Slow-motion car crash

JGS

You're right. Neither Ms Harman nor the rest of this tawdry government get it. They're dole cheats; no more, no less.

DavefromLuton

The Derek Conway argument would have more credibility if she linked with him the sort of abuse perpetrated by Jacqui Smith.
Both examples stink and should be roundly condemned.

Vulture

Hmmm - I expect they will. But before crowing TOO loudly over the exposure of this manifest Liebour corruption, let's just wait and see what the (no- longer) Torygraph has to say about the Tories' exes. You are right to draw attention to the BNP - they are going to be the main beneficiaries of this exposure of the sins of the entire political elite. Where are General Dannatt's tanks when you need them? (Probably mothballed for lack of the proper parts).

Ivy Eileen

"our system does not have the corruption that obtains in other countries" -

this was the line being put out by Toenails Robinson on the 8.00 a.m. (Radio 2) News. How irrelevant is it possible to be? What happened to judgement, integrity and standards - what used to be the British hallmark.

Stepney

So. Let's get this straight. The Leader of the House of Commons - the foremost defender of our democracy defends the plundering and THEFT of the public coffers by our representatives by saying that:

We're not as bad as other countries.

That's it? That's the best she can do? That's how far we've come since magna carta? Can you imagine that in a Crown Court?

"I may have robbed the pensioner but she at least she wasn't on crutches. That would have been really bad"

How much more of this filth masquerading as virtue can we take? If we were a little less English we'd be building barricades and ripping up the cobblestones...

Nick

Harriet Harman is coming close to claiming that "foreigners are corrupt" which comes across as an oddly xenophobic "Daily Mail-type" comment from a professed "progressive" left winger.

Mike, Brighton

Some of this is just simply fraud. If I did 1% of this this in my expenses claims at work I'd get sacked.
It really is end-game stuff. I thought Brown and Labour would hang on until May 2010 now I'm havind real doubts. It's going to be horrific to watch his eviction from No.10 with not a shred of principle of integrity left.

Kevyn Bodman

The expenses claims may well be within the rules.
Who wrote the rules?
Does any MP think that if these rules had been put to the electorate in advance of being implemented the voting public would have approved them?

It was said clearly on a comment on another thread:
using expenses to increase the value of private property is theft.

And,in disagreement with Vulture:
let's crow VERY loudly about the exposure of this manifest Liebour corruption.

And if the Tories' exes show abuse, let's denounce THEM loudly too.

C Powell

I'm with Stepney on the ripping up of cobblestones.

This is fraud, pure and simple.

I run an investigations unit within a major commercial entity and if any of our employees did even a tenth of what these MPs have done they'd be dismissed for gross misconduct.

As for Harman's comparison with other countries, this is contemptible. At least in Italy there was a "Clean Hands" operation and magistrates who took action and a large number of politicians/businessmen and others were arrested/sent to prison/indicted and convicted.

All we're getting here is bleating about the "rules" / about their "mistakes" / about how they've repaid the money - have they repaid interest on that money? / about how the Fees Office approved the payments thus trying, unsubtly, to pass the blame onto them (even Harman was doing this this morning) and other feeble excuses that wouldn't pass muster if it were a benefit cheat doing it.

The words of Margaret Thatcher when explaining why she didn't take her Prime Ministerial salary - "I never forgot that it was taxpayers' money" - ought to be tattooed on MPs' hands so that they're reminded of them every time they take their credit card out......

THX1138

Going to be a long day for Labour but I do smell a rat.

Why no Tory expenses claims leaked?

If the the leakers thought they were doing the Tories a favour it's a big mistake. It's bound to come out later, wouldn't it have have been better to get it all out in the open today and for it to get diluted in a general rant against the lot of them? Now we're just going to get the Tory day in the expenses spot light later on and nearer the GE.

John Lea

Stepney - you don't expect honest argument from this crowd, do you? Harman has a 3rd-rate mind and doesn't see the hypocrisy in occupying the role of Deputy Leader of the Labour Party while sending her offspring to private school.

Mafia of the mediocre.

boulay

nicky campbell nailed harman on 5 live this morning. in response to him asking about some cabinet members she said" i won't comment on specific cases" and he lashed back at her "but you commented on derek conway" and put her nicely back in her box.

it is pretty tragic that they are trying to refocus people's attention on conway - in fact they need to be careful as conway was quickly dealt with and the public will ask why labour are not dealing with their miscreants too.

