So now we know ...
What have we learnt from the material released today by the House of Commons about the second home expenses of 14 current and former MPs?
Apart from the details of Tony Blair's and Gordon Brown's taxpayer-funded kitchen refurbishments, we now know that the Blairs were late payers of bills, that Margaret Beckett unluckily experienced lots of plumbing problems, that Barbara Follett likes clean windows, that Peter Mandelson reads lots of newspapers, that Ming Campbell prefers other people to do his sums for him, and that John Prescott was worried about the 'adverse press coverage' over the arrangements for paying his council tax bill.
We can also see that Tony Blair took out a new mortgage in 2004 and that the former Tory MP John Wilkinson informed the Commons authorities that his main home was in the Isle of Man while claiming for his constituency home in Northwood in north west London.
All of this was approved by the Commons authorities, and it's just some of the information contained in the three boxes of photocopied documents distributed to journalists by Parliamentary officials this afternoon. When the detailed receipts and invoices are examined at greater leisure they may yield further stories.
Many MPs are now very exercised at the possibility that this kind of material will reveal their home addresses. There are three addresses which have been blanked out in the information released today. The Commons was allowed to do this only in the case of a specific security threat to the individuals involved.
The addresses blanked out are those of Gordon Brown's flat in Westminster, Margaret Beckett's constituency home in Derby, and the central London flat of Alan and Ann Keen (but their other address in Brentford is revealed).
As well as the Keens' other address, the documentation discloses home addresses at the time for Tony Blair, David Cameron, John Prescott, Mark Oaten, Sir Menzies Campbell, George Osborne, William Hague, Peter Mandelson, Barbara Follett and John Wilkinson.
It's taken three years and an extensive and costly legal battle. There are several hundred pages of financial information. For some FOI campaigners this is a test case that establishes a fundamential principle of transparency in the spending of public money; for some of the MPs on the receiving end it's a pointless intrusion into their privacy.
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Why on earth do the Keen's need a tax payer funded flat in central London, when they represent neighbouring constituencies in west London?
You could almost walk from Brentford to Westminster in less time than it takes the for the average TAX PAYER to commute.
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I'm so angry about the MP's expenses! I worked for years in a local authority social services office and in order to claim a 50p drink of a service user I had to fill 2 forms in, get them signed and fill out another 2 forms when actually getting the money.
If I bought a service user two drinks (heaven forbid!) I wouldn't be reimbursed as that was extravagance!
Yet look at our MP's, living a life style beyond the imagination of the majority of the people they *represent*.
£10k for a kitchen, I can remember arguing with my manager for more than £10 for food for a family of 4 for 2 days.
My first time voting was for labour, having being brought up in a labour household there was never another option - 11yrs later. I'm so disillusioned and let down. What has the world come to when the Tory leader is screwing us for less expenses than the *socialists*!?!?! The world's gone mad!
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I resent the tone of these enquiries that are purportedly made on my behalf as a member of the public. Earlier generations fought to ensure that MP’s were paid and that being an MP was not the preserve of the wealthy. MP’s salaries and other payments, especially those that allow them to maintain a home in their constituency as well as one in London, are essential to ensure ordinary people can represent other ordinary people. I don’t know the whole history of the development of the salaries and allowances that are paid but I do know that I want to be represented by someone from an ordinary and not a moneyed background. Anything that allows the impression to develop that somehow it is not right to properly compensate MP’s is wrong. In addition I resent the fact that these enquires distract public servants from the job in hand just to satisfy the self centred “seekers of truth”. I’d prefer my public servants spent more time concentrating on those things that really matter like how to continue the improvements in health care, education and in other important areas.
I hope that this nonsense does not discourage any MP’s form whatever party from doing this important job.
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Ok, so this report reveals what we already knew - that our dishonourable mp's are indeed dishonest and taking great advantage of their positions ...AND this only lists 14 of them!
What now? Who has the ability to stop the blatant daylight robbery from our mp's. I work for a social services department. If I spend 30p on a stamp or less, I am told from on high that I will NOT be reimbursed without a valid receipt. So WHY oh why were mp's allowed to spend £250 of TAX PAYERS and not have to account for it??
Why do they get their council tax, transport, partners/hangers-ons tabs paid for, even the poorest paid have to meet these costs?
There is no need for second homes. Everyone else would be expected to relocate or seek local lodgings. The houses of parliament is big enough!
How and why are these people allowed to get away with such downright deception, lies and fraudulent behaviour that others would be put away for?
