London cost of living

Barry, have you not seen his actual reasoning?

You seem to be focusing on salary and family life - what he is whinging about is the expense side of things; that his family cannot come and stay with him in London as he can't find a flat for 27k / year which can house them without going to the outer reaches of London. That is why I say it is nonsense and that is why I say he is massively out of touch. Regardless of a little distance to Westminster, as a minister, he would be chauffered anyway so he wouldn't have a commute to make.
 
Hamm said:
Barry, I have no issue with what you are saying re paying top politicians more. A salary of 500k could easily be justified for cabinet ministers.

However, it is his tone and use of language that irks here - he seems to think that 24k can not get you a 2-3 bed flat close to Westminster. It can. Unless you want to live in luxury. And that is the point. He is very, very out of touch. If he wanted to be with his family so much, why be an MP in the first place? Wasn't he ever aware that politicians spend a lot of time in Westminster, which is hardly a bus ride from Lincolnshire, is it?
Click to expand...

Fair enough. My reading of the extracts from the Radio 4 interview was that he wanted accommodation for his family close to work. So to Mrs BtB and the little Bulls, that would mean a 3 bed gaff with a garden.

Everybody lives by different standards. As things stand, in our eagerness to punish politicians in their wallets, we're heading back to the Victorian reality, in which only those with private means could afford to be in politics
 
EC1 said:
but he is in a job that tells others to manage on a lot less..thats why its a disgrace
Click to expand...

Politicians don't tell people what to live on. Why are people with money or the ability to earn money expected to worry about people less well off?
 
SlimChance said:
Politicians don't tell people what to live on. Why are people with money or the ability to earn money expected to worry about people less well off?
Click to expand...

I don't expect people with money to give a fig about anyone else..not sure where you get that from...i do expect a politician to set an example when his job involves legislation about levels that people can live on..politicians are involved in telling others what they can manage on...the budget just one instance..minimum wage levels another..benefit levels...loads of areas....i'd like to see him manage on the minimum wage..he's have something to cry about then

politicianing..like any other job..you know what the wages and allowances are before you apply...so why be surprised by anything re money later on

don't see why anyone would feel sorry for him..he's hardly suffering is he?

he picked the wrong job..tough stuff
 
Last edited:
EC1 said:
I don't expect people with money to give a fig about anyone else..not sure where you get that from...i do expect a politician to set an example when his job involves legislation about levels that people can live on..politicians are involved in telling others what they can manage on...the budget just one instance..minimum wage levels another..benefit levels...loads of areas....i'd like to see him manage on the minimum wage..he's have something to cry about then

politicianing..like any other job..you know what the wages and allowances are before you apply...so why be surprised by anything re money later on

don't see why anyone would feel sorry for him..he's hardly suffering is he?

he picked the wrong job..tough stuff
Click to expand...


I'd rather apply this logic to the septic bastards that run banks then politicians.
 
archie said:
We are talking about someone who forgot he earned £50k from a healthcare firm in 2012.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17104463
Click to expand...

:lol:

brilliant..and he's got people feeling sorry for him being strapped for cash

its very nice to have an extra 50k per annum..but you must have one hell of a lot of other cash when you actually forget you have it

it must be hard to make ends meet when you are hard up MP for sure..they should get more money really:)
 
Last edited:
dvds2000 said:
How much is property in the centre of London! I thought my flat was expensive at £450 a month, even though its 5 mins from the city centre on a bus, about a 25 minute walk, and a 5 minute walk from the beach lol
Click to expand...

Not my field of expertise, but I reckon you would struggle to get a 3-bed apartment for £2,400 hundred a month in the centre of London (though whether he needed it for 12 months is another thing).

£450 might get you a garden shed in Zone 4 for a month.
 
trackside528 said:
Not my field of expertise, but I reckon you would struggle to get a 3-bed apartment for £2,400 hundred a month in the centre of London (though whether he needed it for 12 months is another thing).

£450 might get you a garden shed in Zone 4 for a month.
Click to expand...

A very quick search on rightmove gave these at around the same price up here lol

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-47552969.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-45771109.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-13379175.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-30130761.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-45261733.html

www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-26620565.html

what sort of money would these types of properties rent for in London?

I don't get why people who have worked for years and years in London, when they retire or earlier in some cases, own a £1000000 house, mortgage paid off, don't move up North where they could pretty much buy any house they wanted and stiill have half a mill to live off cash in the bank.

I get that you would be moving away from family and friends, but its a few hours on train, about £90 first class return, or an hour flying for about £100 each way.
 
dvds2000 said:
A very quick search on rightmove gave these at around the same price up here lol

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-47552969.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-45771109.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-13379175.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-30130761.html

http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-45261733.html

www.rightmove.co.uk/property-to-rent/property-26620565.html

what sort of money would these types of properties rent for in London?

