It is very difficult to form an object assessment of the extent to which Member of the House of Commons, 648 in total have committed acts which if committed by anyone else would lead to a criminal prosecution, or although with the rule was strictly not within the intention or spirit of the rules, whether they were approved by the claims office or not, were genuine mistakes or misunderstandings of the system committed by the Member of Parliament directly or by a Member of their staff. On Sunday morning one newspaper suggested that just over half the existing Members of Parliament will not be standing or will be defeated at the next election. While the Party Leaders are taking action, their first task is damage limitation in order to protect the Party from electoral disaster and to have the quality of Members who will have both public confidence and be able to be effective Ministers and Shadow Ministers. How will we be able to decide with confidence if they have made the right decisions in our individual and the country’s best interest?
One way is for all the constituency is able to question and have a say in whether the existing Member should be standing and for this to be introduced in a formal and systematic way. This would take time to arrange, will involve legislation and preparation. It should also apply to any new candidate who has been a Member of Parliament before the current reforms. This is not practical especially with the momentum for a General Election sooner than later but each Party could and should institute arrangements now. It is noteworthy that while the Conservative Leadership has been pushing this approach the Labour Party appears to be relying on more traditional methods. The evidence is that Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, has become a willing prisoner to the existing system and procedures of his party and this has good and bad consequence. The results are like to be more consistency and therefore fair outcomes, but the impact is likely to give the initiative to Conservatives as the Party of action and change. This has taken away the prospect of the Liberal Democrats becoming the main beneficiaries as the Conservatives are likely to hold their vote and the Liberal Democrats and other Parties pick up votes from the Labour Party who will be the most damaged by the revelations. With the prospect of such major changes to be followed by significant constitutional changes I have been asking myself, what has happened justify this and are the glaring misuses quoted in media valid a are we being swept in one direction by the media?
The Daily Telegraph is publishing an ongoing list of the expenses of Members of Parliament without indicating any relative sense of gravity or potential cause for criminal investigation, potential sanctions by the official investigation body that has been set up or by internal Party discipline. So far just under a third of Members of the Commons have been investigated and which appear to include most if not all the household known names, the Members of Cabinet or Whips office, the Shadow Government spokespersons and Party Whips of Conservative and Liberal Democrat Members of the House of Commons.
I have decided that the only way to answer this question is to study the available information in a systematic way, commencing with Labour Party Members because a Labour Government has been in power for twelve consecutive years. I am examining the information Alphabetically and on Saturday went through the first twenty names. I tried to identify which cases I would want to investigate first before the remainder but realised that this is difficult until have undertaken a preliminary check of everyone and then formed a framework. I came to this conclusion after selecting four of the first twenty and then concluded that I might be doing an injustice to them compared to the actual position of others because the information provided was selective, only covered one component of expenses and lacked the detailed explanation of the Member in question. To achieve individual and collective fairness then each side should be able to question what the other is saying. This applies to those the Telegraph is saying little about and therefore appearing to be giving them a clean bill of health in relation to the matters reviewed. The test appears to be whether the claims are wholly within the spirit of the previous rules and do not just comply with the letter of the rules.
I am relying exclusively on the information provided by Telegraph Newspaper, and which includes their summary lists and the separate articles. The expenses investigated cover the second Home Allowance where payments can be made where they are for the benefit exclusively of the Member in order to conduct their Parliamentary duties (not their party political activities such as campaigning for which separate rules apply). It is therefore presumed that the main home and the designated home for allowance claiming is either in or near the constituency or close to the Houses of Parliament. It is ludicrous if both establishments are the same distance away from the Houses of Parliament as I shall mention two disturbing instances, but which are not untypical.
There are also problems arising from designated homes in other areas, shared purchasing or renting with others, and what happens if these properties are sold at a profit and in terms of paying capital gains tax which is required unless the home is the first home, and property primarily used by the tax payer. The Tax payer can fund rent or mortgage payments in full or in part where shared and for repairs and maintenance including maintenance inside and outside and which includes taxes and utilities. Until this week claims could also be submitted for furniture and furnishings, and for food. There are further complications if the main or second home is used as an office for constituency business in addition to the Member having an office provided at Westminster. This applies if the main home is used by staff whether the staff are members of the family or not and where it is said about 200 of the 648 employ their partners or other relatives as staff funded by the tax payer. Nor does the investigation look at travelling and subsistence while travelling, and office expenses. I begin with the four of the twenty I identified as meriting priority official investigation and then say something about the next sixteen. I wonder how many would agree with my selection?
