SWINDON’S MPs slammed recommendations made by the Commons expenses watchdog to increase theirs and other members’ pay from 2015.

The IPSA, the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority, said yesterday that MPs’ pay should be increased by £6,000 to £74,000 a year, but this rise should be tempered by cuts to perks such as meal allowances and taxis.

Justin Tomlinson, MP for North Swindon, is concerned the plans, which have been opened to public consultation until October 20, are out of line with the current economic problems in the UK.

“Politics should be getting cheaper not more expensive. These proposals are out of step with the real world,” he said.

“I do welcome some of the proposals, for example, the tightening up of expenses. Removing the allowance to claim food, something I have never claimed a penny for, is something I would support.

“I would be very surprised that, after the consultation period, IPSA does not make dramatic changes.”

Whatever the outcome of the consultation, MPs cannot block any decision IPSA makes because they handed pay control to the independent body in the wake of the 2009 expenses scandal.

Robert Buckland, MP for South Swindon, said: “I don’t agree that the cost of politics should go up. It should go down. Nor do I think that MPs’ pay should be going up while public sector pay is, rightly, being constrained.

“IPSA is consulting on its proposals, which it will review after the next election as it is obliged to do by statute. It is independent,but Government will repeat our view on the need for restraint.”

The IPSA proposals include: l A salary of £74,000 in 2015, with rises after that linked to average earnings across the whole economy l A new pension on a par with other parts of the public sector, moving from a final-salary to career-average scheme, which IPSA says will save taxpayers £2.5m a year l Scrapping “resettlement payments”, which were worth up to £64,766 for long-serving MPs still of a working age, the first £30,000 of which was tax-free. and introducing “more modest” redundancy packages, available only to those who contest their seat and lose.

l A “tighter regime” of business costs and expenses including an end to the £15 a night meal allowance.