Within the Houses of Parliament there are 19 restaurants and cafeterias, eight bars and one coffee bar. They are all subsidised and paid for by the taxpayer.
Speaking for the 322 MPs who voted against giving free meals for hungry kids Tory MP, Brendan Clarke-Smith, said “we do not believe in nationalising children.” Tory Minister Paul Scully bizarrely chipped in with, “children have been going hungry for years”.
After his rib-eye steak Brendan might well settle down in one of the eight bars for his whisky (£3.25) and cappuccino (£1.44) and contemplate putting in for some expenses. The 2019 UK expense list showed that more than 130,000 items were claimed by MPs that year, making a total of £22.5 million worth of expenses. That figure is a little more than the hungry children programme cost for the one-week half-term break.
Here is a sample of the items claimed from you and me that year: extra-wooly underwear, pet insurance, food for a ‘guard dog’ (a Shi Tzu), Armani jeans, regular ‘bonding sessions', a garden shed, caravan rental, betting slips, a chimney sweep, fencing for a paddock, a septic tank and a ‘drain doctor’.
I can’t go on as I feel sick and what please is a drain doctor?