001 John Austin is the Member of Parliament for the outer London constituency of Erith and Belverdere where he has his main home and where he also has another home 11 miles away in Southwark which he designated for allowances and which he bought for £110000 and sold for £14000 before buying new home 1.5 miles away from this for £225000 and claimed second home allowances for this. It is not known if he paid capital gains tax on the sale. He has claimed £133000 in second home expenses since 2001. He is said to have announced he was not standing at the General Election prior to the Telegraph series but date of this decision is not stated. His cases is but one of number of Members of Parliament who although living within easy commuting distance of Westminster have bought, repaired, maintained, sold at profit, second homes at the expense of the Taxpayer and where it is assumed he will retain the asset when he retires and presumably be able to switch designation to first home in order to sell it if he wishes without having to pay capital gains tax in the future.
002 Dawn Butler a Government Whip for which she is paid an additional salary and who lived in Stratford before becoming the Member for Barnet and renting a second home in Wembley which is the same distance to the House of Commons as his first home at Stratford. According to the Telegraph she had difficulty in making accurate claims, initially being paid twice for rent and when asked to return the £26000 she offered to submit other receipts to cover the amount. The Telegraph says although only elected a matter of weeks before the end of the financial year she tried to claim £4400 Food allowance, which would cover 11 months. She submitted a claim for £1500 for utilities for six months when the actual amount was £50 a month or £300 allowable. The claim was not paid. All together she is reported to have received £60000 in three years towards second home costs which many if not the majority would regard as having been unnecessary. As a new MP in the Whips Office, it is difficult to understand why her senior colleagues did not appropriately advise her what she could do, what she should do and what she should not. It is said that she has not claimed for the last year treating the Wembley establishment as her home. The position of her original first home is not stated.
003 Hazel Blears is the most well known of those meriting early official scrutiny because she is a Cabinet Member and the Prime Minister has said her conduct is wholly unacceptable. She designated her constituency home bought with her husband in 1997 as her second home in and the London home as her main home. Four months later she sold her London first home and made a profit of £45000. She told the income tax that this had been her first home and therefore was not liable for capital gains tax. She has now sent the taxman a cheque for the tax but still pockets the rest of the profit. She had claimed expenses in march 2004 for the Salford home, including a TV and a mattress for £1500. In December of the same year she bought a new London home claiming £1000 a month mortgage relief having declared it her second home and declared her Salford home as her main home again. She then bought a new TV and a Bed for the new London Home claiming a further £1800. She does not deny intent but insists what she did was within the rules and agreed by the Fees Office.
004 Chris Bryant. According to the Telegraph In 2002 Mr Bryant bought a flat in West London said to be valued at £400000, but designated his constituency property as the second home qualifying for the allowance. He attempted to claim three times the annual allowance when he purchased the constituency nominated home - £58000 for a property costing under £100000. He was allowed £20000 in the first year. He then made the West London flat his second home. This means he was free to sell the constituency home if he lost the seat or resigns, and pocket any profit without being required to pay any capital gains tax. He then sold the West London flat for a property closer to Westminster for £477000 three months later, having received some £3600 in taxpayer support. The new flat is said to have been purchased for £64000 also in West London but closer to Westminster and Mr Bryant received financial help from the taxpayer towards stamp duty £6400, £1000 a month mortgage and £6000 a year from ground rent and service charges. In all he has claimed £92000 since 2004.
005 Ian Austin where the salary as assistant Chief Whip is £89522, changed designation of home so as to be able to claim for new purchase, Claimed near maximum and query whether some purchases strictly within the rules and intentions
006 Hilary Armstrong Intention for Labour Party to buy computer at her tax payer funded home could compromise position and the Claims office suggested a flip in property designation to get round this potential problem otherwise her second home claims were reasonable and comparatively low.
007 Vera Baird Solicitor General salary £125602 the only thing raised was a rejected attempt to buy Christmas decorations and that she designated her London flat as her main home in order to claim for her constituency and larger home to get the larger allowances claim.
