Returning That Which Should Not Have Been Taken

Presently, all MPs are under pressure to return monies claimed in allowances and expenses which 'the court of public opinion' feel have been incorrectly claimed.

With the current race between Gordon Brown and David Cameron - in which each of them is trying to 'out-devolve' the other - one interesting point needs to be made, especially as all the headlines today are about David Cameron wanting to 'devolve power to the people'.

As Helen Szamuely, on Your Freedom and Ours, so eloquently says:

"The state cannot devolve power to the people because it belongs to them in the first place; the state does not grant the people liberties because those liberties are the people's property. It is all the other way round: the people might, for various reasons, loan powers and agree to forgo their liberties for certain purposes. It is high time our politicians grasped this simple fact."

Quite! And now, we want it back!