| Author | Message | | gchq | | Posted: Wed Jun 17, 2009 11:17 pm Post subject: Kitty Ussher sacked from government over her claims |
| MPs' expenses: Kitty Ussher sacked from government over her claims
The Guardian
17 Jun 2009
Move comes in the face of evidence that Treasury minister 'flipped' her homes to avoid paying capital gains tax
Kitty Ussher's departure was prompted by revelations that an accountant
advised her how to avoid paying capital gains tax. Photograph: David Levene
Gordon Brown received a blow tonight on the eve of the publication of MPs' expenses when he was forced to sack Kitty Ussher as a junior Treasury minister in the face of evidence that she "flipped" her homes to avoid paying capital gains tax.
As demoralised MPs brace themselves for another blow to theirreputation tomorrow, the prime minister told Ussher she would have to stand down as exchequer secretary after the Daily Telegraph revealed that an accountant advised her how to avoid paying capital gains tax.
In 2007 Ussher changed the designation of her main home for one month, under the parliamentary allowance system, from her south London property to her house in her Burnley constituency. This meant that she avoided paying CGT, which is liable on second properties, when she sold her Burnley property for a £40,000 profit in March 2007.
The Telegraph tonight informed Ussher that it would tomorrow be publishing a letter from her accountant advising her that changing the designation of her homes allowed her to avoid capital gains tax.
Ussher contacted Brown, who told her that receiving such tax advice made it impossible for her to continue as a Treasury minister. Downing Street accepts that she acted lawfully and within the rules of the Commons.
As an economist, who has an easy manner, Ussher was tipped for high office. But she ran into trouble last month when the Telegraph reported that she asked the Commons authorities whether she could claim for the replacement of Artex coveings on the ceilings in her London house. "It could be a matter of taste, but this counts as 'dilapidations' in my book!" she wrote.
In the reshuffle earlier this month Ussher was moved back to the Treasury (where she had been a minister until last October), from her position as minister responsible for housing benefit in the deparment of work and pensions.
She insisted tonight that she did nothing wrong, but had decided to resign to avoid causing any embarrassment to Brown. In her letter to him she wrote: "It is with the greatest regret I have decided to resign from the government. After careful consideration I arrived at this decision because I do not want to cause you or the government any embarrassment.
"I did not do anything wrong. At all times my actions have been in line with HM Revenue and Customs guidance and based on the advice of a reputable firm of accountants who in turn were recommended to me by the House of Commons fees office. Neither have I abused the allowance system of the House of Commons in any way."
Ussher, 38, who has two children under the age of five, also announced that she would not contest the next election because she finds it difficult to combine life as an MP, minister and parent. "As you know I also decided some time ago, completely for family reasons, that I would not be putting my name forward to contest the next general election. The hours of Parliament simply don't work with kids. There is no other reason for this decision."
Sarah McCarthy-Fry, MP for Portsmouth North, will replace Ussher. McCarthy-Fry has spent just two weeks as a junior communities minister.
The resignation of Ussher comes as MPs brace themselves for the publication of their expenses tomorrow. MPs are likely to face charges of a cover-up as the Commons authorities finally officially publish one million expenses claims and receipts covering the past four years, but censor some of the most damaging information.
The online publicationon Thursday will exclude all rejected claims and their addresses, disguising the extent to which politicians used the "flipping" tactic to redesignate their second homes so they maximised their income.
Tomorrow's long-awaited publication, the result of a year-long court battle, came as the Speaker, Michael Martin, made a farewell address in which he fired a blistering parting shot at the party leaders, especially Brown, for failing to show leadership by backing his package of reforms to MPs' expenses last year.
In a bitter final speech, he accused MPs of "passing up the opportunity" to clean up the expenses system last year.
Martin, effectively the first Speaker to be ejected from office for nearly 300 years, rounded on MPs, describing their response to his own package of reforms as "deeply disappointing".
He said: "I wish with all my heart that that package of recommendations had won the confidence of the House [of Commons] last July. And I wish that party leaders had shown then some of the leadership they have shown now".
