ARTICLE: M.P.s Demands Free Food

PAMPERED MPs want free meals after complaining of MICE and “stinking” cut-price grub in the Commons.

They want taxpayers to pick up the entire bill for all they scoff.

Many complain of “weird” menus served up in “Soviet-style” restaurants INFESTED with mice — and say the food is not worth paying for. But taxpayers fork out£5.8MILLION a year to subsidise their meals.

One MP wrote: “I saw a mouse in the Members’ Tea Room about which I made comment to a member of staff. The member of staff was pretty matter of fact — to the point that I got the impression that the sight of a rodent was par for the course!”

Scores moaned about the standard of their heavily-subsidised food in a survey of politicians and their staff.

They whinged about the wine waiters and complained that coffee bar staff did not know the difference between a cappuccino and a latte.

The complaints about the cheap meals and wine at Westminster come in a survey of MPs and their staff conducted by private pollsters — costing taxpayers another £27,790.

Details obtained under Freedom of Information laws lay bare the full extent of the dissatisfaction. A typical meal — rib-eye steak with hand-cut chips and Béarnaise sauce — costs two quid — £7.80, less a taxpayers’ subsidy of £5.92.

But one MP whinged: “The restaurants are Soviet-style. Vegetables are horrendously overcooked, meat is often raw.

“Sandwiches taste like they have been frozen for three months. It’s a shocker.”

Another blasted: “The food is really starting to stink.”

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/politics/article4391212.ece

MPs’ expenses: how they milked the system

MPs are required by Parliamentary rules to be “above reproach” when claiming expenses. But many found a way round the system, leading to widespread abuse.

Below we look at what they can legitimately claim and how some managed to maximise their income at the taxpayer’s expense.

What they can legitimately claim:

Under the additional costs allowance (ACA), MPs can claim expenses for the cost of running a second home for the purpose of fulfilling their parliamentary duties. In 2007/8, the last year for which complete figures are available, this stood at a maximum of £23,083.

The money can be spent on rent or mortgage interest payments. MPs who do not have a second home can claim for hotel rooms, for which they must submit a receipt.

Within the maximum ACA, MPs are allowed to claim up to £400 per month for food without the need for receipts and, until last year, up to £250 per claim in other categories without receipts.

This has since been lowered to £25. MPs can claim for utility bills, council tax, telephone bills, decorating, employing a cleaner, and even the purchase of furniture and electrical and household goods for their second homes.

The amount which MPs can claim for individual items is governed by the so-called ‘John Lewis List’. Personal items, such as toiletries and electric razors, cannot be claimed for.

The rules state that all ACA claims must be “above reproach” and there must be “no suggestion of misuse of public money”.

How they exploited the system:

A number of MPs used the allowance to pay for furniture and refurbishments for one property, before ‘flipping’ their second home designation to another property and claiming for improvements on that one.

Having used their taxpayer-funded expenses for renovations and repairs, some MPs then sold their homes at a profit. Some with constituencies in outer London bought second homes just a few miles from their main residence.

Others avoided paying Capital Gains Tax on the profit of the sale of their second home by telling the taxman it was their main residence.

A few MPs continued to claim expenses for mortgage interest on their second home even when the mortgage had been paid off.

Many MPs regularly claimed the maximum allowed for food. Others put in claims for utility bills, cleaning and repairs whilst avoiding the need to submit receipts by ensuring that the sums claimed were just below the £250 limit.

Others went on spending sprees towards the end of the financial year on order to reach their maximum ACA. Some bought furniture for their second homes but had it delivered to their main residence.

Among the frivolous and arguably unnecessary items claimed by MPs were radiator covers, pet food, manure and a duck house.

Read on

MPs’ expenses: MPs who milked the expenses system now complain about attempts to reform it

MPs whose controversial claims for accommodation costs, food and furniture were exposed during the expenses scandal are claiming the status of victims instead of offenders.

Members of Parliament whose controversial claims for accommodation costs, food and furniture were exposed during the expenses scandal are using an official inquiry to claim they were victims rather than offenders.

Several politicians revealed by The Telegraph to be taking advantage of their parliamentary remuneration have attempted to justify their behaviour to the Committee on Standards in Public Life.

Read on

Welcome to the sick joke that is Parliamentary “democracy”. How much longer can the People have trust in crooked, corrupt and EVIDENTLY CRIMINAL system?

(2007) Respect Election Cadidate Sajid Mehmood -FALSE DECLARATION

A HALIFAX election candidate who failed to declare his criminal record has appeared in court.

Sajid Mehmood, 36, of Saxon Street, off Hanson Lane, Halifax, admitted making a false statement on nomination papers.

He stood for the Respect Party in Park ward, Halifax, in council elections in May.