Pete Hoskin

THX: My understanding is that The Telegraph are going to go through all the claims systematically over the next few days. They just started with the Cabinet. I expect we'll be hearing plenty about the other parties in due course.

oldrightie

"our system does not have the corruption that obtains in other countries."
Except for Brown's brother and EDF or The Lord Drayson Powderject scam or BaE systems coruption. Wehave that third world corruption and a sophisticated Civil Service to keep it quiet.

TomTom

Harriet Harman is a very low wattage bulb. She screams about Fred Goodwin getting his legal entitlement in lieu of written warnings and Industrial Tribunal but defends PRIVILEGE when it is Labour Mps with "snouts in the trough" as NUR Leader Sid Weighell once so elegantly expressed it

Stepney

With regard to my earlier Crown Court analogy the defence that the appropriation of taxpayers money was "within the rules" can be interpreted as

"It's not my fault. I only burgled the house because they left the door unlocked"

Kevyn Bodman

About 14,13 and 12 years ago we were facing Tory sleaze as well.
Different details, but sleaze nonetheless.
I loathe the current government but I think a large part of the problem is the character of those who go into politics, on all sides, in our current system.

I think Harriet Harman is almost completely wrong in her analysis of the motivation of MPs.

Between 35 and 25 years ago I was a member of the Labour Party, in different constituencies.
A lot of ordinary members had joined because they thought that the party was a vehicle for making things better in the country.They were fundamentally decent people.
The same was true of all the members of the Conservative party, the Liberals and Plaid Cymru whom I met during the canvassing periods before elections.The ordinary members, by and large, are fine even if you disagree with their politics.

My first doubts came during the years of debate on devolution.
It seemed to me then ,and still does, that many supporters of devolution were motivated by 2 major factors:
1) it provided another layer of government and therefore increased opportunities to interfere.
2)it opened up more possibilities of getting elected to a nice salaried position.
The second point is important; it is my belief that many or most MPs or parliamentary candidates are there for reasons of personal status and/or money.
Of course there are people for whom the money is not that significant. That's where the search for status comes in.

Understand that and politicians' behaviour becomes easier to explain.
Why do backbenchers creep and fawn to become ministers? Why don't cabinet ministers resign when they believe the government is pursuing mistaken policies?
Because their concern is not for the country.It is for themselves.

Treat all politicians with the respect they deserve.

Susan Hill

Overheard in my coffee shop this morning.'I`ve always voted Labour. I thought they were the honest ones. Well never a-bloody-gain.'

bitter and twisted

Brown and the cleaner...mmmm...reeks of financial incompetence to be paying as much as this to keep a flat clean.
And second, mmmm some moral compass - why the heck should taxpayers pick up the bill at all? Trying explaining this to the public on the hustings.
I really think the government is truly dead now. Everyday is a farce. They can't go on till next year. There will be a revolution on the streets before then.

catesby

Five times since 10 o'clock last night I have been warned that if we are too critical of Gordon Brown and his colleagues about their expenses, we will be playing into the hands of the BNP.
Is this just coincidence, or has someone issued a "line to take"?
If the latter, why is the BBC's Nick Robinson parroting it alongside the choir of Labour's media stooges?

The Huntsman

I care not a fig for any comparison with other countries. To try and explain this away by saying 'we are corrupt but less so than other corrupt countries, so you should be very grateful' is to treat the British Taxpayer with contempt.

What we want is a system that ensures that there is no corruption and that the Taxpayer can see for him/herself that individual politicians are not simply looting the public purse.

If other countries have more corruption, that is their problem. We, however, choose to beat it out of our system: so' lay on with a will!

Incidentally is not the most egregious example of this the behaviour of twice-disgraced Mandelson who, having lined up a fat cat job in Brussels and after announcing he was going, proceeded to enagage in the systematic pillaging of the public purse in what can only be seen as a calculated piece of self-enrichment?

THX1138

Thanks for clearing that up Pete, I'm looking forward to finding out how much Dave's bicycle clips are costing us.

Steve.W

A question to Harriet Harman, you talk about -

“ the corruption that obtains in other countries.”