He accepted that such votes on MPs' pay aretraditionally not whipped, but pointedly said: "This does not remove the responsibility of leaders to speak up for common sense and for the obvious wishes of the country in seeking necessary reform."
He reminded MPs : "Half of all Members did not attend to vote, and more than half of those who did vote rejected the proposals. I regretted that then: I deeply regret it now, and I expect that many Members of the House now share that regret."
In reality, David Cameron did whip his shadow cabinet to support the package, and much of the resistance was organised by Labour backbenchers.
Brown himself did not vote, some cabinet members including Jacqui Smith and Andy Burnham rejected the package, and 30 ministers voted for the status quo.
His voice cracking with emotion, Martin, due to step down on Sunday, argued his "blunt and straightforward proposals" would have ended the many practices for which Members had been attacked in recent weeks.
The package would have stopped claims for furniture and household goods, stopped outer London MPs claiming for the cost of the second homes, and introduced a system of external audit. He said his package had been praised at the time by Sir Christopher Kelly, the chairman of the committee on standards in public life.
The failure of MPs to reform the expenses system has now led to Kelly being asked to make recommendations for reform, as well as for MPs to be forced to end centuries of self-regulation. Details of the new independent regulator will be published by the government next week with the aim of the new system reaching the statute book by the summer recess.
Reform-minded Labour MPs were privately scathing at what they regarded as a partial and self-justifying account, pointing out that Martin had led the expensive legal efforts to prevent the disclosure of the receipts.
Conservative sources expressed their disbelief that the Commons authorities were only publishing the expenses claims tomorrow, nearly five weeks after the Daily Telegraph started its daily damaging publication of details of claims.
The parliamentary authorities said they first needed to clear the claims with MPs, many of whom are now expecting publication to lead to a fresh round of criticism in their local papers.
The Tories would have preferred for all the expenses claims, including those rejected by the fees office, to be published, as well as full details about second homes. Cameron was facing trouble in his own ranks as the Tory backbencher Brian Binley said he would not repay expenses claimed for renting a flat from his own company. If the Tory scrutiny panel recommends he must pay it back, he will lose the party whip if he refuses. The panel will report next week.
There were fresh claims last night over the former Tory chair, Caroline Spelman, who submitted her expenses to the Coventry Evening Telegraph.
She claimed £40,000 for bills and cleaning for her second home in her Meriden constituency, while her husband Mark claimed it was his main home when he stood unsuccessfully for the European parliament earlier this month.
Jim Devine, the fifth Labour MP to be forced to stand down over his expenses claims, indicated he may force an early byelection after he was told by the party's disciplinary panel that his expenses claims disqualified him from standing for Labour again
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Tony Blair - War Criminal
http://www.petitiononline.com/BWCF/petition.html | |  | | gchq | | Posted: Thu Jun 18, 2009 2:22 pm Post subject: Campaigners cry foul as MPs' expenses are published |
| Campaigners cry foul as MPs' expenses are published – but heavily redacted
The Times
18 Jun 2009
The British political Establishment faced another wave of public anger today after Commons authorities launched a new era of transparency on a sea of black ink.
Tens of thousands of MPs' expenses claims – totalling more than a million documents in PDF format – were posted on the Parliament website at 6am, more than a year after the High Court ruled that MPs should not be exempt from freedom of information laws.
As voters soon saw, the year has been well spent. Both the claims and the receipts accompanying them have been heavily "redacted" – censored – to remove personal details such as addresses, regular travel schedules or names of suppliers.
What was left is often the pettiest of details.
* Tony Blair spent £260 on shredding as he wound up his parliamentary affairs. He also spent £6,990 repairing the roof of his constituency home shortly before leaving No 10.
* The Tory leader David Cameron was charged £150 by Tory whips to replace a lost pager shortly before he became party leader in 2005. Taxpayers picked up the bill.
* George Osborne, the Shadow Chancellor, claimed £47 for two copies of a DVD showing him giving a speech on "value for money".
