House of Frauds, Tory Lords of the Manor Expense Claims

By: Nadeem_Walayat

The Telegraph continued with its leaking of outrageous expense claims at tax payers expense, where the reaction from the Speaker of the Commons was to deride the media for publishing the content rather than on seeking to hold MP's to account, which is not so surprising given his own past track record of going on spending binges to the tunes of several hundreds of thousands at tax payers expense beyond his salary.

My last article briefly covered the Labour Elites expense claims, the release of the Tory claims clearly show that the Conservative members of Parliament operate as Lords of the Manor exempt from normal taxation such as Capital Gains Tax, and living off of the back of the mass of tax paying serfdom.

The list is near endless, but here are a select few items of Tory Claims, for in depth coverage go to the Telegraph site:

• Former shadow defence secretary Mr Ancram, claimed £98.58 for the repair of a swimming pool boiler, and reimbursement of £1,117.43 for a gardening bill.
• Sir Alan Haselhurst, Deputy Speaker of the Commons, claimed £142,000 on his country house, and £12,000 for gardening bills.
• Mr Arbuthnot, chairman of the Defence Select Committee claimed £1,471 for garden and swimming pool costs, and £2,433 for an housekeeper.
• Communities spokesman Mr Jackson claimed £304 for refurbishing his swimming pool.
• David Heathcoat-Amory, claimed more than £380 for horse shit.
• Douglas Hogg, former Agriculture Secretary, claimed more than £2,000 for clearing the moat on his Lincolnshire estate.
• Sir Michael Spicer, chairman of Tory 1922 Committee, claimed £5,650 for having his garden maintained.
• David Davis claimed more than £10,000 for home renovations and furnishings, including a new £5,700 portico.
  

Lib-Dems are Not off the Hook

• Nick Clegg, party leader claimed £23,000 maximum annual allowance for mortgage and renovation costs.
• Andrew George claims mortgage expenses for a £300k flat used by his daughter
• Menzies Campbell charges to tax payers £10,000 for flat renovations.

Key Problems -

The Property Shuffle - Claiming for second homes for furnishings and mortgage payments, council tax bills and maintenance, and then nominating the same properties on their tax returns as their main homes for capital gains avoidance purposes. Therefore the property shuffle results in a double fiddle - a. Where the tax payer pays for the total running costs multiple properties as MP's shuffle between properties during a year, and b. the tax man does not get the resulting capital gains tax payable on second homes despite the fact that many MP's had claimed expenses on the properties AS their second homes. This in effect allows MP's become property developers with the tax payer paying the renovation costs and then without incurring any capital gains tax liability. All legal off course, after all the MP's masterfully drafted the legislation in the first place to allow them to get away with robbing the tax payers - LEGALLY!

Abuse of Expenses - Voters are outraged by the behaviour of MP's after seeing evidence of the abuse that seems to know NO limits, from claims for chandeliers, porno films, expensive hotels, lawn mowers, moats, swimming pools and the list goes on... Basically everything that ordinary people have to pay for out of their salaries the MP's have been claiming as EXTRA expenses.

Despite whatever Michael Martin the Speaker of the Commons says, the The Telegraph has done a great service to the British public for had the MP's had their way then much of the claims would have been blacked out and released after the June 4th European Elections, furthermore MP's had actively sought to exclude themselves from the data information act so as to prevent the voters from knowing the truth of how they are being taken for a ride. At least now the MP's have a real incentive to do something to make themselves more accountable.

The Voters of Britain need to send a clear message to the MP's of ALL THREE mainstream parties at future elections that this is totally unacceptable behaviour by voting for the fringe parties such as the Greens and UKIP and other independents, only under the threat of losing their seats will the MP's take the action to make themselves fully accountable and stop the abuse of tax payer funds.

I also note that the comedian Stephen Fry attempted to excuse the MP's from fiddling of their expenses to the tune of tens of thousands per year, even going so far as to admit that he also fiddles his own expenses, well £30,000 of expense fiddling a year may not amount to much to a rich multimillionaire comedian, but to the ordinary average voter, £30,000 a year is more than their take home pay! Perhaps the Inland Revenue need to take a closer look at Stephen Fry's tax returns given his public admission.

By Nadeem Walayat
http://www.marketoracle.co.uk

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Nadeem Walayat has over 20 years experience of trading derivatives, portfolio management and analysing the financial markets, including one of few who both anticipated and Beat the 1987 Crash. Nadeem's forward looking analysis specialises on the housing market and interest rates. Nadeem is the Editor of The Market Oracle, a FREE Daily Financial Markets Analysis & Forecasting online publication. We present in-depth analysis from over 250 experienced analysts on a range of views of the probable direction of the financial markets. Thus enabling our readers to arrive at an informed opinion on future market direction. http://www.marketoracle.co.uk

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