When you pay lower wages to politicians than the directors in your local & central governments or even heads of departments then you get 3 types of politicians. Those who are incompetent, opportunistic malevolent sort or who actually care. The latter is incredibly rare.

To attract better calibre of people to the field of politics, and to ensure such people do not have strong external associations that corrupt them, you need to pay them more than any other public officer at the very least. That should be the minimum criteria. But that should not come without increased accountability and a mandatory disassociation from external think tanks, lobby groups or foreign vested interest groups.