* Jeremy Hunt, the Shadow Culture Secretary, submitted a phone bill for 1p in October 2005
* Ben Bradshaw, now the Culture Secretary responsible for the country's digital future, allegedly spent £30 on an engineer to show him how to connect a scart plug to his TV
More than a dozen MPs have already seen their political careers ended after the unedited claims were leaked to the Daily Telegraph six weeks ago.
The latest casualty is the junior Treasury minister Kitty Ussher, who quit the Government last night after allegations that she avoided paying capital gains tax by "flipping" her second home. The allegations against Ms Ussher could never have been stood up if the parliamentary censors had had their way.
If the unredacted claims had never leaked out, the public might never have heard of Douglas Hogg's moat or Sir Peter Viggers's duck house. Hazel Blears and Jacqui Smith – both tainted by the scandal – might still be in the Cabinet.
The result is that Westminster's stable doors have been shut after the horses have well and truly bolted.
Maurice Frankel, of the Campaign for Freedom of Information, said that the release today was a "very poor substitute" for the unedited material.
"The problem is that there are no address details," he said. "That means there is no way of knowing whether or when an MP has been ’flipping’."
The former chairman of the Committee on Standards in Public Life, Sir Alistair Graham, agreed that too much information had been withheld from the public.
"I am against the sort of redaction and censorship which has clearly taken place," he told the BBC.
He predicted that there would be more political casualties as further abuses came to light. "I don’t think we are at the end of this story at all. We may not even be at the beginning of the end. I think this is going to run and run," he said.
Today’s official publication covers printed documents and receipts relating to MPs’ claims between 2004-05 and 2007-08 for a series of parliamentary allowances, but with many personal details redacted.
These include claims under the £24,000-a-year additional costs allowance, which reimburses MPs for the cost of having to maintain a second home while serving at Westminster; the £22,000 incidental expenses provision, which pays for running an office; and the £10,400 communications allowance, which covers the cost of newsletters and websites to inform constituents about their activities, as well as details of expenditure on stationery and postage.
Among those criticising the excessive redaction this morning was Norman Baker, the Liberal Democrat MP for Lewes, who said that a better balance needed to be struck between freedom of information and data protection.
"We had a Freedom of Information Act: the result is the publication of expenses today, but we need something to make it all real and tangible," he said. "The Freedom of Information Act has been a great addition to this country, but it is offset by data protection."
The Labour MP David Chaytor has announced that he is stepping down in Bury North at the next general election after admitting an "unforgivable error" in claiming £13,000 in interest for a mortgage that he had already paid off.
But the latest expenses disclosure has Mr Chaytor’s second home address blacked out — meaning that it is virtually impossible to cross-check mortgage records.
The same goes for the former agriculture minister Elliot Morley, who blamed "sloppy accounting" last month when it emerged that he had claimed £16,000 for a mortgage that had been paid off.
The Scunthorpe MP has since announced that he will be standing down at the next general election. In each of the four years covered by the disclosure, the claim form for additional costs allowance (ACA) states that money can be reimbursed only for "costs you have actually paid".
Police are considering whether to open a formal investigation into the arrangements of both men, along with severa other MPs.
Mr Chaytor faced a fresh allegation of wrongdoing today after the Telegraph reported that he used his parliamentary expenses to pay his daughter for work under an assumed name.
It said that Mr Chaytor claimed almost £5,000 on his office allowances for research work done by "Sarah Rastrick", whose address and mobile phone number matched those of his daughter, Sarah Chaytor.
Miss Chaytor, 27, whose middle name is Rastrick, was a graduate student at University College, London, at the time of most of her father’s claims and had registered with the House of Commons as "Sarah Chaytor".
The MP said that his daughter had adopted a "professional name for work purposes" and that she was "extremely well qualified to do the work allocated and worked very long hours".
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Tony Blair - War Criminal
http://www.petitiononline.com/BWCF/petition.html | | | | gchq | | Posted: Thu Jun 18, 2009 5:41 pm Post subject: MPs release their expenses - sort of |
| Channel 4 News
At last, the release of the information the MPs tried to suppress. Transparency, at last? Well, no.
They've given us expurgated, or should I say censored, or simply blacked-out, copies of their expenses claims.
What they've published today is much more informative about what they still DON'T want us to know about openness and all that.
