Columns

They came to your door in the guise of beggars imploring for alms; beseeching you, in the bowels of Demos, to fill their empty bowls with your ballots. Knelt at your feet and vowed to be your humble servants. They beat their breasts and swore to dedicate their lives to serving you. The altruistic joy of serving, they said, would more than recompense their pecuniary sacrifice. Somewhere over the rainbow, they said again and again, is the fabled pot of gold which is yours by divine right to enjoy. Give us your votes and we will bring it and lay it at your door. Then, having fondled your children with a sudden ruffling of their hair, they left with your votes assured.

They haven’t been seen since.
And no wonder. For they who came as your humble servants are now the haughty masters of the state. And having found Thusitha Heaven on earth, they are far too busy milking the cornucopia dry and have neither the time nor the inclination to ponder over something as insignificant as filling your larder. But no matter. Let them enjoy the spoils of election triumphs, let them drink their fill from the horn of plenty for perhaps the twenty million people of Lanka owe them a collective samsaric debt and this is the means through which karma has determined they should pay it back. Else, what other reason can there possibly be that makes the masses suffer their every profligacy at the public expense without even a whimper of protest.

Whist the people have had to scrape the barrel to eke out an existence, these elite tribe holding renewable five-year membership cards to enjoy the pomp of power and the perks of privilege, have through the years continued to serve themselves well with the spoon meant to serve the masses. Whilst the people have had at times been forced to stage street protests for a rise in wages, whilst they have paid with their lives merely for asking a glass of clean water to drink as happened during the last regime, these pampered jades of Lanka have continued to fatten their bounty without a blush.

It is a practice that has been going on for the past 38 years. It all begins with the premise that the honourable members are the representatives of the sovereign people of Lanka and as such they must be provided with adequate resources to discharge their duty. True. But none asks whether the present resources are not more than adequate for the work they do. None demands to know whether the people get value for money for the service the members say they provide. Successive years of the nation’s tolerance of their representatives’ avaricious bent to demand more and more financial benefits for themselves and have them granted by a group of their own, has let greed become their second nature and self interest their paramount motivation. Hardly surprising, is it, when they have been empowered by the people to wield the wand to make their wishes for their own betterment come true.

Consider the pay packet of each MP. Each of our honourable representatives is paid a monthly salary of Rs 54,285. Plus we give them a fuel allowance of Rs 30,000. Plus a phone allowance of Rs 2,000. Thus we pay every member Rs. 86,285 every month tax free. The total annual bill for the luxury of being represented by 225 members amounts to Rs. 232 million per year.

This is only for starters. They are also allowed to employ a private secretary, an office assistant and a driver. Their salaries, presumably a minimum of Rs 30,000 corresponding to the minimum wage of a government servant, are paid by the Government. This amounts to Rs 90,000 per month. Whilst no doubt it serves a useful function in bringing down the unemployment figures by 675 being the total number employed by 225 members it also costs the government or the people of Lanka, a further Rs. 243 million. Thus the basic total costs per year amount to Rs. 475 million. And all this is tax free.

Then of course there is the duty free permit valued at around Rs. 5 million for members to import any vehicle of their choice. When the scheme was first introduced over 30 years ago, the member could not sell the vehicle to anyone else for a number of years. During the previous regime this limitation was lifted. Now they are free to sell the vehicle or the permit the moment they receive it. Today when any candidate wins at the election or is appointed a MP on the national list, he or she is instantly rewarded with a cash prize of Rs. 5 million courtesy of the public. Many sell the permit to outsiders.

When Finance Minister Karunanayake in his budget speech stated that all these permits will be abolished henceforth, the uproar by the MPs was only to be expected. This was a direct assault on their embedded perks and soon the Finance Minister had to surrender and make an exception. The MPs would be exempted. They would continue to be the sacred cows. Whilst duty free permits would no longer be given to those, including doctors and civil servants, who had enjoyed the privilege earlier, parliamentary members would continue to be entitled to this Rs. 5 million duty free bonanza.

However, with the doctors union, the GMOA, staging a fight back even to the extent of putting the lives of innocent patients at risk with a total strike two weeks ago, the status quo was restored. Now, as the cabinet spokesman Minister Dr. Rajitha Senaratne stated this week, doctors and others would be entitled to a duty free permit every ten years. And the MPs? Well, since — as Minister Senaratne explained — they required cars to visit their electorates and serve the people, they would be entitled to a permit every five years.

The hidden cost of duty free permits issued to MPs is Rs. 1,125 million. That is the duty the Treasury would have received during a period of five years had it not been for the Rs. 5m duty waiver on 225 luxury vehicles. Thus the cost per year is Rs 225m.
Furthermore the MPs are also given free loans by state banks to finance the cost of the vehicle. The loss incurred to state banks as a result of money given free of interest is another hidden cost. Somewhere down the line someone has to pay the interest. The price of money is the interest. There is no such thing called free money and the lender of free loans has to bear the interest component. In this case the state banks.

