Tag Archives: paul kennedy

Stephen Tall

Lembit wins MPs’ expenses appeal, is now owed £40

By Stephen Tall | Thu 4th February 2010 - 6:25 pm

Last week it was Lib Dem MP Jeremy Browne has won his appeal against repaying £18,000 of expenses. Now fellow Lib Dem Lembit Opik has also had his appeal against repaying hundreds of pounds in parliamentary expenses allowed by Sir Paul Kennedy, the judge brought in to arbitrate on disputed claims. The BBC reports:

Montgomeryshire MP Lembit Opik was ordered to pay back £900 he claimed for a mobile phone bill. Sir Thomas Legg, the retired civil servant auditing MPs’ expenses, said the Liberal Democrat MP should not have been able to claim for the phone bill. But Mr Opik won an appeal against the ruling.

Intriguingly, this leaves the taxpayer in debt to Lembit:

The MP, one of almost 80 MPs to challenge Sir Thomas, has actually repaid £195 in total, so is now technically owed £40 by the Commons authorities.

Now there’s an ethical dilemma for an MP just months away from seeking re-election.

Menawhile, here’s a brief clip of Lib Dem MP Norman Baker talking about the publication of Sir Thomas’s report.

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The Voice

Three Lib Dem MPs fighting Legg’s expenses judgement

By The Voice | Sun 31st January 2010 - 10:20 pm

Three Lib Dems are among the 70 MPs who lodged appeals after being told to pay back some of their taxpayer-funded Commons expenses by Sir Thomas Legg, reports today’s Telegraph:

At least 35 Labour MPs and former Labour MPs have appealed against Sir Thomas’s findings, as well as 30 Conservatives, three Liberal Democrats and two independents. Among them are MPs who made some of the highest-profile claims exposed by the Telegraph investigation, including £1,645 for a duck house.

Sir Thomas’s 30-page report is thought to identify more than 300 MPs — nearly half of those in Parliament — whom he found

…

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Recent Comments

  • Chloe
    The hubris that was around in 2016 & 2019 is making a comeback. I wonder what's changed for this careerist.... https://x.com/andyburnham/status/806563566...
  • David Evans
    cim, The one thing too many Lib Dems don't understand fully is what is meant by the word balance. That is the key and is the opposite of dogma - which is where...
  • Slamdac
    Sorry I should have said £150,569 after 14 years. It is still a massive amount of taxpayer's money. I think they get paid more than enough. There is only a ...
  • Slamdac
    Any return to Freedom of Movement or the Single Market will require a Referendum of British Citizens, otherwise there is nothing stopping a future Conservative ...
  • Matt (Bristol)
    Oops, Richard Cripps not Roger Billins....