If these are Continental countries why do you allow the UK to be in a political confederation with them?

Mike, Brighton

THX1138 : Tory frontbencher expenses (such as cleaning the swimming pool amd servicing the Aga) are coming out tonight for publication in tomorrow's Telegraph.

The rat I smell is that Brown went onto YouTub a few days ago so I guess Andrew Porter tipped No.10 off that this was coming?

John Lea

Talk about irony, I witnessed a BNP rally in Glasgow 2 weeks ago, where the elderly BNP candidate was trying to attract attention by stating 'British jobs for Britsh workers', while a spotty student - who happened to be a wearing a t-shirt with some naff socialist slogan on it - shouted him down, bawling 'Nazi Scum!' in his face.

Paul B

To bloody many of them, with too little to do and too much time on their hands.Being an ordinary back bench MP is not a full time job, they need to paid a basic honorarium, of say 40grand (generous I believe) a year and thats it.Office staff to be paid for,employed & recruited by an independent branch say of the Cabinet Office, and hotel rooms bulk purchased by that same branch for those MPs representing out of London & out of commuting distance constituencies.

PS I used to commute on daily basis from a North Oxfordshire village to central London, so I would draw the compass mark distance far beyond the outer London Boroughs of Hillingdon, Bromley, Havering etc etc on what would be considered a reasonably daily commute.

A plague on all their houses

The Bellman

She doesn't seem terribly keen to bring this case before her much-vaunted Court of Public Opinion.

I'm glad Harriet thinks "most" MPs enter politics for public service, but I'm not sure she can single out Conway while ignoring Jackboots or Mandelson. Unfortunately for these protestations, the picture now emerging is more that "I entered for the public service, but I *stayed* for the gravy."

Ken

@bitter and twisted:

On carpets.. and this from a man who claimed earlier that the £1.8 million bill for allowing all Gurkhas in, was too high.

The homegrown Mafia is of course just so superior to the continetal wallahs. (to paraphrase Hateperson)

Nicholas

Catesby, no it is a "line". It follows the usual New Labour modus operandi of pointing at demons to divert attention from their own, oh so copious, failings. It also touches on the socialist tendency for highly charged emotional blackmail to coerce compliance with their deluded and distorted view of the world. We saw it last night from Gray on QT over the DNA Register. Some examples:-

"Freedom of speech does not extend to shouting "Fire!" in a crowded cinema"

""People should also have the freedom not to be blown up by terrorists"

"We will do whatever is necessary to ensure the safety of our citizens"

"Our criminal justice values focus on the victims" (a good excuse to undermine all safeguards for the accused - fine unless you happen to be innocent)

"If you have done nothing wrong you have nothing to fear"

Look out also for key cliché buzz words/phrases like "unacceptable" and "sending a message".

Basically - if you don't do as we say you are an evil extremist and we will kill the puppy.

The links to totalitarian communism, although thinly cloaked, are discernible in most of the "lines" crafted and spouted by Brown's junta of former Marxists. Leopards don't change their spots - they only appear to change as the predatory beasts slink through the undergrowth in pursuit of their deadly purpose. The citing of Conway was not haphazard but deliberate and connived at, like McBride's smears. Expect to see other New Labour gauleiters parroting this comparison.

Boudicca

So Harman - the so-called Leader of the House - highlight Derek Conway but fails to mention the disgraceful behaviour of Smith and McNulty (the latter claimed for a property he doesn't even own and which he says he used as an office despite having an official office a mile or so away).

I thought the Leader of the House was supposed to represent the House of Commons - not Labour.

Miss Harman is as blatently biased as Gorbals Mick, the Speaker.

That is not to excuse Conway - or any other Tories found to be fraudulently raiding the public purse. But this is going to hit Labour far worse. They've been the Party of Government for the past 12 years; they've allowed this corrupt system to develop and they have blatently been benefitting from it.

In Parliament because they want to serve the public.... my ar$e.

Ian C

The 'rules' can be summed as "MP's can rip the public off as they choose to write the rules".

And Hatty Harridan can't see that this is what she is defending instead of admitting it is immoral, dishonest and disgusting. Gobsmacking.