And it's all farcical anyway, as we already now know much, much more about their expenses anyway, courtesy of the Telegraph leaks.
One is now forced to recognise the service that the Daily Telegraph performed, whatever its origins were.
But there are extraordinary things covered up in all this. None of the expenses claims that were rejected appears in this documentation.
So, for example, the duck houses, the moat cleaning, and much more, are absent.
What is present is, for example, the revelation that George Osborne spent £47 on two DVDs of his own speech, and Gerald Kaufman had the “Dear Mr” blacked out, presumably because he takes great pride in being “Dear SIR Gerald”. One is bound to ask: can it get much worse?
And we also hear tonight that the police are considering what moves to make on the possibility of illegality in MPs' claims.
It feels as though a number of MPs may be fairly likely to come under police scrutiny. Gary Gibbon is on the case.
And the triumphant return from maternity leave of Cathy Newman will find her assigned to Hazel Blears tonight, whose own boat will be rocking tonight whilst we’re on air.
Following her resignation on the eve of last month's elections - and her own expenses shenanigans - she'll be facing her constituents, an engagement which many expect her to survive.
There is a whole raft of possible lead stories tonight, but it’s difficult to see the expenses eclipsed.
MPs' expenses report heavily censored: http://tinyurl.com/lbr3qz
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Tony Blair - War Criminal
http://www.petitiononline.com/BWCF/petition.html | | | | Phoenix | | Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 8:03 am Post subject: |
|  | | | | gchq | | Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 2:37 pm Post subject: Blair claimed £7,000 for new roof two days before leaving |
| Tony Blair claimed £7,000 for new roof two days before leaving No.10
The Telegraph
18 Jun 2009
Tony Blair put in an expense claim for almost £7,000 of roof repairs on his designated second home just two days before stepping down as Prime Minister, newly-published documents show.
The former prime minister has already faced questions over his expense
claims Photo: PA
Mr Blair, who left Downing Street on 27 June 2007, submitted an invoice on June 25 for "roof repairs" which cost £6,990. The bill was dated June 8, suggesting that Mr Blair arranged for the work to be done after he had announced the date when he would be leaving parliament.
The expense claim - which is one of more than a million documents published online today by parliament - amounts to yet another example of an MP taking the last available opportunity to exploit the system to repair or renovate their designated second home with thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money before leaving office.
Mr Blair's claim was reduced to £4,453 by the fees office, but he was still able to claim £5,772 in the 2007-08 financial year, despite being in office for less than three months.
His expense claims for that year also included £735.81 for council tax - half of his yearly bill of £1,470, despite the fact that he was replaced as MP for Sedgefield on July 19, 2007, meaning he was an MP for just three and a half months of that year.
Other invoices submitted by Mr Blair in 2007-08 included £305.50 for shredding, £466 for cleaning and hundreds of pounds for phone bills and utilities.
The former prime minister has already faced questions over his expense claims after it emerged that he remortgaged his constituency home for £296,000, almost 10 times what he paid for it, months before he bought a town house in London for £3.65 million. Mr Blair was able to claim on his parliamentary expenses for the interest repayments on almost a third of the new mortgage on his designated second home.
The amount lent was sufficient to cover the deposit on his house in Connaught Square, west London, one of five properties owned by the former prime minister, valued at £10 million in total.
The invoice for the roofing repairs, made out to "Mr A Blair", covers "repairs to roof and guttering; strip off old roof to porch above front door and renew "latts", slates, felt and lead; strip off two main roofs above rear of property and renew latts, slates, felts and lead; take off and renew the coping stones to main roof which were irreparable".
MPs are allowed to claim "winding up" expenses in the weeks before they leave parliament, but evidence of outgoing members doing up their homes, often to make them easier to sell when they no longer need a second home, has led to accusations that they were abusing the system.
A spokesman for Mr Blair said: “Roof repairs were carried out well before Tony Blair announced that he was standing down as PM, but the claim was made much later.”
Mr Blair still owns his former constituency home in County Durham, but others who have spent money on their designated second home shortly before leaving office and selling up include Lord Mandelson, who submitted invoices for almost £3,000 of work on his Hartlepool home less than a week after he announced his decision to stand down as an MP.