008 Ed Balls and 009 Yvette Cooper Salary each £141866. They were previously involved with a referral to Standards Commissioner because they had designated their Landon Family home as second home, sold and moved into a larger home but paid capital gains tax in full. Their new home is valued at £650000. They only claim the maximum of one additional home allowance although they are entitled to two allowances under previous rules.
010 Margaret Beckett Salary varied between £100000 and £140000. She spent £80000 on her former family home in her constituency where there were no rent or mortgage payments as second home after moving into Grace and Favour accommodation and she occupied grace and favour apartment at Admiralty House, where there are Income Tax implications and rented out her for London flat during this period.
011 Liz Blackman. Main home Nottingham constituency, Has one bedroom London flat for which she pays rent of £12000/£13000 a month and bought domestic items at end of each financial year to get as close to the maximum second home allowance as possible. a practice which applies is to other Members according to Telegraph. Claimed for food allowance of £250 to £350 a month. You only eat once!
012 Tony Blair raised two re-mortgages on his constituency second home which totalled £400000 after the initial mortgage of £30000. The first re-mortgage was for repairs and improvements but the second appears to have been to raise the deposit on his £3.65 million London main home for when he left Downing Street. He only claimed interest on buying and repairing the property. In addition to flats in Bristol one of which has been sold he has bought a £4 house in Bucks and spent £800000 buying a news house backing on to the London Home to create one property. He is said to have so far earned over £10 million since leaving the office of Prime Minister. The paper does not say what happened to the constituency home.
013 Ben Bradshaw is a Minister with a salary of £100,000 who switched the designation if his second home after entering into a civil partnership and being eligible for grants at this second home grants with mortgage reimbursement starting at an average of £1000 but rising to £1500 compared with under £700 for his former designated second home. The position is that if you buy a home with someone where you are not married/have a civil partnership, you can only claim half the mortgage. In the new situation Bradshaw paid the whole mortgage and was reimbursed accordingly.
014 Kevin Brennan moved from the North London home he was buying with his brother to a one bedroom flat closer to Westminster obtaining the maximum allowance for stamp duty and mortgage repayments. The raised concerns are the purchase of items delivered to his family home which he claims were for use at the designated second home and being allowed a claim for beds for his children rejected as not within the rules for others. It is not known what has happened to buying interest in the home bought with his brother, for which the tax payer contributed.
015 Gordon Brown Prime Minister salary £194 250 Mr Brown decided not use his grace and favour Flat at 11 Downing Street while Chancellor of the Exchequer but designated a flat in Westminster as the second home and not the constituency home. However as soon as Mr Blair announced his retirement Mr Brown designated his Constituency Home as the second home. The position of his Westminster home is not known since moving into 10 Downing Street.
016 Nick Brown claimed £18000 for food over four years without the need for receipts out of a total claim of £87000 over the four years
017 Russell Brown. The issued raised was the attempt to obtain reimbursement of the full cost of modernising the bathroom of rented accommodation. He was advised that the maximum was £3500 although he is reported to have stated that other colleagues were repaid more. The terms of the renting included the requirement to meet the cost of nay major repairs or improvements.
018 Andy Burnham, a Government Minister singled out by the Telegraph because of protracted eight month bid to use a special but out payment from rented property towards the purchase and equipping of a new designated home. The low cost designated London home was bought out by a company who offered tenants the right to stay at commercial rents or gave them a transfer to new property payment, which in his instance came to £18000. He paid this into the fees office but then engaged in the correspondence to be able to use the amount additional to other allowances and £16600 eventually paid toward the new property, and said to be in addition to the standard allowance. Mr Alexander has pointed out that in the period of review he has claimed £40000 less than the maximum available.
The Daily Telegraph wrote at length about Minister 019 Douglas Alexander but I do not understand what was the problem. The Minister’s designated home in his constituency was so badly damaged by fire that he had to live nearby for six months while the first was repaired and redecorated. His home was a yards away from property rented by the terrorists who attacked Glasgow Airport. Prior to the fire Mr Alexander had received £30000 for improvements but these are not listed. Mr Alexander was given help towards the temporary home and repaid approximately £2000 when his contents insurance was settled although he had found that he had been under insured overall.
020 Hilary Benn Claimed only £10000 a year on his second home allowance and had no queries raised by the Telegraph and is therefore the star goody of the twenty according to the Telegraph.
