Today's Private Eye has revelations about the expenses claimed by Tory Leader of Lincolnshire County Council who apparently booked into the Intercontinental Hotel on London's Park Lane and expected us us council taxpayers to pick up the tab.
Looking forward to Councillor Martin Hill's explanation, as he made his name when in Opposition as a rottweiller who went through the Council's accounts with a fine toothcomb looking for half a chance to attack any spending by the then Labour-LibDem administration as 'extravagant'.
Wonder what the Taxpayers Alliance would say about his stay at the Intercontinental?
No doubt the Private Eye story is embarrassing for Cllr Hill, particuylarly if the local media actually follow it up.
Of course, it's not exactly in the same league as Martin's Conservative predessessor 'Honest' Jim Speechley, who you may recall, went to prison convicted of abuse of public office...
PS - sorry, no link to the Private Eye story as don't put their articles online...
You'll have to buy one!
Showing posts with label MPs expenses. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MPs expenses. Show all posts
Friday, September 18, 2009
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Senior Tory's whinge after expenses scandal...
So Alan Duncan thinks MPs are 'treated like sh**' and have to 'live on rations'...
The Tory MP for Rutland and Melton been forced to apologise after being caught on camera giving his private views on the expenses scandal - in which he was well and truly embroiled but refused to apologise for claiming a large wodge of public money for repairs to his ride-on lawnmower!
Who says the Tories are no longer the Nasty Party?
UPDATE: The BBC carries more of Mr. Duncan's comments when he was being secretly recorded in which he appears to justify claiming £1,000 a year to maintain his garden by saying the actual cost was £2,000 and he could have 'claimed the bloody lot'.
What's that saying about when in a hole...?
The Tory MP for Rutland and Melton been forced to apologise after being caught on camera giving his private views on the expenses scandal - in which he was well and truly embroiled but refused to apologise for claiming a large wodge of public money for repairs to his ride-on lawnmower!
Who says the Tories are no longer the Nasty Party?
UPDATE: The BBC carries more of Mr. Duncan's comments when he was being secretly recorded in which he appears to justify claiming £1,000 a year to maintain his garden by saying the actual cost was £2,000 and he could have 'claimed the bloody lot'.
What's that saying about when in a hole...?
Friday, June 26, 2009
Openness and transparency...er, no!
The Peterborough MP who took public money for repairs to his swimming pool and gardening at his second home is to pay back more parliamentary expenses - but this time he is refusing to say what he claimed the money for in the first place!
Thursday, June 18, 2009
What our South Lincs MPs claimed...
Links to full parliamentary expenses claims for South Lincs MPs for the past five years now at the Spalding Guardian website.
Haven't had a chance to have a look yet at the claims by John Hayes, Quentin Davies and Mark Simmonds, but I'm sure there's some interesting reading - and lots of tittle-tattle.
Haven't had a chance to have a look yet at the claims by John Hayes, Quentin Davies and Mark Simmonds, but I'm sure there's some interesting reading - and lots of tittle-tattle.
Would-be Chancellor and 'value-for-money': you couldn't make it up...
The resignation of a Treasury Minister after revelations about tax and parliamentary expenses surely piles more pressure on would-be Chancellor Georgie Osborne to do the decent thing.
He stands accused of avoiding paying £55,000 in capital gains tax.
This afternoon, Tory Leader David Cameron agreed to pay back almost £1,000 he has admitted wrongly claiming - that's on top of the hundreds of pounds he had to pay back a couple of weeks ago.
(UPDATE: Thanks to Matt for pointing out that the total the two re-payments Cameron is making add up to almost £1,000. sorry, my mishtake).
Wee Georgie is refusing to budge despite growing pressure. He claims, as the departed Minister did, that he has done nothing wrong.
But the overall prize for the most ironic of parliamentary claim of all surely goes to the aforementioned Mr Osborne...
It emerged this afternoon that the MP for Tatton actually claimed £40 from the public purse for two DVDs of himself talking about, er, 'value for taxpayers money'.
You couldn't make it up.
He stands accused of avoiding paying £55,000 in capital gains tax.
This afternoon, Tory Leader David Cameron agreed to pay back almost £1,000 he has admitted wrongly claiming - that's on top of the hundreds of pounds he had to pay back a couple of weeks ago.
(UPDATE: Thanks to Matt for pointing out that the total the two re-payments Cameron is making add up to almost £1,000. sorry, my mishtake).
Wee Georgie is refusing to budge despite growing pressure. He claims, as the departed Minister did, that he has done nothing wrong.
But the overall prize for the most ironic of parliamentary claim of all surely goes to the aforementioned Mr Osborne...
It emerged this afternoon that the MP for Tatton actually claimed £40 from the public purse for two DVDs of himself talking about, er, 'value for taxpayers money'.
