Call me paranoid, but I can’t help thinking that there is a right-wing conspiracy to drag our system of government back to the Middle Ages. I refer to the long-running campaign in the Tory press calling for cuts to pay and expenses for MPs.

The argument, often aired by columnists like Simon Heffer in the Telegraph, is that MPs should all be very rich, successful people who represent their constituents as a kind of pastime. Their pay should only be necessary for the occasional lunch at Smiths of Smithfield, or a bit of light opera.

Dishearteningly, I have heard this argument parroted by people on Radio Five Live phone-ins, who seem to think that democracy should be cost-free. This is a worrying – not to say dangerous – trend. It is becoming popular to believe that only the rich should be allowed to hold political power.

Clearly this view has gathered momentum thanks to 12 years of a Labour Government which has specialised in graft, corruption and nepotism on a grand scale, while presiding over an emergency stop in social mobility. The stories about Tony McNulty’s expenses last week were merely the icing on the giant Labour cake of greed and self-interest.

But in spite of all that – and here I have to declare an interest, as I am part-paid by an MP – I don’t believe that pay or expenses are the root cause of public resentment. In my view, the real problem is that too many MPs have second jobs and directorships.

Let’s start with their pay. An MP is paid £65,000 a year, roughly the same as a middle-ranking civil servant or a head teacher. They also get about the same again in office and staffing allowances and their controversial a second home allowance – a total of around £130,000 a year. This is still considerably less than the chief executives of most local authorities.