[Livia]

There are lots of volunteers working in the House of Commons and in constituency offices all over the country, especially students getting experience as interns. Once you have experience of working for an MP, it looks good on your CV if that's the kind of career you choose to follow. Likewise I have friends who worked for TV production companies for free just to get the experience they needed to go for a paid job in TV, which is a notoriously difficult sector in which to get a foothold.

However... the fact that this particular MP is replacing a paid member of staff with a volunteer is hypocritical in the extreme. Lyn Brown's predecessor, Tony Banks, also acted inappropriately as far as I'm concerned. He was Minister for Sport and MP for West Ham but supported... Chelsea. Bloody turncoat.