SHAMELESS MINISTERS SHOW NO REMORSE FOR EXPENSES SCANDAL

Shocking revelations included more than £6,000 claimed by Mr Brown to pay his brother Andrew to fund a shared cleaner.

The PM also claimed his Westminster flat was his second home for years before switching it to his constituency house in Scotland. Justice Secretary Jack Straw overcharged taxpayer funds by around £1,500 for council tax reimbursement, which he has since paid back.

Former Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott claimed the maximum sum of £400 a month for food and claimed twice to have his lavatory seat mended.

Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon used the second home allowance to help him build up a property portfolio worth an estimated £1.7million.

As tensions grew over the scandal, Commons authorities called in the police to investigate how two million receipts used to back up MPs’ claims were leaked to a newspaper.

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And last night it emerged that employment minister Tony McNulty could also face a police probe over his £60,000 claims towards a ‘second home’ in Harrow where his parents lived.

A parade of Cabinet ministers yesterday tried to dismiss the public fury. Hazel Blears said: “I have only ever had one small one-bedroom flat in London. I live here in Salford but to be an MP, I have to have somewhere to live in London.”

Business Secretary Lord Mandelson claimed the leak was “classic smear tactics” being used “to inflict damage on the Government, on Labour politicians, by creating the perception, but not the fact or the evidence, of wrongdoing”.

He added: “If there had been any wrongdoing on the part of a Cabinet minister you would have heard about it a long time ago.”

House of Commons Leader Harriet Harman admitted: “I know it looks bad, I know people are angry about it and we have already agreed to make a change. But what I don’t want is for people to feel that all MPs are corrupt and the system is rotten.”

But many MPs expressed horror at yesterday’s revelations.

Liberal Democrat MP Norman Baker, a campaigner against Westminster sleaze, said: “There has been a tacit agreement to claim more on expenses, a nod and a wink agreement.

“The rules themselves are set by MPs – so this has probably all been approved – but the reality is this doesn’t wash down the pub.”

Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg said: “We cannot allow this going on. It does an immense amount of damage to British democracy.”