On Friday evening I watched the amazing two hour final result show of American Idol with the two contestants singing three songs each the night before. Simon in particular supported by the three other judges proclaimed Adam Lambert a creative International Star, but after nearly 100 million votes Chris Allen the evangelic Christian won. I suspect he received the majority of votes from the fellow evangelist Christian who came third and was not in the final. Chris is the talented musician from next door, who also plays the piano and guitar, while Adam came across as worldly, ambitious and highly professional. The amazing aspect was not the result but number if guest stars who performed with the final thirteen including Rod Stewart, Smokey Robinson and Cyndi Lauper and then Brian May of Queen.
Sussex beat Somerset at Taunton in the televised Quarter Final of the Friend‘s provident Trophy and have a home tie for the semi Final. I might get to see them play in the Final at Lords yet.
I managed to complete twenty completed sets registrations before deciding I wanted to work on the information about individual expense claims of Members of Parliament.
I am still struggling with the second level Chess having failed to achieve a run of more than thirty five wins over recent weeks, but have completed 1000 games of Hearts with only one loss.
I cleared the patio container of bulbs setting off to dry until next Autumn. I will take a look at what is offer at the B and Q garden centre on Wednesday morning when I can claim a 10% reduction.
On Friday I enjoyed a bacon roll at the Ship and Royal before doing a little shop at Azda for fruit and breads. I bought the Telegraph and had a good read which prompted the present research.
Jenson Button has top spot on the Monaco Grand Prix and which is usually the most boring of the races, yet prized because of the glamour and location. There is virtually nowhere on the circuit where one can overtake safely you rely on rain, driver or vehicle failure in in order to advance up the field. There is what has become the first of the one matches between England and the West Indies, at Bristol, another ground I have not visited and then after a roast chicken dinner I shall be going to Sunderland for the final match of the season against Chelsea which the team is expected to lose and where as much attention will be paid to the other results. It is coincidence but the four teams facing relegation with West Brom are all on the East Coast/riversides, Newcastle, Sunderland, the Boro and Hull, Tyne, Wear, Tees and Humber.
I have been over eating overall. I enjoyed a smoked mackerel salad and two pieces of white fish baked on Friday and Saturday a salmon steak salad and a pork stir fry, baking the meat in strips before cutting up and mixing in. There was melon, bananas and strawberries, all to the good as was a bowl of cereal. The problem was a croissant and three puff pastry fruit filled cakes as well s small carton of mixed olives. There was also a roll with soup. With fine weather promised I will try to make amends
One way is for all the constituency is able to question and have a say in whether the existing Member should be standing and for this to be introduced in a formal and systematic way. This would take time to arrange, will involve legislation and preparation. It should also apply to any new candidate who has been a Member of Parliament before the current reforms. This is not practical especially with the momentum for a General Election sooner than later but each Party could and should institute arrangements now. It is noteworthy that while the Conservative Leadership has been pushing this approach the Labour Party appears to be relying on more traditional methods. The evidence is that Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, has become a willing prisoner to the existing system and procedures of his party and this has good and bad consequence. The results are like to be more consistency and therefore fair outcomes, but the impact is likely to give the initiative to Conservatives as the Party of action and change. This has taken away the prospect of the Liberal Democrats becoming the main beneficiaries as the Conservatives are likely to hold their vote and the Liberal Democrats and other Parties pick up votes from the Labour Party who will be the most damaged by the revelations. With the prospect of such major changes to be followed by significant constitutional changes I have been asking myself, what has happened justify this and are the glaring misuses quoted in media valid a are we being swept in one direction by the media?
The Daily Telegraph is publishing an ongoing list of the expenses of Members of Parliament without indicating any relative sense of gravity or potential cause for criminal investigation, potential sanctions by the official investigation body that has been set up or by internal Party discipline. So far just under a third of Members of the Commons have been investigated and which appear to include most if not all the household known names, the Members of Cabinet or Whips office, the Shadow Government spokespersons and Party Whips of Conservative and Liberal Democrat Members of the House of Commons.
