Friday May 29 2009 byGabriel Milland, Political Correspondent AS MANY as 200 MPs could be stepping down or losing their seats in the great expenses storm, experts predicted last night.
Three more MPs announced yesterday that they would be quitting, making a total of 12 who are to step down before or at the next general election.
First of yesterday’s MP victims was Tory Julie Kirkbride following revelations involving the homes that she and her fellow-MP husband had got taxpayers to pay for.
She was followed by Labour’s Margaret Moran and Tory Christopher Fraser.
All three continued to insist they had done nothing wrong.
Last night it emerged that disgraced MPs are set to cost taxpayers an astonishing £335,000 each.
Honourable members exposed as expenses cheats and choosing to step down will collect around £230,000 in wages, pension contributions and expenses over the next year.
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DISGRACED: Christopher Fraser, Margaret Moran and Julie Kirkbride
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That will be topped off with up to £105,000 in golden goodbye payments.
Campaigners called for MPs forced to step down to quit the Commons immediately, instead of waiting for up to a year.
Susie Squire, campaign manager at the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said: “Any disgraced MPs should step down immediately and give their constituents the chance to elect someone they can be proud of.”
She added: “There should be no payoffs or resettlement grants for guilty MPs. They have fleeced taxpayers of quite enough.”
Last night Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg also called for shamed MPs to go now.
He said: “Why do people need to wait to have their say? If MPs have done something wrong then surely people in their constituencies should have the right to sack them.”
With up to 200 members of the Commons possibly stepping down or losing their seats because of the scandal, the total bill to taxpayers for so-called “zombie MPs” over the next year could reach almost £70million.
MPs who stay on in Westminster for another year will collect almost £65,000 in salary, plus £20,000 in pension contributions and an average £144,000 in expenses. By standing down at the next election instead of quitting immediately they are eligible for a resettlement grant of up to 100 per cent of their salary with the first £30,000 tax-free.
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That means MPs such as long-serving Sir Nicholas Winterton will collect another £65,000 while Ms Kirkbride will get around £32,500. Retiring MPs also collect a winding-up allowance of £40,799 supposed to be spent on employing staff to tie up loose ends.
On top of the immediate costs of £335,000, taxpayers will also pay for disgraced MPs’ lavish, index-linked pensions.
Those over 65 qualify for annual payouts of up to £48,000 while reduced pensions can be taken from 55.
Ms Kirkbride finally agreed to quit yesterday morning after it was revealed that she extended her taxpayer-subsidised mortgage by £50,000 so her brother could have his own room.
There were also allegations she had employed the wife of her local Conservative Association chairman as her secretary and given their daughter a job as their nanny.
The final act in her political career came almost a fortnight after it emerged that she and her fellow-MP husband Andrew MacKay had arranged their Commons expenses to claim almost £250,000.
Ms Kirkbride, 48, listed her constituency address as her second home while Mr MacKay listed their London property – meaning taxpayers picked up all of their living costs.
Tory leader David Cameron had tried to support Ms Kilbride but the continuing revelations had left her fatally damaged by yesterday morning.
Mr Cameron said he respected Ms Kirkbride’s decision to stand down and insisted she made had it herself.
But Ms Kirkbride yesterday refused to admit any wrong-doing. In a letter to Mr Cameron, she added: “My principal concern has to be for my very loyal local supporters in Bromsgrove whose trust in me has been very humbling in the last few weeks.”
However more than 5,000 constituents had signed a petition calling for her to go.
South West Norfolk’s Christopher Fraser allegedly spent £1,800 on trees at his constuency home. He insisted his wife’s health problems were to blame and the matter was unconnected to the row.
Minister Tony McNulty, who is being investigated over claiming allowances for the house where his parents live, has repaid thousands of pounds he “mistakenly’’ received, it emerged yesterday.
The Work and Pensions Minister has returned £2,600 for mortgage interest payments and £455 for council tax. But a spokesman insisted it related to “calculation errors’’ rather than basic problems with the claims.
Mr McNulty has denied wrongdoing, insisting he regularly works at the Harrow home but in March announced he had stopped claiming the second home payment.
He owns the house which is in his Harrow East constituency, 11 miles from Parliament, and lives with his wife in her house three miles from Westminster.
Scotland Yard is considering whether to launch a formal probe into his expenses arrangements, and those of other MPs.
SHOULD DISGRACED MPS LOSE ALL THEIR PERKS?
HAVE YOUR SAY!
ONLY 200?
29.05.09, 10:26pm
Are you implying that there maybe approx 450 honest ones? or more likely 450 who have covered their backsides better.
The guilty MUST be punished,not rewarded
• Posted by: JackPershing • Report Comment
AND THE REST
29.05.09, 7:03pm
Get all those out who robbed the country while pretending to represent the people who elected them. Not only get them out, but get them out before the next election so they do not get any bonuses. Or if this results in an early election the same applies. Have them repay all the money they stole before they go. No peerages for any of them EVER! Have the police investigation take all of them to court like the common man if thier actions require it - ie no cover ups. All of them give up the right to ever stand for Parliament ever again.
