Submitted on Saturday 24th October 2020
Rejected on Friday 30th October 2020
Current status: Rejected
Rejection code: duplicate (see below for details)
Charge MPs market rate for food purchased in the House of Commons and Lords
End subsidised meals for MPs when attending parliament, as clearly if the people can’t afford it for hungry children then they can’t afford it for civil servants on a full time wage
Over 500,000 people at the time of writing have signed a change.org petition to end subsidised meals for MPs attending parliament, as hungry children in the UK will not be afforded the same right.
As the vote to not extend free school meals for children during the holidays was dismissed, the only reason for this can presumably be that the public purse cannot afford it. If that is the case, surely we can no longer afford to pay for the lunches of those earning almost triple the median UK wage
You can't sign this petition because it was rejected. But you can still comment on it here at Repetition.me!
The Government e-Petitions Team gave the following reason:
There's already a petition about this issue. We cannot accept a new petition when we already have one about a very similar issue.
You are more likely to get action on this issue if you sign and share a single petition.
We have published the following petition, which you might like to sign:
Increase food and drink prices for MPs in House of Commons catering venues: petition.parliament.uk/petitions/555565
The House of Commons Catering service does not provide a subsidised service in the commercial sense of the word. Some venues make a profit, while in other venues the cost of providing the service does exceed the income received in sales due to the irregular hours and unpredictability of parliamentary business. The House of Commons publishes details of the cost of House of Commons catering services: www.parliament.uk/site-information/foi/transparency-publications/hoc-transparency-publications/catering-services/transparency-reporting-catering-services/
Customers of the House of Commons Catering Services include some of the 650 MPs but also around 14,500 other pass-holders, many of whom are staff on lower wages that work irregular hours. In addition, members of the public and non pass holding visitors to Parliament also have access to these services. The irregular hours and the unpredictability of Parliamentary business contribute to increasing the net cost of providing a catering service. To offset this many of the restaurants, dining room facilities and their staff, are used to cater for private events at times when they are not required by the House. This is one of a number of measures used to reduce costs.
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