I have decided that the only way to answer this question is to study the available information in a systematic way, commencing with Labour Party Members because a Labour Government has been in power for twelve consecutive years. I am examining the information Alphabetically and on Saturday went through the first twenty names. I tried to identify which cases I would want to investigate first before the remainder but realised that this is difficult until have undertaken a preliminary check of everyone and then formed a framework. I came to this conclusion after selecting four of the first twenty and then concluded that I might be doing an injustice to them compared to the actual position of others because the information provided was selective, only covered one component of expenses and lacked the detailed explanation of the Member in question. To achieve individual and collective fairness then each side should be able to question what the other is saying. This applies to those the Telegraph is saying little about and therefore appearing to be giving them a clean bill of health in relation to the matters reviewed. The test appears to be whether the claims are wholly within the spirit of the previous rules and do not just comply with the letter of the rules.
I am relying exclusively on the information provided by Telegraph Newspaper, and which includes their summary lists and the separate articles. The expenses investigated cover the second Home Allowance where payments can be made where they are for the benefit exclusively of the Member in order to conduct their Parliamentary duties (not their party political activities such as campaigning for which separate rules apply). It is therefore presumed that the main home and the designated home for allowance claiming is either in or near the constituency or close to the Houses of Parliament. It is ludicrous if both establishments are the same distance away from the Houses of Parliament as I shall mention two disturbing instances, but which are not untypical.
There are also problems arising from designated homes in other areas, shared purchasing or renting with others, and what happens if these properties are sold at a profit and in terms of paying capital gains tax which is required unless the home is the first home, and property primarily used by the tax payer. The Tax payer can fund rent or mortgage payments in full or in part where shared and for repairs and maintenance including maintenance inside and outside and which includes taxes and utilities. Until this week claims could also be submitted for furniture and furnishings, and for food. There are further complications if the main or second home is used as an office for constituency business in addition to the Member having an office provided at Westminster. This applies if the main home is used by staff whether the staff are members of the family or not and where it is said about 200 of the 648 employ their partners or other relatives as staff funded by the tax payer. Nor does the investigation look at travelling and subsistence while travelling, and office expenses. I begin with the four of the twenty I identified as meriting priority official investigation and then say something about the next sixteen. I wonder how many would agree with my selection?
001 John Austin is the Member of Parliament for the outer London constituency of Erith and Belverdere where he has his main home and where he also has another home 11 miles away in Southwark which he designated for allowances and which he bought for £110000 and sold for £14000 before buying new home 1.5 miles away from this for £225000 and claimed second home allowances for this. It is not known if he paid capital gains tax on the sale. He has claimed £133000 in second home expenses since 2001. He is said to have announced he was not standing at the General Election prior to the Telegraph series but date of this decision is not stated. His cases is but one of number of Members of Parliament who although living within easy commuting distance of Westminster have bought, repaired, maintained, sold at profit, second homes at the expense of the Taxpayer and where it is assumed he will retain the asset when he retires and presumably be able to switch designation to first home in order to sell it if he wishes without having to pay capital gains tax in the future.
002 Dawn Butler a Government Whip for which she is paid an additional salary and who lived in Stratford before becoming the Member for Barnet and renting a second home in Wembley which is the same distance to the House of Commons as his first home at Stratford. According to the Telegraph she had difficulty in making accurate claims, initially being paid twice for rent and when asked to return the £26000 she offered to submit other receipts to cover the amount. The Telegraph says although only elected a matter of weeks before the end of the financial year she tried to claim £4400 Food allowance, which would cover 11 months. She submitted a claim for £1500 for utilities for six months when the actual amount was £50 a month or £300 allowable. The claim was not paid. All together she is reported to have received £60000 in three years towards second home costs which many if not the majority would regard as having been unnecessary. As a new MP in the Whips Office, it is difficult to understand why her senior colleagues did not appropriately advise her what she could do, what she should do and what she should not. It is said that she has not claimed for the last year treating the Wembley establishment as her home. The position of her original first home is not stated.
003 Hazel Blears is the most well known of those meriting early official scrutiny because she is a Cabinet Member and the Prime Minister has said her conduct is wholly unacceptable. She designated her constituency home bought with her husband in 1997 as her second home in and the London home as her main home. Four months later she sold her London first home and made a profit of £45000. She told the income tax that this had been her first home and therefore was not liable for capital gains tax. She has now sent the taxman a cheque for the tax but still pockets the rest of the profit. She had claimed expenses in march 2004 for the Salford home, including a TV and a mattress for £1500. In December of the same year she bought a new London home claiming £1000 a month mortgage relief having declared it her second home and declared her Salford home as her main home again. She then bought a new TV and a Bed for the new London Home claiming a further £1800. She does not deny intent but insists what she did was within the rules and agreed by the Fees Office.
