Tory minister on 100k wants free intern


11:30 am - June 12th 2012

by Chris Barnyard    


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David Gauke is a minister at the Treasury and MP for South West Hertfordshire.

He also earns around £100,000 a year in salary, plus expenses for staff and his mortgage payments.

But he doesn’t like paying interns any money.

A job advertised a few weeks ago said he was looking to recruit a ‘voluntary intern’ for his constituency office in Rickmansworth for a minimum of 6 months.

No salary would be paid, only “reasonable” travel expenses.

David Hencke points out how much he earns from the taxpayer:

He only has an income of just over £100,000 a year – with his £98,750 salary and he claims from the taxpayer a London living allowance of £3379.15 a year (desperate problem for MPs having to pay for higher London prices except for the taxpayer paid subsidised food in Parliament)

Funnily enough his expenses paid by the taypayer for the last financial year come to almost the same £98,680.93 as his salary including some £78,000 on staff (presumably in Westminster rather than Rickmansworth), another £9000+ on accommodation and £10,000+ on administration. So the poor man only has £200,000 going through his accounts.

Then there are his two homes to maintain by Tory standards well below any mansion tax level. But poor man,since this terrible crackdown on Mps expenses he has had to lose such a lot. He did grab £15,000 a year in mortgage interest payments ,a quarterly £687 maintenance charge and car parking fees- all paid from the taxpayer on his Westminster Bridge Road apartment in London which he paid £285,000 in 2007. Mind you he has had a £30,000 rise in his income since the coalition came to power.

Despite his wealth, income and taxpayer-funded expenses, he did not want to pay a penny towards the salary of an intern.

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About the author
Chris is a regular contributor to Liberal Conspiracy. He is an aspiring journalist and reports stories for LC.
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Reader comments


1. Barrie J

Why would we expect him to, he’s a Tory and a politician, operating in a neoliberal environment.
Any of his constituents should be grateful that the Tories have not introduced ‘droit de seigneur’.

2. Don Harrison

I feel so sorry for the man, that his £100k means that he can not afford to pay his staff.

3. Mr Grunt

This is the Conservatives vision of The Big Society !

Why not abolish wages for the lower classes altogether and just pay their expenses. Soon this country will not have an army of industrial workers, it will have an army of voluntary labour !

4. Dissident

Mr Grunt

It will be far from voluntary, hope you enjoy the ladle of cabbage cores, fish heads and rotten barley broth working 40-80 hrs a week will get you….

The only thing scum rising to the top learn from history, is how to treat people like numbers, it goes without saying though, his own family will be exempt (in theory)


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