So what has your MP been claiming on?

[drunkenmaster]

Oxford East - (Labour) Andrew Smith

Took £600 for "bedroom furniture" (only claimed 50% of the 1200 furniture bill)

Claims his council tax as well (why can he not pay tax himself again?)

Did pay someone £120 to break into his house after his "key failed"

Also paid £2k for painting and repairs (has he ever heard of DIY?)

And charged TV license to the tax payer (pay it your self ffs or don't have a TV)

Spent £3k on "Management Marketing Services" (can't really work out what exactly they did for him from their website)

Um, spent £3k on a mailshot ... and for some reason did not have to pay VAT on it?

Not bad overall - but still :/

So how much should a bed, matress, wardrobe, curtains and lights cost exactly? the cheapest Ikea bed is £60, + £30 for slats, + £200 for a only slightly decent matress and you're halfway there. lamp for £20, a Wardrobe for £150, curtains, something else, its not exactly mad. lets say £600 is far for the bare essentials, so instead he spent an extra £600 and got himself a nicer matress, lamp, bed and wardrobe and he paid the difference, not sure how you can complain about that.

though I don't know, is that for a second home so he can get into london for voting and the like, or his main home, in which case I don't agree with really any of the costs. Costs coming from needing a second place purely because of the job they are doing, are fine. As for the DIY, not everyone is good at DIY, the repairs might have been extensive and completely beyond his capability, the painting might have been £50 with plumbing repairs at £1950, who knows.

 

[shauncr91]

£196 for a shower curtain + Towels
£56 for a kettle
£64 for a toilet seat
£149 for a cleaner
£104 for a replacement telephone
He's claimed all his TV licenses
£60 for a fan
£173 for another phone..
£235 - DVD
£240 - Upholstered chair
Parking

 

[Tee Hee Johnson]

Mines seemed pretty bland last year... Adam Ingram. The private one was just mainy rent, cleaning, etc and was roughly 2k every month. The office/staff one was similar... bland, phonebills, internet, lots of eden water and cups lol.

Anyone got some good ones?

 

[rodo]

John Pugh seems to claim for a lot of apple goods and servicing. Processors, PCI cards, network switches, several purchases of RAM.

And a few cameras too.

 

[rypt]

drunkenmaster, he has been an MP since '87, so it's not like he needed a whole new bedroom suddenly for a new house - and if he chose to sell his previous house and buy a new one - well that is his choice, should not be claim for furniture again just because you decided to sell.

 

[dalin80]

claims about a grand a month.

frequent extra claims that have been blanked out.

treated himself to a new kitchen for a couple of grand.

 

[shauncr91]

Mines seemed pretty bland last year... Adam Ingram. The private one was just mainy rent, cleaning, etc and was roughly 2k every month. The office/staff one was similar... bland, phonebills, internet, lots of eden water and cups lol.

Anyone got some good ones?

Check my list, it seems everything in his bathroom must be gold plated or something...

 

[DominicStar]

Seems to have claimed the maximum.

£390 on food every single month!
£200 every month on maintenance charges.
Curiously it totals £1923 every single month I looked at.

Although every time he has bought an expensive item such as a washing machine, no service/maintenance is due on his property and his £190 a month cleaning bill isn't payable on those months...

Just seen a classic on the Guardian site from George Osborne's though, probably the most ironic yet:

Here's one of the best revelations of the day. In 2005 George Osborne, the shadow chancellor, claimed £47 for two copies of a DVD of his own speech on 'Value for Taxpayers Money'. A spokesman for Osborne said: "Four years ago George received a request from a member of the public for a video copy of the speech which he obtained through the House of Commons broadcasting unit."

 

[Heliospherez]

Gerry Adams bought 2 Sandisk 2GB USB Flash Drives at £55.

Must have seen him coming.

 

[Dark88]

Just been looking at Ann Widdecombe MP for Maidstone and she's seems whiter than white

looks like she commutes into London (about 1 1/2 hour journey) when she could quite easily fleace the tax payer for a nice posh London pad. Also when she does stay in hotels in London she's clearly marked thats she's not claiming for dinner, or newspapers etc and just circles the basic room charge to be claimed! So looks like there are still some upstanding MPs around.

 

[rojones]

Our MP Claims about £2,200 a month on the private claims.

£1,200 a month Mortgage
£400 a month food bill

and all the other gubbins.