004 Chris Bryant. According to the Telegraph In 2002 Mr Bryant bought a flat in West London said to be valued at £400000, but designated his constituency property as the second home qualifying for the allowance. He attempted to claim three times the annual allowance when he purchased the constituency nominated home - £58000 for a property costing under £100000. He was allowed £20000 in the first year. He then made the West London flat his second home. This means he was free to sell the constituency home if he lost the seat or resigns, and pocket any profit without being required to pay any capital gains tax. He then sold the West London flat for a property closer to Westminster for £477000 three months later, having received some £3600 in taxpayer support. The new flat is said to have been purchased for £64000 also in West London but closer to Westminster and Mr Bryant received financial help from the taxpayer towards stamp duty £6400, £1000 a month mortgage and £6000 a year from ground rent and service charges. In all he has claimed £92000 since 2004.
005 Ian Austin where the salary as assistant Chief Whip is £89522, changed designation of home so as to be able to claim for new purchase, Claimed near maximum and query whether some purchases strictly within the rules and intentions
006 Hilary Armstrong Intention for Labour Party to buy computer at her tax payer funded home could compromise position and the Claims office suggested a flip in property designation to get round this potential problem otherwise her second home claims were reasonable and comparatively low.
007 Vera Baird Solicitor General salary £125602 the only thing raised was a rejected attempt to buy Christmas decorations and that she designated her London flat as her main home in order to claim for her constituency and larger home to get the larger allowances claim.
008 Ed Balls and 009 Yvette Cooper Salary each £141866. They were previously involved with a referral to Standards Commissioner because they had designated their Landon Family home as second home, sold and moved into a larger home but paid capital gains tax in full. Their new home is valued at £650000. They only claim the maximum of one additional home allowance although they are entitled to two allowances under previous rules.
010 Margaret Beckett Salary varied between £100000 and £140000. She spent £80000 on her former family home in her constituency where there were no rent or mortgage payments as second home after moving into Grace and Favour accommodation and she occupied grace and favour apartment at Admiralty House, where there are Income Tax implications and rented out her for London flat during this period.
011 Liz Blackman. Main home Nottingham constituency, Has one bedroom London flat for which she pays rent of £12000/£13000 a month and bought domestic items at end of each financial year to get as close to the maximum second home allowance as possible. a practice which applies is to other Members according to Telegraph. Claimed for food allowance of £250 to £350 a month. You only eat once!
012 Tony Blair raised two re-mortgages on his constituency second home which totalled £400000 after the initial mortgage of £30000. The first re-mortgage was for repairs and improvements but the second appears to have been to raise the deposit on his £3.65 million London main home for when he left Downing Street. He only claimed interest on buying and repairing the property. In addition to flats in Bristol one of which has been sold he has bought a £4 house in Bucks and spent £800000 buying a news house backing on to the London Home to create one property. He is said to have so far earned over £10 million since leaving the office of Prime Minister. The paper does not say what happened to the constituency home.
013 Ben Bradshaw is a Minister with a salary of £100,000 who switched the designation if his second home after entering into a civil partnership and being eligible for grants at this second home grants with mortgage reimbursement starting at an average of £1000 but rising to £1500 compared with under £700 for his former designated second home. The position is that if you buy a home with someone where you are not married/have a civil partnership, you can only claim half the mortgage. In the new situation Bradshaw paid the whole mortgage and was reimbursed accordingly.
014 Kevin Brennan moved from the North London home he was buying with his brother to a one bedroom flat closer to Westminster obtaining the maximum allowance for stamp duty and mortgage repayments. The raised concerns are the purchase of items delivered to his family home which he claims were for use at the designated second home and being allowed a claim for beds for his children rejected as not within the rules for others. It is not known what has happened to buying interest in the home bought with his brother, for which the tax payer contributed.
015 Gordon Brown Prime Minister salary £194 250 Mr Brown decided not use his grace and favour Flat at 11 Downing Street while Chancellor of the Exchequer but designated a flat in Westminster as the second home and not the constituency home. However as soon as Mr Blair announced his retirement Mr Brown designated his Constituency Home as the second home. The position of his Westminster home is not known since moving into 10 Downing Street.