HALF my wages go on tax, council tax and indirect taxes and it pains me to know I'm helping to fund some minted mp's newspaper bill.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
am i missing something here? these allowances were meant to compensate mps for having to maintain a second home to be near parliament, so why are members who have grace and favour homes in london, (blair, brown, prescott etc) being paid expenses? Also why can they charge for food? they would ha
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oops pressed the wrong button!
to continue......they would have to eat either in london or their constituency not both!
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Ok good. So the next logical step is to bring these MP's to justice I presume. They should be grateful that there is no request to put them behind bars for committing such a crime. What they are doing is worse than tax evation.
They should be made to refund/reimburse the money plus interest and penalty at the very least.
These people actually don't care for the general public. Living expenses, utilities bill, fuel,etc has at least double within the last 10 years, yet the lowest salary for the same job is still £16 grand a year, and these people are dancing over our misery.
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Hmmm.... speaking as a director of a small company I wonder how the nice people at HMRC would react if I used company money to refurbish the one kitchen in my only home.
Yet they take money from me so our elected comrades in power can have a free kitchen in their second home (which I'm also paying for, it would appear). Yet they have the nerve to claim that I have no right to see how much of my taxes they are spending on themselves?
Of course what makes it even worse is the ever-increasing amount of information they expect "we the people" to give to them. They worry about their own security, but what of the security of the 25,000,000 people whose details were lost?
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Why not build a huge hotel or apartment building in London or take over an existing one and refurbish , for the use of incoming and outgoing MPS , they could pay a small rent seeing as how they are so hard up !!, and the building would be easy to police etc and as its only a second home they don`t have to be there all the time , but the main thing is it would remain the property of the UK and not as a leaving perk for the already well paid ..
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The way forward to counteract all this sleaze which really is all about the squandering of taxpayers money is quite simple.
Independent Regional Panels comprising of members of the general public need to be set up to oversee ALL expense claims made by MPs.
MPs will ONLY be reimbursed if it is deemed their claims meet the criteria laid down and are to do with their role in performing the work they do as an MP.
All frivilous claims would be thrown out, this would include, gardening, window cleaning, tv licences, tv satellite dish subscriptions, food and new kitchens plus a myriad of other superfluous items.
MPs are not poorly paid. They know what to expect when going into Parliament. No-one is forcing or cohercing them to take up this occupation.
I am sure there would be no problem in members of the public coming forward and getting involved in such a plan.
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Notwithstanding the rights and wrongs of the current situation regarding MP's expenses looking at (for example) the invoices for the building work carried out for Tony Blair and Gordon Brown I was both shocked and amazed at the lack of detail and the cursory nature of the invoices.
I thisk that if any other person who is actually paying for the services would demand somewhat greater detail and costings - if however others are paying (as in this case) there seems to be a total lack of care. Additionally how can such cursory invoices be approved as a justified expense - both in terms of the nature of the work and the acuracy of the costings? Such invoices could possibly disguise significant other works - a situation commercial organisations would not accept.
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The hard work of all those journalists who succeeded in obtaining this information is now rewarded. The rotten heart at the centre of our so-called democracy is exposed. One can only hope that the revelations force Parliament to reform the outdated expenses system and make it a more fair and transparent system.
@ DN_Millan - MPs are elected to represent the people not to live the high life on a grotesque gravy train at our expense. Go and live in Zimbabwe if you object to MPs' expenses being put under scrutiny.
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It makes me feel physically sick to learn what these people get away with at my expense, whilst I get screwed at every turn by the taxman. I run a small business and it's impossible (unless you're a crook) to obtain a penny (or a penny's worth of benefit) from one's business without paying the taxman his cut. Meantime, politicians fleece us for every type of pointless extravagance without so much as a "by your leave" to the taxman. I know these claims are supposed to fall within their arcane rules, but how on earth can they justify - in all conscience - stealing money from us like this? Small wonder that most of the population consider politicians to be little more than parasitic pond life.
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re MP' expenses. Surely enough is enough now. What is equally disgusting and alarming about these expense is the fact they are supposed to be monitored. What has the monitoring committee been doing? The general public has to be accountable to the authorities for every penny earned. We would all like our kitchens refurbished and our food paid for, for free. How can these MPs' look the electorate in the eye. Have they no shame? Now it seems we can expect them to protect their 'stealing, because in essence that is what it is, by passing laws that will maintain the staus quo and allow them to continue to abuse our trust. So much for equality and New Labour. The New Labour MPs' and Ministers seem to be among the very worst.