CW. Glasgow

While it is good sport to watch the public impaling of MPs on specific items, it is quite clear that the culture of abuse of the allowance system has a number of origins. One was the practice of the successive PMs of the day over the last 20 years of urging and securing pay restraint from his parliamentary colleagues for political impact. This resulted in both wage erosion and grievance. This in turn spawned an "entitlement" attitude towards maximising the return from what in retrospect has been a soft allowances regime in compensation.

In this climate there is little doubt that only an eccentric or highly moral few will have resisted all the temptations that were offered by creative exploration of the lax monitoring of a generous and ill-policed system. I am sure the lucrative mechanisms which have developed have been a significant topic of all party tea-room discussion.

However I consider the whole brouhaha to be a relatively trivial matter and a diversion in the context of the current national issues Parliament is facing.

I suggest that pending the introduction of a new system (hopefully for vouched expenses rather than allowances)there should be an amnesty of say 4 weeks for MPs to "fess up" to any sharp practice they now wish to recant from and repay the sums in question. This should apply to all claims except for criminal deception - eg claiming allowances for an unoccupied flat - which should go, not to Parliamentary officials but to the DPP.

After the amnesty expires any offences subsequently coming to light should be publicised by a newly vigilant and strictly independent Parliamentary standards commission.

Not perfect but surely a pragmatic approach to a systemic and endemic wrong causing longer term disproportionate damage to and diversion of an important public body.

While MPs have demeaned their office by their sharp practices I think it is time for a fresh start rather than a tawdry and tedious series of show trials in the courts of public opinion.

In any event, its not as if any journalist or voter ever "larged up" an expenses claim!

Verity

Reading the very acute comments above, I wonder whether Harriet Harman is, in fact, sane; or whether she's as untethered to reality and off with the squirrels as Gordon Brown. She offers up the thought, which she clearly believes to be palliative, that we're not as corrupt as some other countries - clearly referring to Europe. As someone wrote above, if European politics is that corrupt, why on earth are we formally shackling ourselves to them?

I like the suggestion from Paul B that MPs be paid an honorarium of £40,000 a year and should have a pleasant, modern but modest, hostel available to them for those from outside London.

In addition, with most of the legislation - except the ever-tightening noose that squeezes the liberties out of our society - comes out of the vile EUSSR anyway. So we certainly don't need 600 of them. Three hundred would be more the marke. Or 250. By ceding so much of our precious power to the EUSSR, they tightened the noose around their own necks. That's how stupid they are.

BTW, has there ever - going by the evidence - been a bigger fraudster in Parliament than Jackboots Jacqui? Apparently, on her council tax, she claims that the home she shares with her porn-fan husband and her children is actually her primary residence after all! It's a miracle! Yet, to the expense checkers at Westminster, she says her sister's spare room is her primary residence. Shurely shome mistake, occifer ...

noaxetogrind

A carrier bag? A bath plug? This is really terrible! A million or two - this is fair reward for failure!

John Lea

Verity - not only is MS Smith a fraudster, the fact that someone so vacuous and second rate could become Home Secretary tells you just how low this country has sunk in political terms. And we all thought Margaret Beckett as Foreign Secretary was embarrassing! Blimey, she looks positively Churchillian compared to our Jacqueline.

Mark Adrian Solomon

I always believed the line that the UK was less corrupt than some of our neighbours until I actually moved to one of them - Spain. Having lived here for 12 years I can see now that the UK is just as corrupt as the worst of them, it just hides it better and because the British people do not expect it, corruption is not sought out with the same vigour. Here there is at least one investigating judge permanently looking into cases of corruption and while of course many are just attempted smears of political opponents, there are regular arrests to keep the rest on their toes. Given how thouroughly the UK has been Europeanised under Labour, perhaps they should import an independent anti-political-corruption unit too.... but then I suspect they won't and we all know why!

carol42

No wonder they don't care about council tax doubling in the past twelve years or about the huge increase in stamp duty, they don't pay either. No worries about the rising costs of food and fuel, don't pay that. Will someone tell me what on earth do they pay for from their salary? a whole different world from normal people they are no better than benefit cheats and should be treated the same when caught

nick

Conway's actions were inexcusable, but wasn't he thrown out of the Conservative party as a result, now sits as an independent and will be out of a job as soon as Brown calls an election?
By contrast Jacqui Smith is not just still in the Labour party, she still holds one of the four most senior positions in Government.