FORGET the scandal of MPs’ salaries and expenses, a far larger problem is looming.

The people of Scotland were outraged when their new parliament cost £414 million.

Now British MPs are considering spending at least 15 times that to renovate the Palace of Westminster, and grand public procurement projects have a habit of costing twice as much as the estimate, which already stands at £5.5 billion and rising.

The argument is framed around preserving tradition and a historic building, but the truth is that the building is a fake, a mock Gothic confection built just 160 years ago.

It is a building designed to house a 19th century two-party democracy, an environmentally unsustainable building unfit for the modern world.

As with our voting system, the establishment is seeking to preserve its power base at the expense of the nation.

A few hundred pounds trousered here and there to pay for the upkeep of moats and duck houses, by MPs fiddling their expenses, will pale into insignificance if Parliament does not seize the opportunity to construct a new parliament fit for multi-party democracy in a 21st century nation.

It is time to leave the Palace of Westminster to tourists.

Christian Vassie, Blake Court, Wheldrake, York