They are also given round the clock police protection. The cost of providing this service 24/7 is also an invisible cost. But police cover alone has not been considered adequate. MPs have been given the opportunity to add to the gun culture. Over sixty MPs, including two women MPs, availed themselves of the Defence Ministry offer to issue free guns for their personal use. On Vap Poya day in October they were given arms training at the Kotelawala Defence Academy at Kandawala on the fine skill of shooting to kill. Thirty five of these wannabe Bonds, not satisfied with the revolvers issued to them, insisted that they too be given the same 9mm Luger pistols issued to ministers.

As far as their working hours are concerned, it is the application of laissez-faire in a work environment, where the employer does not have many laws and rules regulating the discipline of the workers. Parliament sits for only two weeks a month. One week it sits, the following week it’s on leave. Monday is a holiday. Only during budget month does it sit beyond its usual schedule. Otherwise on average it sits eight times a month. MPs are paid Rs. 500 if they attend parliament.

But there is no clocking in or clocking out. MPs can and go as they please or not come at all. They can be absent from Parliament at a stretch for three months and thereafter obtain parliament sanction of their action which is normally extended by the members in a show of unison and for its reciprocal benefits. The only check on MPs is the chief whip of the party who is entrusted with the task of ensuring that party members turn up to vote especially if a vital bill is to be taken. Even if the MPS do attend Parliament, a great part of their time is spent in the parliament canteen which offers subsidised scrumptious meals for the lucky representatives of the people.

And if they can endure the relaxed bohemian life style in an environment caressed by the Diyawanna Oya breeze on the outside and a cool climate regulated by an air conditioning system within for a period of five years they will receive a pension for the rest of their lives, even if they have not spoken a word in parliament — pensions which those members of the public employed as government servants, have to work a lifetime to receive.

One would have thought that all these perks and privileges and the freedom to speak with absolute privilege in the well of Parliament, to utter the crudest filth in that sacrosanct chamber, to cast the vilest calumny, to hurl the most scurrilous slander against any member of the public with impunity buffeted by blanket immunity would have sated both their gluttonous material wants and gratified their egoistic al urgings. Apparently not.

So what does one give this pampered lot who already have everything and more they could ever want, for Christmas? The Government has come with a novel one. Last Saturday, Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe stated that the Government now had plans to increase the staff of individual MPs from three to eighteen assistants, their salaries to be paid for by the state. Announcing this proposal at the committee stage debate on the budget, he told Parliament that the new move was to ‘strengthen the parliamentary system”. But will it? And what will the extra cadre which will do nothing more than further bloat the already inflated egos of MPs, cost the Treasury?

Already MPs receive a hefty package deal which the nation can ill afford. As stated above, their present package comprising their salaries and their allowances amount to Rs. 232 m per year. The cost of providing them with three assistants each to help them in their tasks cost the state a further Rs. 243 m. The total annual cost is thus Rs. 475 million. This is without the police protection offered and the costs of foreign trips whenever they arise. This is also without taking into account the revenue lost by the grant of duty free permits which amount to approximately Rs. 245 million per year. If this loss to the Treasury which is a direct financial benefit to the MPs is added to the sum required to maintain the lifestyle of these politicians it will, by conservative estimates, amount to approximately Rs. 725million. This is without the invisible interest cost on free loans borne by state banks. At approximately Rs. 10 million per vehicle, the entire loan requirement would be Rs. 2,250,000,000 with the interest component amounting, at 10 percent minimum interest rate, to minimum Rs. 250 m a year.

Unless it was offered as bait for dissenting MPs to toe the Government line and vote for the budget, the Government’s new plan will cost the state a further Rs. 450,000 per month per MP. Or a total bill of Rs. 1215 million for all MPs per year. Add the present sum of Rs. 725 m to this new figure of Rs. 1215 million and you get the grand total of Rs. 1940 million per year. The question is, are they worth this money? Does the service they provide give value for money, nearly two billion bucks? And what are the eligibility requirements for this top job?

No educational qualifications are required for the job. Not even a simple pass at the O’ levels. No formal training in any vocation either. No experience in any field of human activity needs be shown. The only ability one can discern is their tendency towards prolix: to speak in full flood akin to the Victoria reservoir with all sluice gates open.

But does this ability alone qualify them to be the right sort of know-alls to decide what is best for us, to determine what is right for our economic well being, to make judicious laws to regulate every sphere of our activities, to be the guardians of our morals, and go beyond the brief we have entrusted to them whenever it takes their fancy. Alas, these are the inevitable short comings of any democratic system of government to which no sure fire answer is instantly available. Perhaps for starters, the time has come to consider the possibility of taking the power of politicians to award themselves pay and allowance rises away from them.

The possibility of appointing an independent committee compromising retired ministry secretaries tasked with the duty of recommending future pay and allowance increases to MPs based on what is actually required for an MP to enjoy a dignified less ostentatious life style more in keeping with the economic lives of the people should be considered. But the secretaries should be retired secretaries to prevent the possibility of the exercise ending as a “you raise my salary and I’ll raise yours” sham. But it should be addressed as soon as possible.

Especially when, even before the new plan has come to fruition, another Minister, the national list MP Mahinda Samarasinghe has already raised the call for another increase in MPs salaries on the basis it was vital to attract “high calibre people”, echoing the perennial excuse trotted out by so many to justify a bigger pay packet for themselves.