I find the current media frenzy over expenses and the Commons pretty alarming, not to mention lacking in much real interest in solutions.

On the one hand, yes, it is hard not to balk at the notion of paying to clean someone else's moat(!). On the other hand it seems pretty obvious that most MPs have to live in two places, and that maintaining two homes costs money.

Just in a fit of fantasy, I decided to appoint myself as my own local, moat-free MP.

The current annual salary for an MP is £64,766. Some of you know my house - it is a small 3-bed semi in a working class commuter village that mainly caters to young families starting out. As a teacher on top scale I could not possibly afford to buy it if I was starting out. Age forty-six, and long on the property ladder I can afford it. Now, on my fantasy £65k I can - the 100% mortgage is £1700 or so, but I am already on the ladder, so my salary hike goes even further - great!

Travel to Westminster would be under 3 hours, per day. Each way. Because I like to sleep, I need a bed in London. Suddenly, not so great.

At my age, and with a fantasy family, I need a similar house. I am going keep it simple, and rent/buy the same sort of house in, say, Norwood. Hardly a flash address, but a practical distance from the Commons after a late-night vote. To my surprise, I found I can buy for £250k a solid ex-council house. My 100% mortgage costs are going to be £1900 or so. I can rent for £1100 up. Add on my living expenses, and my MP's salary is now not even close to being enough.

In London the simple and unpretentious little suburban house my mother lives in costs way above what a single income MP could afford to buy from scratch - as a single home. It could be rented, yes, but that, plus living costs, would easily rule out the ability to maintain a family home back in a constituency.

MPs may be paid a great deal more than I am, but then they in turn are paid a very great deal less than my GP (head of practice), who does not have to frequently leave his surgery at 10.30 at night for a 2 hour commute home. One result is that MPs have other jobs, but is this what we actually want? I quite like the idea of having my MP concentrating on my interests, thanks, and not moonlighting.

Just idly playing about with some figures suggests that either MPs NEED to max out their expenses, or be independently wealthy, or have other jobs, to maintain a quite simple lifestyle at all. The fact that many are indeed already rich, or have wealthy partners, or have well-paid other jobs is not the point I am trying to make. I, on the other hand, could not afford to be an MP on my salary. I would not be able to maintain a very simple, no holidays, and old car lifestyle if I wanted to be an honest, effective MP representing my constituency. Guess what - I am going to have to claim all the expenses I can get, just to get by - and face the prospect of widespread public scorn, hate and ridicule.

What sort of an idiot would put himself or herself in that position?

What sort of people do we want to be our MPs anyway? Have they all got to live in bed-sits? Do they have to be rich to consider the job?

Mathew Parris and others suggest that MPs treat their expenses as an allowance - as part of their remuneration - and claim accordingly. Why not cut out the opportunities for doubt or exploitation and offer a salary whereby MPs can (and are required) to maintain their constituency address, but also another within practical distance of the House? I don't think that is an unreasonable suggestion.

Why not create a reward system whereby MP's are paid enough to live comfortably whilst being able to concentrate on doing an honest and effective job?

Or is it really better to have a largely cynical media let loose on an obviously impractical current system that has long been known to be open to abuse? I scanned the dailies online this morning. The sheer hatred for MPs as a group is terrifying. It is suggested that 325 of them will stand down. Who is going to replace them? Who would want the wretched job? Who would expose themselves almost universal automatic disdain?

I know a local councillor down here. He is a very "normal" sort of guy - nothing pretentious or flash. He has a lovely family. Very much a local. He would make a fantastic constituency MP, but if my calculations are correct he simply could not afford to be one. When I merrily asked him if he would stand for Parliament he laughed out loud. In my new career as fantasy politico I offered him £120k to do the job. He went a little serious at that point, and talked about how much he had wanted to help the community, and the unthinking hostility he frequently meets just as a local councillor. I asked him about making a real difference, by going to Westminster, if he was properly funded. He turned my "offer" down flat, and said that he would not be prepared, for any money, to expose his family to the kind of atmosphere MPs now routinely live in. To be an MP is to expect to be hounded, and to be distrusted, as a matter of course - read today's headlines and he is right, hence his decision.

I don't blame him. The media seems to be utterly hell-bent on making public service a living nightmare, and the public are apparently lapping it up, but the current storm is merely the latest in a long line of exposes. Blame is in, scandal is what we *expect*, we know the system is corrupt, but we don't want the pain of real change. Far better to focus on outrage, entitlement and the X-Factor.

I reckon that in general we get what we pay for in life, and, by and large, what we deserve. We surely want honest people to serve us, and serve us properly, but we don't create a system where they can, or treat them in a way that would attract and then encourage the right people.

Honestly, who in their right minds would want to stand as a British MP for any mainstream party now? Not me. What I will do, however, is watch the BNP vote with interest.