MPs' pay to go up 11% to £74,000 by 2015

MPs’ salaries are set to increase by 11% in 2015 to £74,000, the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) has said.

From May 2015, MPs’ salaries would be in line with average earnings while pension schemes will be scrapped.

IPSA insists that the increase to salaries will not cost the taxpayer “a penny more”.

IPSA’s chairman, Sir Ian Kennedy, said: “For the first time, MPs’ pay and pensions will be set independently, and away from political deals cooked up in Westminster.

“We are sweeping away the out-of-date and overly generous benefits, and introducing a one-off uplift in pay. Crucially, thereafter MPs’ pay will be linked to everyone else’s.

“We have designed these reforms so they do not cost the taxpayer a penny more. When taken with the tens of millions we have saved by reforming the business cost and expenses regime, we have saved the taxpayer over £35m with the changes we have introduced since 2010.”

David Cameron opposed the rise saying it was “unacceptable” for MPs to accept a rise at a time when public sector pay rises are capped at 1%.

In an interview with BBC Radio West Midlands, he said: “We need a process and an outcome in which the public can be confident and a one-off large pay increase at a time when you’ve got pay restraint across the public sector. I think that is not on.”

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