No offence he may not be the worst by a long shot, but why on earth should he be claiming food and mortgage expenses and council tax !!! FFS i work to pay that stuff i dont work for the fun of it. The 60k these MP's get just goes straight to the piggy bank.

Really winds me up.

 

[RDM]

No offence he may not be the worst by a long shot, but why on earth should he be claiming food and mortgage expenses and council tax !!! FFS i work to pay that stuff i dont work for the fun of it. The 60k these MP's get just goes straight to the piggy bank.

Because he is claiming for the second home he needs to work in both his constituency and westminster. It is only second homes that they can claim those expenses for. Otherwise they would have to pay council tax in their constituency and council tax in London.

 

[antijoke]

Because he is claiming for the second home he needs to work in both his constituency and westminster. It is only second homes that they can claim those expenses for. Otherwise they would have to pay council tax in their constituency and council tax in London.

So bloody what. Joe public must pay the bandit tax they call council tax. Talk about taking the bloody ****.

 

[Perywinkle]

six and a half grand on a new bathroom, and 10 grand on a new kitchen for mine lol

 

[muon]

unedited list

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/new...de-the-Telegraph-this-Saturday.html?WT.srch=1

Telegraph really are milking this for all they can.

 

[RDM]

So bloody what. Joe public must pay the bandit tax they call council tax. Talk about taking the bloody ****.

But Joe Public normally only pays it for one location. They will be paying council tax on their main residence, it is only on their second home do they claim it because it is directly related to parliamentary business.

 

[rz30]

Harman got a new PC, fair enough tbh... they do go through a lot.

 

[Vixen]

So bloody what. Joe public must pay the bandit tax they call council tax. Talk about taking the bloody ****.

If you were working away from home, you would expect your employer to cover the costs too. My mum works away from home and her expenses cover council tax on her second property.

I had a quick look through the list for Alastair Darling and most of it is blacked out although the numbers don't seem too bad.

 

[matt_fsr]

Just been looking at Ann Widdecombe MP for Maidstone and she's seems whiter than white

She may have a face that resembles the back end of a horse, but she does seem to be an honest, down-to-earth politician.

Wish we could find enough of them to actually fill the Commons with similar people.

My MP claims £400 a month food religiously every month, utter tosh TBH. Thats £4.40 for every single meal of every day in the month. Not even food in London is that expensive, and I bet she doesnt spend many days in London what with being from Oop North.

 

[Amp34]

From Bracknell he's resigned and it's interesting how many are overdue.

I'm looking through to see if any of them bought stuff made by the firm I work for. One good use for me

You can actually see the companies names? For my MP they are all blacked out, on most of the reciepts the only thing thats actually shown is "Final Gas Bill = £98.20"...

Oxford East - (Labour) Andrew Smith

Took £600 for "bedroom furniture" (only claimed 50% of the 1200 furniture bill)

Claims his council tax as well (why can he not pay tax himself again?)

Did pay someone £120 to break into his house after his "key failed"

Also paid £2k for painting and repairs (has he ever heard of DIY?)

And charged TV license to the tax payer (pay it your self ffs or don't have a TV)

Spent £3k on "Management Marketing Services" (can't really work out what exactly they did for him from their website)

Um, spent £3k on a mailshot ... and for some reason did not have to pay VAT on it?

Not bad overall - but still :/

EDIT: £600 dell PC with £100 for installation
OptiPlex C2D E6750, with Vista Business and 2GB ram and 17" display

Also charged to have an electrical socket installed in his kitchen

And charged for Window Frosting :/

And £2.3k to erect a partition

And he bought a toilet seat lol

Ooooh, bought something for £6 from halfords - a bulb apparently (at least he drives to work)

Bored now though

Looks like a bog standard office PC to me, nothing wrong with that IMO, however paying for an electrical socket is a bit much

I recently did a university project for a charity, during the course of this project they asked me for advice on their current website and domain. The guy they were paying to maintain the website was asking for £50/month to 'preserve the URL'.

People really rinse the uninformed first chance they can get.

Especially if the person doesn't really care about price, as they get it on expenses...

'Petty cash' seems an easy one to just get some beer money every month, no receipts.. job done.

Also I don't really get this claiming for food? If you were at your constituency you have to eat, if you're in London you eat there instead.. but why do you get to claim it?

But you would eat in at home, whereas if you are staying in a hotel for a night for example you would need to eat out, costing more. It's a pretty standard expense for business as far as I know (the company I worked for gave me a Peri diem for food when I had to buy my own food away from home).