016 Nick Brown claimed £18000 for food over four years without the need for receipts out of a total claim of £87000 over the four years
017 Russell Brown. The issued raised was the attempt to obtain reimbursement of the full cost of modernising the bathroom of rented accommodation. He was advised that the maximum was £3500 although he is reported to have stated that other colleagues were repaid more. The terms of the renting included the requirement to meet the cost of nay major repairs or improvements.
018 Andy Burnham, a Government Minister singled out by the Telegraph because of protracted eight month bid to use a special but out payment from rented property towards the purchase and equipping of a new designated home. The low cost designated London home was bought out by a company who offered tenants the right to stay at commercial rents or gave them a transfer to new property payment, which in his instance came to £18000. He paid this into the fees office but then engaged in the correspondence to be able to use the amount additional to other allowances and £16600 eventually paid toward the new property, and said to be in addition to the standard allowance. Mr Alexander has pointed out that in the period of review he has claimed £40000 less than the maximum available.
The Daily Telegraph wrote at length about Minister 019 Douglas Alexander but I do not understand what was the problem. The Minister’s designated home in his constituency was so badly damaged by fire that he had to live nearby for six months while the first was repaired and redecorated. His home was a yards away from property rented by the terrorists who attacked Glasgow Airport. Prior to the fire Mr Alexander had received £30000 for improvements but these are not listed. Mr Alexander was given help towards the temporary home and repaid approximately £2000 when his contents insurance was settled although he had found that he had been under insured overall.
020 Hilary Benn Claimed only £10000 a year on his second home allowance and had no queries raised by the Telegraph and is therefore the star goody of the twenty according to the Telegraph.
On Friday evening I watched the amazing two hour final result show of American Idol with the two contestants singing three songs each the night before. Simon in particular supported by the three other judges proclaimed Adam Lambert a creative International Star, but after nearly 100 million votes Chris Allen the evangelic Christian won. I suspect he received the majority of votes from the fellow evangelist Christian who came third and was not in the final. Chris is the talented musician from next door, who also plays the piano and guitar, while Adam came across as worldly, ambitious and highly professional. The amazing aspect was not the result but number if guest stars who performed with the final thirteen including Rod Stewart, Smokey Robinson and Cyndi Lauper and then Brian May of Queen.
Sussex beat Somerset at Taunton in the televised Quarter Final of the Friend‘s provident Trophy and have a home tie for the semi Final. I might get to see them play in the Final at Lords yet.
I managed to complete twenty completed sets registrations before deciding I wanted to work on the information about individual expense claims of Members of Parliament.
I am still struggling with the second level Chess having failed to achieve a run of more than thirty five wins over recent weeks, but have completed 1000 games of Hearts with only one loss.
I cleared the patio container of bulbs setting off to dry until next Autumn. I will take a look at what is offer at the B and Q garden centre on Wednesday morning when I can claim a 10% reduction.
On Friday I enjoyed a bacon roll at the Ship and Royal before doing a little shop at Azda for fruit and breads. I bought the Telegraph and had a good read which prompted the present research.
Jenson Button has top spot on the Monaco Grand Prix and which is usually the most boring of the races, yet prized because of the glamour and location. There is virtually nowhere on the circuit where one can overtake safely you rely on rain, driver or vehicle failure in in order to advance up the field. There is what has become the first of the one matches between England and the West Indies, at Bristol, another ground I have not visited and then after a roast chicken dinner I shall be going to Sunderland for the final match of the season against Chelsea which the team is expected to lose and where as much attention will be paid to the other results. It is coincidence but the four teams facing relegation with West Brom are all on the East Coast/riversides, Newcastle, Sunderland, the Boro and Hull, Tyne, Wear, Tees and Humber.
I have been over eating overall. I enjoyed a smoked mackerel salad and two pieces of white fish baked on Friday and Saturday a salmon steak salad and a pork stir fry, baking the meat in strips before cutting up and mixing in. There was melon, bananas and strawberries, all to the good as was a bowl of cereal. The problem was a croissant and three puff pastry fruit filled cakes as well s small carton of mixed olives. There was also a roll with soup. With fine weather promised I will try to make amends
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