More Bang for Your Buck

(Pun intended)

An interesting story popped up on the beeb awhile ago noting that the MLAs in Stormont have already topped £720,000 in claimed expenses. Oddly enough, no one in the Irish blogosphere thought it worth commenting on. Since I was bored and my curiosity piqued at such a high amount being spent in such short time I crunched the numbers and figured out party averages.

So topping the list is the UUP with £8861 being claimed on average. Roy Beggs topped the UUP with £12,419 being claimed. Not one UUP MLA claimed under £6,000 in expenses with Billy Armstrong coming closest with just £6,284 being claimed. Sir Reg claimed £8,922. A word of advice to the UUP. When your leader gets elected in the third count, with the other member of the executive in the tenth you might want to try a little frugality in governance and personal exependitures. Remember, the money you spend today will be a reflection on the NI Conservatives when they take your place after you lose your MP next time around and finally throw in the towell.

So coming in second (becoming sort of a theme for them) is the SDLP with an average claim of £8,635 pounds per MLA. Mary Bradley (let her know how you appreciate her spending your hard earned money) topped the entire assembly by spending £18,757 which included remodelling her office. North Antrim's Declan O'Loan came in at the bottom with a mere £2,914 in expenditures. Party Leader Mark Durkan came in at a "respectable" £7,784 claimed.

Being that too many of the analysis out there disregards any other parties other than the "big 4" I thought it be only fair to include Alliance in this piece. So, what is there to say about Alliance? They cost on £7,863 per MLA and are soooo self righteous that even the fact that Anna Lo got elected can't make me really like them that much. David Ford for all of his huffing and puffing about blow in carpet baggers in South Antrim sucked £7,462 off of the public teat (the blow in carpet bagger claimed £3,962 by the way, but we'll get to them shortly).

Now for the fact that I'm uncomfortable with a political party being tied up with a church it looks like some the evangelical sense of frugality rubbed off on the DUP. Their 36 MLAs only cost £7,552 per member. Though the DUP can claim the lowest cost per MLA in the unionist family the Big Man himself claimed the most for any party leader with £9,828 in costs. Allan Bresland broke the mold entirely by not claiming any expenses at (fairplay to him).

And finally, in reference to the title and picture we come to Sinn Fein. Sinn Fein MLAs cost the taxpayer £2,241 per member at Stormont. 4 of them have claimed no expenses (Paul Butler, Daithi McKay, Caral Ni Chuilin, and Claire McGill). Not one MLA claimed over £6,000 with Raymond McCartney coming the closest with £5,539. Grizzly Adams claimed £881 in expenses thereby putting him at the bottom of the list for party leaders with ODFM Martin McGuinness beating that claiming only £650. Oddly there were seven MLAs with exactly the same amount spent (£1965.32). Kind of creepy if you ask me.

As far the unionist camp goes I don't think how much money was spent is an issue. The UUP need a reason to exist not curb expenses. Though "Decent people" who are "Simply British" probably wouldn't mind a their MLAs thinking twice before ringing up an expense.

For nationalists it should give pause. While the SDLP like to wind up the Shinners during elections about their recent reversals in regards to law and order and talk about how Bertie, Enda and McDowell think they're great people it doesn't really cut it when you crunch the numbers. Let me give a small example. Mary Bradley spent more money in two months than I made for all of last year. Admittedly I took a temporary pay cut to work for my current contractor but the point still stands. If the SDLP want to stop their electoral decline they need to get their heads out of their asses and realize a few things. One, don't run more candidates than you have quotas. Two, goofy picture stunts don't really convince people of your anti-

establishment credentials when they have the this place in their constituency.

It only serves to alienate in places where a very small "n" nationalism will suffice. Three, don't piss away other people's money like it's your own (see the rest of this post).