You couldn't make it up.
Monday, June 15, 2009
BREAKING NEWS: Wee Georgie Osborne's mortgage and expenses...
Wee Georgie Osborne is the latest MP to face questions over his claims for parliamentary expenses.
It seems Cameron's sidekick took out a mortgage for more than he actually paid for his house - and then billed the taxpayer!.
The would-be Chancellor is also having to explain why he paid no Capital Gains Tax on the £700,000 profit he made on the sale of his London property - a house which he had designated to the Fees Office as his second home but designated to the tax authorities as his main home.
He is arguing that the expenses he claimed on his London property were actually intended for his Cheshire home - and that the Fees Office had agreed to this arrangement
In fact, the record shows that wee Georgie billed the taxpayer for a mortgage on the Cheshire
home worth more than he had actually paid for the house in cash two years before!
And - in the two years between buying his house for cash and taking out a new mortgage - George Osborne billed the taxpayer for £36,067 which he now says went to pay for that property.
Under this arangement, the taxpayer will eventually end up paying George Osborne £4,995 more than he paid for the house and £36,067 in expenses before he even had a mortgage.
I'm sure it's all within the rules...!
It seems Cameron's sidekick took out a mortgage for more than he actually paid for his house - and then billed the taxpayer!.
The would-be Chancellor is also having to explain why he paid no Capital Gains Tax on the £700,000 profit he made on the sale of his London property - a house which he had designated to the Fees Office as his second home but designated to the tax authorities as his main home.
He is arguing that the expenses he claimed on his London property were actually intended for his Cheshire home - and that the Fees Office had agreed to this arrangement
In fact, the record shows that wee Georgie billed the taxpayer for a mortgage on the Cheshire
home worth more than he had actually paid for the house in cash two years before!
And - in the two years between buying his house for cash and taking out a new mortgage - George Osborne billed the taxpayer for £36,067 which he now says went to pay for that property.
Under this arangement, the taxpayer will eventually end up paying George Osborne £4,995 more than he paid for the house and £36,067 in expenses before he even had a mortgage.
I'm sure it's all within the rules...!
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Did MP ride his lawnmower to Parliament...?
Defiant Rutland MP Alan Duncan faced angry questions over why he claimed £4,000 from the public purse for gardening bills and repairs to his ride-on lawnmower. But he refused to apologise!
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Moat man and his 'Lady' keep it in the family...
The unfortunately named Douglas Hogg, the Lincolnshire MP apparently caught with his snout in the trough has announced he will step down at the next General Election.
So-called Grandee Mr Hogg is MP for Sleaford and North Hykeham where I grew up. When the scandal was first exposed, former Agriculture Minister Mr Hogg, or Viscount Hailsham to give him his proper title, claimed he'd done nothing wrong and refused to pay back a penny of his outrageous claim for £2,000 to clean the moat at his 13th Century country estate in Lincolnshire.
Today, several days later, the Right Honourable member Mr Hogg says he now entirely understands the public anger over disgraceful excesses in expense claims allegedly made by MPs of all parties - including Labour.
Mr Hogg claimed his main residence wasn't his country pile in Lincolnshire at all - but a flat in London. He then apparently claimed £20,000 a year in public funds to clean his moat, repair the stables, tune the piano and employ a lady to look after his second home in Lincolnshire.
Presumably the lady looking after the family home is not Lady Hogg, his wife, who is facing an under investigation investigation herself, it was revealed today.
The so-called Lady Hogg is said to have attempted to justified a claim for £5,594 overnight expenses by saying her main home was, unlike her husband's...OUTSIDE London!
What a stench.
Must the manure.
So-called Grandee Mr Hogg is MP for Sleaford and North Hykeham where I grew up. When the scandal was first exposed, former Agriculture Minister Mr Hogg, or Viscount Hailsham to give him his proper title, claimed he'd done nothing wrong and refused to pay back a penny of his outrageous claim for £2,000 to clean the moat at his 13th Century country estate in Lincolnshire.
Today, several days later, the Right Honourable member Mr Hogg says he now entirely understands the public anger over disgraceful excesses in expense claims allegedly made by MPs of all parties - including Labour.
Mr Hogg claimed his main residence wasn't his country pile in Lincolnshire at all - but a flat in London. He then apparently claimed £20,000 a year in public funds to clean his moat, repair the stables, tune the piano and employ a lady to look after his second home in Lincolnshire.
Presumably the lady looking after the family home is not Lady Hogg, his wife, who is facing an under investigation investigation herself, it was revealed today.
The so-called Lady Hogg is said to have attempted to justified a claim for £5,594 overnight expenses by saying her main home was, unlike her husband's...OUTSIDE London!
What a stench.
Must the manure.
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