IPSA's administration costs and the total cost of MPs' expenses

Request

  1. Details of your current annual administrative costs.

  2. Your forecast of the year by which it will begin to cost less than the preceding arrangements by the Fees Office.

  3. How you expect to achieve this, bearing in mind the high additional costs you incur for the rental of Portland House.

Costs of MPs expenses and allowances:

  1. The total cost of these in 2008.

  2. Their total cost in 2010.

  3. Their forecast cost in 2011.


Response

In response to the first part of your request – I can confirm that the IPSA budget for non capital expenditure in 2010-11 is £6.46m (including both set up costs and a core operational budget, which is £6.153m). This information is due to be published in the IPSA Annual Report and Accounts at the end of the financial year. This cost is already below the likely cost of the Fees Office once non direct costs have been taken into account. Further, a cost comparison with the Fees Office is not comparable with the operational costs of IPSA as an independent organisation. It does not include the costs of governance and the amount of management time that was incurred as it is unquantifiable. The Fees Office gained significant economies of scale from operating within the House Service.

The Portland House rental costs were lower than those for other available accommodation on the government estate, so are not a critical element driving IPSA costs. This is a different scheme for MP’s expenses, as such it has different requirements, it is however more effective and costs less overall.

I can advise that IPSA does not hold the costs of the previous MP’s expenses scheme, as this information is held by the House of Commons. I have attached a link to the House of Commons website, which will assist you in making a search for the information: http://www.parliament.uk/business/commons/. The cost of the current MPs’ scheme in 2010-11, which covers a period of 11 months of the year, is budgeted to be £148.638m. The estimated forecast for the cost for 2011-12 is still in the process of being calculated, but the figure is likely to be broadly similar to the cost for 2010-11.

Ref:
FOI2011-008
Disclosure:
28 January 2011
Categories:
IPSA - FINANCIAL
Exemptions Applied:
None