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Re. 2nd paragraph of article:
Erm, the ex Lib Dem leader is called Menzies Campbell. OK, so it's pronounced 'Ming', but still...
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Well it now looks as if to save their blushes in future about their kitchens, window cleaning, mock tudor gables and newspaper reading, they are going to award themselves a lump sum of £23,000 EACH. I'm speechless! Instead of facing up to disgraceful way they have indulged themselves at the taxpayers expense, they are actually in effect going to award themselves a huge bonus which will prevent future FOI queries happening again.
This is not a party issue - you can't vote at the next election (when we get around to having one!) to get rid of the offending party, because MPs from across the spectrum are at it. The British taxpaying public is being swindled and there is no democratic way of stopping this.
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I've got the perfect fix for this:
Give them all council flats on a London housing estate and have them all commute by public transport. Remove any security detail.
When this has focused their minds on social need: decent housing, transport and policing, and the area has improved, then move them to the next area.
Also, to steal an idea from Plato (if I remember correctly), when they become an MP all their property and shares should be invested in the state. If the state does well, then they get a profit when they leave office, otherwise not.
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so good to see that a pergola was considered not quite right for claiming on expenses, but could anybody explain how morgaging your house for twice it's value and then getting the interest paid by the taxpayer was accepted?In any walk of life this ammounts to theft regardless who they are.
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What I find most galling isn't so much the amount of money they spend, it isn't the fact that they don't provide receipts. What really makes my blood boil is the way they can sit there with a straight face and tell me that it is not in my interest to tell me how my money is being spent!
It shows that they have nothing but contempt for us - the fact that they think we wouldn't notice what they are doing just shows that they think we are docile cow herd who can be distracted by waving a bit of coloured paper about.
I've just emailed my MP and I can't wait to hear the excuses for why he doesn't need to show me his expenses.
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I would have thought that there would be some comment on this page about the sly way the commons could exempt themselves from the FOI act.After the embarrassment of who claimed what in the latest list to be made public,the bright idea of paying a lump sum to MPs to cover expenses and therefore not needing receipts, with one stroke they remove themselves as individuals from the FOI.Cannot work out tax rates or tax allowances but when it is something important like grabbing more money they are masters.
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I hope the general public are now realising that the Orwellian 'Animal farm' is as true and alive in Democracy as it ever was in communism. Once again the greedy win over the needy. The biggest laugh is the 'security risk posed by address information being published' - Oh really, would this be the security risk posed by the angry public who's money you have been stealing for so long? Do as I say, not as I do should be the party line for all the democratic parties in the UK - without exception.
How much more insult can the UK public take? And don't be fooled into thinking Cameron's tory boys or any other party will be any different. It's the system we live under that's the problem, whoever is in power, once they're there - they want to milk it as much as possible. It hasn't changed in the last 35 years I've been on this planet - I don't expect it to change before I die either.
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....by the way - another revealing aspect of this which demonstrates how MP's will lie and manipulate the truth to keep them out of the firing line.....
Did anyone find it co-incidental that big fat John Prescott revealed he had Bulimia shortly before his £6k food bill was revealed under this FOI request?
I never believed a word of it, my sister suffered from Bulimia for years and she never looked as well as Prescott during any part of it. Most Bulimic's throw their food up afterwards as they feel guilty about eating it. JP obviously didn't - however is anyone actually surprised he would happily lie and insult bulimic's all over the world just to cover his own fat a*se??
He was obvioulsy the biggest PIG in this animal farm!
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John Wilkinson had his main home in the Isle of Man. Does that mean that as an MP he was not resident in the UK for tax purposes?
As the subsequent post reminded me, this is not supposed to happen with peers appointments: MPs are responsible for setting the taxes fro the rest of us - peers are not.
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This is the best thing that's happened since politics began. Look at the cockroaches running as the light is switched on. Perhaps now we will be able to make an informed decision at the polls based on who is 'ripping us off least'. Too many people are in politics for the wrong reasons (i.e. money). It should not be a career which rewards you financially, but rewards you for the good you do for society and the country with respect from your fellow citizens. Hopefully we might see a lot of MP's standing down at the next election as they realise the 'golden tit' is going to dry up. Maybe we will get a fresh set of new, young, bright MP's who actually have dignity and respect for the voters as well as the all important principles.
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