What do you expect on a rogue's salary?

MY CHAMPAGNE GLASS IS ALWAYS HALF FULL

- VIRGINIA BLACKBURN

POLITICIANS are to get a whopping pay rise: good. Not that the lot currently in government deserve it, of course, and the vast majority of them are only there because the Tories made such a mess of their own time in power. But the political class as a whole should be properly paid and the 5% rise they’re getting in April, to take a backbencher’s salary up to just under £100,000, is a step in the right direction. If anything they should be getting more.

And while I know £100,000 is a vast amount to thee and me — and the idea is to take it to £110,000 by the end of Parliament — the fact remains that if you are going to attract the best then you have to pay top whack.