Then elect replacements who are just, honest and want to do the job they are elected to do. Overhaul the rules for expenses, not just in the House of Commons, but in the Lords and also the EU Parliament.
Give the people the referendums they have deserved, on Lisbon and on our membership of the EU. This Parliament and future Parliaments need to listen to the people, and represent the people, it is right that we should be able to democratically show our opinion on major issues involving our country.
This fiasco has been going on for far too long, have an indepent body outside of "goverment" control to oversee all MP"s expenses and payrises. For too long have these elected officials been able to ratify their own pay rises way above the cost of living, while restricting other public sector services (Police, Fire, Ambulance, Military, Teachers etc) to rises way below.
Fix it NOW!
• Posted by: WinstonChurchill • Report Comment
KICK THEM WHEN THEY ARE DOWN THE BANK ?
29.05.09, 6:50pm
""KICK 'EM WHEN THE'RE DOWN
29.05.09, 6:33pm
It's a free for all kick an MP time, but why now?
If you think it's just because they fiddled their expencese then you are missing the carefully nurtured crisis in the making. It's now taken on a life of it's own and even perfectly good MPs are being hounded out of their jobs as the rabid public smells blood.
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No, I think that we are kicking the MPs because they all helped themselves to the Westminster pot of money and Tax evasion funds and put themselves into a bribable, blackmailable position when it came to important votes in Westminster - Like the Lisbon Treaty, the Nice Treaty, Maastrict, and even the EURO sell off of the Royal Mail Postmen.
...we are not thinking of voting Naye Sir, ? What with a mortgage on a non existant home ?.. best go with the Ayes...if I was you...."
• Posted by: JonO • Report Comment
KICK 'EM WHEN THE'RE DOWN
29.05.09, 6:33pm
It's a free for all kick an MP time, but why now?
If you think it's just because they fiddled their expencese then you are missing the carefully nurtured crisis in the making. It's now taken on a life of it's own and even perfectly good MPs are being hounded out of their jobs as the rabid public smells blood.
But what got it to this stage? MPs expenses were hardly the most important thing on peoples minds. The bank baleout, increasing taxes, job security, ressession, they are all more important financially than the amount of money MPs screw out of the expense system.
Would MPs expenses have been a hot topic if the media failed to report it? But they did report it but there are plenty of things that they don't bother reporting or chose when to report.
The result is a massive clearout of the house of commons and a reform. Most welcome this, but it looks like the whole MP expenses thing was arranged in order to facilitate this spring clean.
• Posted by: Wayland • Report Comment
BEFORE THEY GO.....!!!
29.05.09, 6:09pm
Perhaps before they all disappear into oblivion, one of them could find out what is happening here......
This e-Mail arrived today from a friend....is this an indication of panic sweeping through the corridors of Parliament, and outbound to the various Council Offices around the UK? It's beginning to look as if the situation appertaining to MP's expenses is not the only blight existing in our society. Whatever is happening with these Postal ballots doesn't look ethical, in fact there appears to be a distinct aroma of corruption.
• QUOTE:
"DEMOCRACY ROBERT MUGABE STYLE
Zimbabwe-style electoral practices are being adopted by the political elite in Britain. Postal ballots in the Copeland Council, Cumbria, North West European election region, are being stored in easily opened cardboard boxes until counting day on June 7th. Clive Jefferson, North West Regional Organiser said: “The boxes being used are of extremely poor quality... This is extremely alarming because the council has steel boxes but they are deliberately not using them.”
Mr Jefferson pointed out that Copeland Council have never before used anything else but the steel boxes. “All of a sudden, because our support has grown in the region, we are confronted with cardboard boxes in which the postal and other votes are going to be stored until they are counted,” he said.
The BNP polled 40 percent of the vote in the Kells by-election in December, Mr Jefferson said. “Why is it that as our support rises to an all-time high, the council sees fit to stop using steel ballot boxes and switch to poor quality cardboard ones which could easily be tampered with?”
“This is an outrage and an invitation for electoral fraud,” he said. “I have made the strongest possible complaints to the returning officer in Copeland Council and to the North West returning officer. It appears that despite my best efforts, the security of the English ballot has been reduced to a pile of flat pack cardboard boxes.”
Mr Jefferson appealed for all those concerned about a free and fair election to telephone or email Copeland and Manchester Council, and politely voice their concerns over this matter.
“A polite email or call to the Whitehaven News to firmly express your outrage about this disgraceful situation would also be appreciated,” Mr Jefferson said."
• UNQUOTE:
If the MP's of the major parties & Council House members are concerned about the people’s interest in the BNP, they should look inwards at their own conduct & perhaps the reasons will become obvious. Whether the public interest is in respect of a 'Protest Vote' or a genuine desire to stop the decay to the British Culture.....is probably debatable, however it looks like there could be a few shocks on the horizon next week.
• Posted by: Anonymouse • Report Comment
IF I HAD STOLEN FROM MY PLACE OF WORK...
29.05.09, 5:59pm
...the Police would have been involved and I would have been given the sack in disgrace with no references or redundancy money. Why are these so called 'Gentlemen' who we have chosen to represent us allowed to get away with these shady going ons?
• Posted by: Disgruntled • Report Comment
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