There have been rumblings about the workrate of some Reform MPs since being elected to Parliament last July, what with leader Nigel Farage and deputy Dubai Dicky Tice racking up the air miles to America and the United Arab Emirates respectively.
One man who is keeping the parliamentary authorities busy, however, is Elon Musk’s pick to replace Farage – Rupert Lowe, MP for Great Yarmouth.
Parliamentary records show that the inquisitive Lowe has submitted at least 816 written questions to ministers since being elected (in fact, that may be low as it doesn’t include those yet to be responded to).
Unsurprisingly, most relate to the culture war issues Reform campaigns on: immigration, grooming gangs, Sharia law, sentences for “posting offensive remarks on social media” and, in the case of the Treasury, what lessons it had learned “from the policies of the Javier Milei administration in Argentina”. In contrast, leader Nigel Farage has had 19 questions answered.
Such fishing expeditions don’t come cheap. The Cabinet Office says it does not hold the approximate average cost to the public purse of answering a written question given that it “depends on numerous factors, including the size of parliamentary teams, volumes of parliamentary questions submitted, and the complexity of the question asked”. It does, however, have a cut-off limit: any question which would cost more than 140% of the cost of answering a freedom of information request is refused. As an FOI costs £600 to answer, that makes the current cap £850.
The last time Labour was in power, in the noughties, the average cost of a written question was published, and estimated at £149 a pop.
If that was still in place, Lowe’s one-man think tank operation would have cost the taxpayer £121,584 in the six months since he was elected. If every question was at the top of the cut-off limit, it’s the thick end of £693,600.
“Everyone has to watch what they spend and make savings. So should the government. After all, they are spending our money, not theirs.”
That’s taken from Reform’s 2024 election manifesto. Perhaps Lowe should give it a read!
