There are a few issues. Firstly, this is a consultation, not the delivery of a pay change. My advice is that everyone who has any thoughts about this should submit to the consultation via the IPSA website.
Secondly, it is absolutely right that MPs should be divorced from any decision about their pay. It is widely accepted that their ability to determine the outcome of their pay was instrumental to the expense scandal that hit parliament before I was elected. It is therefore absolutely right that MPs should have no say whatsoever in their pay and terms. The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA) that deals with all this is independent. It must remain so.
My own thoughts are as follows:
This is the wrong time for IPSA to be proposing a pay rise for MPs. There is never a right time, but this seems to be the worse time.
My motivation to being an MP has nothing to do with money. There are many, many MPs who took pay cuts when they got elected and I was one of them. I do the job because I enjoy it and I want to make my contribution to serving the community by being an MP. Pay is not, nor has it ever been, a determining factor.
Finally, there are many questions going round about whether an MP would turn down any pay rise. I think this sets a very dangerous precedent and my feeling is that whatever the outcome of the consultation, all MPs should abide by the ruling of IPSA. It would not be fair for rich MPs to put pressure on those who may have financial pressures by refusing a pay rise. Self determination of pay becomes too confusing for people to understand and starts the return to elitism: all MPs should and must be equal in every way. It also sets an appalling precedent at elections - imagine if the decision to vote for a candidate became about how much they would pay themselves and not about what they would do for the community they seek to serve?
More here: http://parliamentarystandards.org.uk/payandpensions/Pages/default.aspx