Mr Blair, who has earned about £16 million since leaving office, through public speaking, directorships and a book deal, bought his constituency home in Trimdon, County Durham, shortly after he was elected as an MP in 1983.
His parliamentary expense forms show that he claimed £387 per month in mortgage interest, just under a third of the total monthly interest payments on the Durham house. One claim form, for 2005-06, is covered with handwritten sums detailing each month's mortgage interest claim to the penny, which vary by around £20 per month as the interest rate changes.
His claim forms for the additional costs allowance for 2004-2007 also showed that he claimed £177.13 for food and £15 to pay his window cleaner. He also claimed £131.50 for his television licence, an annual newspaper bill of £1,167.48, regular bills for his Orange mobile phone and £515.75 for the delivery and installation of a Siemens dishwasher.
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Tony Blair - War Criminal
http://www.petitiononline.com/BWCF/petition.html | | | | gchq | | Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 4:29 pm Post subject: Brown's worst weeks? |
| Channel 4 News
BROWN'S 'WORST WEEKS'?
After weeks of squirming embarrassment, bald-faced front, finger pointing and a tsunami of sudden repayments, the police are now pouring over the honourable members' expenses receipts.
At least 20 MPs have already thrown in the towel job-wise in one form or another.
But now the police involvement moves this long-running tale onto a rather different level.
MP's £5,000 petty cash claims: http://tinyurl.com/njt8jo
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Tony Blair - War Criminal
http://www.petitiononline.com/BWCF/petition.html | | | | gchq | | Posted: Sat Jun 20, 2009 4:33 pm Post subject: Police open criminal inquiry into MPs and peers |
| MPs' expenses: Police open criminal inquiry into MPs and peers
The Telegraph
20 Jun 2009
Scotland Yard has begun criminal investigations into the expenses claims of a number of MPs and peers following disclosures by The Daily Telegraph.
Among those known to be at the centre of inquiries are Elliot Morley and David Chaytor, the Labour MPs, who claimed for mortgages that they had already paid off.
Baroness Uddin, the Labour peer, is also under investigation. She allegedly claimed £100,000 in parliamentary allowances by registering as her main home a property that was apparently barely occupied.
At least one other MP and another peer could face questioning in the wake of the MPs' expenses scandal following discussions between the Metropolitan Police and the Crown Prosecution Service.
Police received more than 100 complaints from members of the public about the apparent abuse of expenses following a Telegraph investigation.
Sir Paul Stephenson, the Scotland Yard Commissioner, and Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions, set up a panel to assess the allegations. Senior officers and lawyers decided that prosecutions were possible only in cases where MPs allegedly misled or deceived the Commons fees office.
Among other cases being looked at are those of Lord Clarke of Hampstead, a former Labour Party chairman, and Baroness Thornton.
Lord Clarke apologised for his "terrible error" in claiming up to £18,000 a year for overnight subsistence when he often stayed with friends in the capital or returned to his home in St Albans, Herts.
Lady Thornton allegedly claimed up to £22,000 a year in expenses by saying that her mother's home in Yorkshire was her main home.
The Daily Telegraph understands that two other MPs, Ben Chapman and Bill Wiggin, who were also exposed as claiming on phantom mortgages, will not face further inquiries.
Mr Morley claimed £16,800 for a mortgage that did not exist and also admitted wrongly claiming £20,000 for mortgage capital repayments on in contravention of rules.
Mr Chaytor, who admitted making an "unforgivable error" in "accounting procedures" when claiming almost £13,000 in interest for a mortgage that he had paid off, confirmed that his solicitor had been contacted by police. He said he would co-operate fully with the investigation.
Lady Uddin declared a flat in Maidstone, Kent, as her principal residence for the purposes of expenses but on the House of Lords website she says that the East End of London has been her home for "over 30 years".
Neighbours in Kent claimed that the property had been empty for a number of years since it was purchased in 2005.
Lady Uddin denies any wrongdoing.
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Tony Blair - War Criminal
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