Details of staff employed by Yvette Cooper MP

IPSA holds the information that you request.

Please find attached, at Annex A, the job titles and tenures of all individuals employed by Yvette Cooper MP since 2010. This includes full-time, part-time and temporary members of staff, and encompasses staff based both in London as well as in the constituency.

This information reflects the total number of individuals employed since 2010, and does not indicate the number of individuals actively working for the MP at any one point in time. Further, in some instances, individuals may have changed job titles. Where this is the case, we have only included their most recent job title and contracted hours.

The specific salaries of junior staff members employed by Members of Parliament are personal information. We do not believe there is a reasonable expectation that such information would be made freely available, and disclosure would therefore contravene the Data Protection Principles specified in the Data Protection Act. As such, we are withholding this information under Section 40 of the FOIA.

Section 40(2) provides that personal information about third parties is exempt information if one of the conditions set out in section 40(3) is satisfied. Under the FOI Act disclosure of this information would breach the fair processing principle (Principle 1) of the Data Protection Act 1998 (DPA), where it would be unfair to those persons or is confidential. For further information, you may wish to visit the UK Legislation website.

However, for each job title we publish the salary bands on our website. You can find this information via the following link: http://parliamentarystandards.org.uk/IPSAMPs/HR%20Payroll%20and%20Interns%20libruary/A%20-%20Employing%20Staff/MPs%20staff%20paybands%202015-16.pdf

Under the MPs’ Scheme of Business Costs and Expenses (‘the Scheme’), Staffing Expenditure may be claimed to meet the costs of incidental expenses incurred by volunteers. MPs who engage volunteers must submit a signed volunteer agreement with the volunteer to IPSA before any claims for incidental expenses will be made. The signed agreement must comply with the model volunteer arrangement published by IPSA. Incidental expenses are limited to reasonable travel and food, and non-alcoholic drinks. Since 2010, three volunteers have been registered with IPSA by Yvette Cooper MP.

Annex A

NOTES

† IPSA does not hold the contracts of a small number of individuals who remained on House of Commons contracts following IPSA’s creation in 2010, but left the MP’s employment before transferring to an IPSA contract. As such, we do not hold this information.

*This information reflects the total number of individuals employed since 2010, and does not indicate the number of individuals actively working for the MP at any one point in time. For example, were a ‘Caseworker’ to leave employment, and a replacement ‘Caseworker’ subsequently employed, this would result in ‘Caseworker’ being included in the list twice, but does not necessarily mean two Caseworkers were employed at the same time.

**In some instances, individuals may have changed job titles. Where this is the case, we have only included their most recent job title and contracted hours.