MP's Expenses, an alternative view!

I have decided it is time for me to stick my head above the parapet on the issue of MP’s Expenses.
I will open my post with the words of Jesus in John 8:7 ‘When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, "If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."
OK so who is without sin on this issue? On the whole the MP’s have actually not broken the law just exploited the system, yes this is taking advantage of loopholes and making personal gain out of it but who doesn’t?
There are expectations and it seems clear that, in a small number of cases there have been very blatant and serious lawbreaking but on the whole it is either exploiting and taking advantage of the rules or minor misdemeanours.
Have you ever brought home a pen from the office? Ever used the office phone to make personal calls or used work time to surf the net fro that bargain holiday?
Have you ever been given gifts by suppliers at Christmas? Is this right? Is there a difference?

I know that in the industry I used to work, Transport within the Building industry, the giving and receiving of gifts was common place, and yes there were times that this influenced who received work/contracts or preferential treatment in one way or another.
Oh yes I hear you say that the difference is that it’s the Taxpayer being fiddled in this case well in many cases the taxpayer will have footed the bill for these fiddles as some of the projects were road building or infrastructure projects and even where it wasn’t the taxpayer footing the bill the additional cost would have been added on to the final price of, say, the house building project so individual members of the public will have been footing the bill.
AND let’s take it a stage further, what about tax declarations? Who, if they knew they could get away with it, would accidentally ‘forget’ to put some small item on their tax form or even inflate a tax deductible item or try claiming tax deduction on an item not used for work? I would hazard a guess that there are a good few tax forms each year that are economical with the truth, the fact is that the majority of the British public are at it, or would be if they thought they could get away with it.
Take another example, buying alcohol/cigarettes from France, now many of us exploit the tax laws to buy cheap booze or cigarettes from abroad? OK yes it’s legal but is it a loophole? And let’s twist the thumb turns a notch, what about buying for a mate? Well that is not legal, the law says that what you buy and import must be for your personal consumption so who doesn’t agree to buy some supplies for a friend whilst they are ‘over there’
And what about the black market economy? This is where people work for cash instead of providing an invoice and putting it through the books. Have you ever asked a tradesman to do a job and he has offered you a discount ‘for cash’? Have you agreed? Well you have been complicit in an act of fraud.
I am not wishing to generalise and accuse everyone in the UK of fiddling, most of us are generally law abiding citizens but even so we are prepared to exploit the rules even if we won’t consciously break the law, personally I try to keep within the law but I know that there have been times that I have strayed the wrong side of the law and got away from it! There are more times where I have taken advantage of the anomalies to reduce the amount of tax I have had to pay.
So what am I saying? Am I condoning the MP’s and their actions? No certainly not!
BUT don’t go too hard on the MP’s because after all they are human, just like you and me, yes they should be there to look after the interests of the people they are elected to serve but at the same time they are entitled to claim expenses and to have money coming in for the hours of work and energy they put into trying to run this country.
I have a feeling this subject just won’t go away but for one am extremely bored of it already and I would love to have the same kind of scrutiny be made of the reporters and media barrons who are making such a big deal of this situation because from what I know the media industry is among the worst for this sort of practice.
Therefore I come back to the words of Jesus ‘Let him who is without sin cast the first stone’
The passage goes on to say: ‘Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?" "No one, sir," she said. "Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin."

Notice he didn’t say she was without sin he just told her to mend her ways; I have a feeling that the MP’s will be much more scrupulous in their expenses from now on, at least for a few years! However, what about other industries? Will they continue in their ways or will they actually clean up their acts as well? My guess is they will only clean up their act if and when they are caught out.