I don't get why people who have worked for years and years in London, when they retire or earlier in some cases, own a £1000000 house, mortgage paid off, don't move up North where they could pretty much buy any house they wanted and stiill have half a mill to live off cash in the bank.

I get that you would be moving away from family and friends, but its a few hours on train, about £90 first class return, or an hour flying for about £100 each way.
Click to expand...

My family were from the north and settled here in the 50s. All true the above but never in a million years would they have gone back.

Close friend of mine is from Sunderland. Had coffee with him yesterday and they did just the above a few years back. And we meets clients in London a few days a week using that very train

He's itching to move down here again. He loves London too much

Everyone's different but when you are used to life down here (and the weather) then it's a hard cultural shift. We don't all want to live off pies and have canon and ball as height of cultural entertainment

I was in Manchester last Friday...
 
clivex said:
My family were from the north and settled here in the 50s. All true the above but never in a million years would they have gone back.
Click to expand...

My mam was from London, well Southall to be exact, and travelled down every now and then to see friends, and she said she would never go back there, I asked her if she had the choice to make again would she stay there or come here , she said here without a doubt, apart from the weather she much prefered it up here, but its all just personal opinion really isn't it.

Close friend of mine is from Sunderland. Had coffee with him yesterday and they did just the above a few years back. And we meets clients in London a few days a week using that very train

He's itching to move down here again. He loves London too much
Click to expand...

I love London, for a week or so at a time, I don't think I would want to live there though, just because of the way my life is at the moment, I love being able to just wander down to the beach anytime I want, I'm 20 mins in the car away from countryside, 20 mins on the metro to Newcastle if I want a decent resturant (admittedly theres only a couple in Sunderland!) theres not much I can't get to or do within maybe a 30 minute journey that you can do in London.

Everyone's different but when you are used to life down here (and the weather) then it's a hard cultural shift. We don't all want to live off pies and have canon and ball as height of cultural entertainment

I was in Manchester last Friday...
Click to expand...

Haha yeah we do seem to have quite a few greggs up here, think theres 7 in Sunderland city centre alone.

A friends daughter was up from london for a week last week and she couldn't believe how many free playparks and stuff there was for the kids, how big they were, and how cheap the places that do charge were.

Theres plusses and minuses for everything though, shopping is rubbish, but then the internet sort of covers that loss, still not the same as walking into Harrods though. :D
 
clivex said:
My family were from the north and settled here in the 50s.

Everyone's different but when you are used to life down here (and the weather) then it's a hard cultural shift. We don't all want to live off pies and have canon and ball as height of cultural entertainment
Click to expand...

ffs Clive..best entertainers in the UK in the last 100 years..and you spell it wrong..how out of touch are you?

the north isn't made for soft southern pansies..with their soft southern...oooh i can't manage on 200k a year..i just can't ...MPs..and all their other soft nesh ways

i hope you never have to fight northerners in a North South civil war...you'd get bull whipped
 
From that rabid left-wing organ, the Daily Mail:
"Mr Simmonds has claimed more than £1.7million in expenses since becoming a Tory MP in 2001. He also made more than £500,000 by selling a house on which the taxpayer paid the mortgage interest.

Six months after becoming an MP, he bought a five-bedroom house in Putney, south-west London, for £650,000. From 2001 to 2009, he claimed £2,000 a month for the mortgage interest.

When expenses rules were changed to ban such claims, he sold the property in January 2011 for £1,187,500 – £537,000 more than he paid. The same month, he used the massive profit to help buy the 17th-century property in his constituency for £900,000.

Set in 15 acres, it has formal gardens, a garage for three cars, a tennis court and a heated outdoor swimming pool."

All perfectly legal but bearing all the hallmarks of long term retirement planning without the necessity of putting in 30 or 40 years graft.
 
archie said:
From that rabid left-wing organ, the Daily Mail:
"Mr Simmonds has claimed more than £1.7million in expenses since becoming a Tory MP in 2001. He also made more than £500,000 by selling a house on which the taxpayer paid the mortgage interest.

Six months after becoming an MP, he bought a five-bedroom house in Putney, south-west London, for £650,000. From 2001 to 2009, he claimed £2,000 a month for the mortgage interest.

When expenses rules were changed to ban such claims, he sold the property in January 2011 for £1,187,500 – £537,000 more than he paid. The same month, he used the massive profit to help buy the 17th-century property in his constituency for £900,000.

Set in 15 acres, it has formal gardens, a garage for three cars, a tennis court and a heated outdoor swimming pool."

All perfectly legal but bearing all the hallmarks of long term retirement planning without the necessity of putting in 30 or 40 years graft.
Click to expand...

quaity Archie..quality:cool:

Clive..i bet you got a Canon camera;)
 
Back
Top