Sentencing was adjou-rned at Bradford Crown Court until November 23.

Under the Represen-tation of the People Act, anyone given a prison sentence of three months or more, even if it is suspended, is disqualified from standing for election for five years.

In 2003, Mehmood was sentenced to three months in jail for possession of heroin and cocaine.

He was also convicted of driving offences and received four months in prison in 2004 and another 16 weeks in 2005.

In August, the High Court refused to order a re-run of the election in Park ward after former Conservative councillor Mohammed Chaudhary Saghir petitioned the court for the result to be declared void.

(2009) Respect Party M.P. George Galloway -PARASITE

George Galloway, the controversial left-wing MP thrown out of the Labour Party, tried to charge the taxpayer for the cost of Christmas cards sent from his constituency office.

The Respect MP for the east London constituency of Bethnal Green and Bow – where many of his constituents are Muslim – submitted a claim for £32 on his Incidental Expenses Provision for the festive greetings cards.

However, the claim was rejected by the Parliamentary fees office, who informed the MP it was against the rules.

In a letter to Mr Galloway a member of the fees office stated: “The Department of Resources disallows costs relating to Christmas cards as they do not fall within the remit of this allowance.”

On Saturday night, Mr Galloway said the claim was a “simple error” by a new member of staff.

As an MP for an inner-London constituency Mr Galloway is not eligible to claim a second home allowance. He did however receive a £1,978 supplement for MPs from the capital last year.

The previous year he received the maximum £2,712 London allowance.

An analysis carried out earlier this year by The Sunday Telegraph found that Mr Galloway, who was expelled from the Labour Party in 2003 for accusing Tony Blair and President George Bush of acting “like wolves” in Iraq, represents the least value for money for his constituents of any MP.

Read on

How the Parasites in Westminster Waste YOUR Taxes.

Quad bikes, window cleaning, beds, life insurance and mock Tudor fireplaces – these are just some of the things that the criminal pirates masquerading as Tory, Labour and Lib-Dem MPs at Westminster have claimed from your tax money as “benefits.”

Tory MP David Maclean claimed £3,300 for a quad bike which he claimed was necessary to get around his constituency in Cumbria. Not too surprisingly, Mr Maclean was also behind a failed bid to exempt MPs and peers from Freedom of Information laws that require public figures to reveal their expenses.

His fellow Tory MEP Giles Chichester sucked £500,000 into “office services” for a business – staffed by his own family and of which he was director. At the time, Mr Chichester had been appointed by Conservative leader David Cameron to ensure that Tory MEPs did not swindle the taxpayers.

Tory MP Derek Conway paid his sons, Henry and Freddie, £80,000 for being his “researchers.” Mr Conway was then exposed by the BNP’s spokesman on law and order, Mr Michael Barnbrook. Mr Conway was ordered to pay back a mere £13,160 after an enquiry found no evidence that Freddie did any research work for his father. He was ordered to cough up around £3,700 for Henry. Further investigations showed that the Conservative MP had spent more than £260,000 of taxpayer’s money in “salaries” to members of his immediate family over a six-year period.

Labour Party MP and former foreign secretary Margaret Beckett claimed more than £6,500 in allowances for gardening expenses at her home in Derby. This included bills for pruning shrubs, trimming the hedges and for dismantling and rebuilding a rockery. In 2006 she also tried to claim £600 in costs for her garden plants.

She was joined in this never-ending swindle by fellow Labour MP Barbara Follet who claimed £1,600 for window cleaning. To make matters worse, the invoices for the window cleaning were made out to her husband, well known fiction author Ken Follett.

Possibly the most outrageous swindler yet is Labour Minister Tony McNulty who claimed more than £60,000 for a “second home” which in fact is where his parents live. There is no excuse whatsoever for this blatant theft from the public purses, as Mr McNulty’s actual residence was only nine miles away from his parents’ house. Mr McNulty would have been arrested and charged with fraud under any normal financial regime.

Not to be outdone in the outrageous stakes was Liberal Democrat MP Mark Oaten. After he was forced to resign over a sex scandal involving male prostitutes, it transpired that he had claimed bedroom furniture and other household items from his Parliamentary allowance.

Labour’s former deputy Prime Minister John Prescott felt the need to redecorate his house in mock Tudor style, putting up reproduction panels and a beautiful fireplace. All very nice one might say — except that the taxpayer paid for all of it.

Labour husband and wife MP duo Alan and Ann Keen spent a mere £175,000 on a “second home” allowance to buy an apartment on the South Bank of the Thames — despite owning a home in Brentford, West London, which is only 30 minutes away by car. Mrs Keen also took out a joint life insurance policy worth £430,000 and claimed back the £867.57 a month premium on her expenses.