this could be rigidly applied
as a maximum—a judgement would have to be made depending
on what might be available in the particular place at the particular
time an office is needed. To this end we propose that the House
should retain the services of surveyors to assist with the process
of office procurement, rather than leaving it to MPs to find their
own surveyors.
128. We found considerable support among Members
for constituency offices to be funded centrally, though some would
prefer to retain the option of renting their own office and claiming
that against the IEP. Our view is that it would make sense to
run the two systems alongside each other for the foreseeable future,
not least because trying to migrate all Members onto the central
procurement system at the same time would be impractical. As leases
come to an end, or new offices need to be found, or new Members
are elected, it would make sense to use the new procurement model.
129. Currently the average cost of renting an
office is £5,773 per annum. Renting commercially is around
£1,000 pa more expensive than renting from the local party,
but this is not necessarily always comparing like for like. The
SSRB suggested reducing the IEP by £5,000 and then paying
the actual costs of renting the office. This seems to us to be
well-judged, though there is also a case for also paying the business
rates centrally where the rent is paid centrally.
130. We recommend acceptance of the SSRB proposal
that constituency office lease or rental should be met in full
by the House recognising that in some constituencies office costs
are higher than can reasonably be met out of the current Incidental
Expenses Provision; that this should be limited in size and standard
under detailed criteria to be drawn up by an independent chartered
surveyor; that the scheme be run under the guidance of such a
surveyor employed by the House; that the scheme be phased-in over
a period of time; and that Members who choose not to make use
of the new scheme can continue to claim for constituency office
costs under the Incidental Expenses Provision or its successor.
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