Should MSPs be paid the same as nurses? Petition calls for politicians salaries to be cut in half
Tomas Fyrdrych, who is behind the petition, suggests the MSP salary should be cut in half to £40,000 - around what a band five NHS nurse could be expected to make.
Currently each MSP in the Scottish Parliament is paid a starting salary of £77,711 per year - but is it time that salary was cut in half?
This is the subject of a petition to the Scottish Parliament calling for MSP’s salaries to be reviewed to make them more representative.
Tomas Fyrdrych, who is behind the call, suggests the MSP salary should be cut in half to £40,000 - around what a band five NHS nurse could be expected to make.
He thinks MSP’s on high salaries cannot truly understand the real-life impacts of things like the cost-of-living crisis.
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Mr Frydrych said: “Nurses earn half of what an MSP is paid, despite it being an unskilled job that requires no qualifications or experience, and as we have discovered this year, you don’t even need to be a permanent resident in the UK.
“Whereas if you are a nurse you at least need a nursing degree, so even that is a basic justification for them earning a bigger salary.
“This is not about putting politicians on minimum wage, because they should be paid for the work they do, but it is very difficult to see why a nurse’s salary is not enough for them.
“It is a very cushy job with no hours of work and you don’t even have to turn up to vote.
“If folk in Scotland think £80,000 a year is appropriate because they are doing a good job and serving us well, then fine - but I suspect many people like me think it is too much.”
Mr Frydrych added: “It’s been on my mind for some time.
“MSPs are paid very, very highly - they are in the top seven per cent of Scottish earners, which is hugely unrepresentative of the people of Scotland.
“People with highly unrepresentative salaries cannot understand the lived reality of people who don’t.
“I know from my own experience when I was fortunate enough a few years back that making a significant amount of money means you have less perspective.
“If you are making almost £80,000 a year, then £5 for a coffee and £10 for a sandwich is nothing, you don’t think twice about it. But if you are on minimum wage, everything changes.”
Mr Frydrych, who is originally from Czechia but now lives in Falkirk, also believes the recent Peter Murrell court case is another example of why MSPs are paid too much money.
He said: “I’m minded about Nicola Sturgeon who said she couldn’t see the pattern of her husband’s fraud because they were both on high salaries.
“The reality is people on high incomes leads to a very unrepresentative democracy - putting parliamentarians on a typical Scottish income means they will have an interest in the lived reality of the people of Scotland.
Up until 2016, MSPs’ salaries were calculated as being 87.5 per cent of MPs’ salaries - since then it has not been tied to Westminster salaries after MPs’ pay increased by 9 per cent. MSP salaries are now linked to public sector pay rises in Scotland.
All political parties have been approached for comment.
The Scottish Greens said they will not comment, but each Green MSP gives 20 per cent of their salary to the party. Reform UK said it will not be commenting.
The Scottish Conservatives said: “Scottish Conservative and Unionist MSPs stand up for Scotland’s hard-working taxpayers while standing up to the wasteful SNP government.”
The Scottish Parliament’s public petitions committee will consider Mr Frydrych’s petition in due course.
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