MPs to be exempt from publishing expenses

[Albus]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/jan/16/mps-expenses-exemption

Ministers are poised to exempt all MPs and peers from having to publish details of their expenses, only weeks before MPs were due to be forced to disclose more than 1.2 million receipts covering claims for the last three years.

The move next week will allow parliament to nullify all the long-fought victories by campaigners and journalists to force MPs to publish details of all their individual receipts for their second homes, including details of what they spent on furnishings, maintenance, rent, mortgage payments, staffing, travel, office staffing and equipment.

The changes will be retrospective and all pending requests for more information under the Freedom of Information Act will be blocked.

The changes will put MPs and peers in a special category as the only paid public officials who will not have to disclose the full details of their expenses and allowances.

....

Harriet Harman, leader of the house, is understood to have pressed for the change after being lobbied by the Conservative 1922 backbench committee and the parliamentary Labour party committee, which both wanted to stop the release of the information.

MPs in both parties have already been embarrassed by disclosures under the FOI about their expenditure.

Examples released last year included Margaret Beckett, now the housing minister, claiming £1,920 for plants and pergola for her Derbyshire constituency home and the Labour MP for Stevenage, Barbara Follett, claiming £1,600 for cleaning the windows of her London home.

....

Harman said: "The public will have more information than they ever have before and we will take it back to 2005 so that for all members, each year their allowances against 26 headings will be made public."

Ministers claim that a tougher audit procedure will ensure that MPs do not get away with extravagant claims but none of the information will be made public.

One told the Guardian last night: "MPs' expenses should not be an entertainment show for the public."

[Albus]

1. Remember this

next time you are filling in your tax return