The Evening Standard’s Paul Waugh has been doing some digging into the newly-released MPs’ expenses claims on the Parliamentary website, and has come up with this ‘file-under-you-couldn’t-make-it-up’ story:
Among the tiny fragments of new info available on MPs exes today is this:
George Osborne claimed £47 of taxpayer’s money for two copies of a DVD of his speech – and the speech was on “value for money”.
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Greg Hyde 
David Sparrow 
Paul Greg Hyde 
Nonconformistradical 
13 Comments
Forgive me for not understanding, but I can’t find Nick Clegg’s expenses on his website anymore, and it seems like he’s been claiming the full mortgage payment and not just the interest. Can anyone clear this up for me?
Robson
Yes, the relevant page of Nick Clegg’s website appears to have been removed within the last fortnight or so.
But you can still see Google’s cache of the page by doing a Google search and then clicking the “Cached” link:
site:www.nickclegg.org.uk “nick clegg’s parliamentary expenses”
The URL of the page was:
http://www.nickclegg.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=260
It does actually say “Mortgage payments [interest only] or rent”.
Nick’s constituency website has been redesigned in the last week and so it does look as though it has disappeared – I suspect this isn’t the final version of his website though. Maybe as everything is now available online through the parliament website he decided it wasn’t needed on his own website anymore. No particular knowledge on it, just thinking out loud.
I incline towards the cock-up theory as regards Nick
But £23 for a DVD? That’s what I paid for the extended 4 disc super-edition of Return of the King.
Surely Osborne has to go, if this is true?
Just read Paul’s account of his mortgage! Ditto with bells on, if true…
Anders
“Maybe as everything is now available online through the parliament website he decided it wasn’t needed on his own website anymore.”
I don’t think that is the case, as Nick Clegg’s website showed expenses for the first half of 2008-9, whereas (if I understand correctly) the official release on the parliament website only goes up to 2007-8.
It may well be a cock-up, though the timing is unfortunate.
Just looking at the expenses of my opponent at the last election.
Why (it appears) are MPs allowed to claim food and other expenses during the General Election period when they are merely candidates?
Ruth, I think you are correct.
I recall mention of an MP (who should have known better) who had a claim for a TV refused because it was bought after parliament was dissolved.
Ruth
Because the expense system pretty much consisted of putting a large pile of money in the middle of the room and saying “help yourself boys and girls”.
Someone on the door checked you hadn’t taken more than your share but that was about it.
I’m sure those Lib Dem MPs who claimed the max of £4800 a year food allowance (without producing receipts AFAICS) will be able to explain themselves to a single pensioner constituent who (with Pension Credit) gets less than that for the whole year.
And I’m sure they can point to their criticisms of the system before Heather Brooke started asked awkward questions.
Indeed!
I find some of the food claims especially wince-making when our MPs oppose an ANNUAL food grant to pregnant women of £190.
The BBC is saying that the police are conducting a criminal investigation into both MPs and peers over expenses claims, including Baroness Uddin, who claimed allowances in respect of a flat that she wasn’t – allegedly – living in.
I just read the title for this article… laughed out loud. What a classic. What vanity. What madness that this man could become chancellor!!!!