My Parliamentary Expenses

I am proud to represent the people of Blackpool South in Parliament. I believe that Parliament should be a transparent institution, working effectively and openly for the hard-working people whom it represents.

So I am publishing detailed listings of all my expenses as a Member of Parliament for the last four financial years in the following categories as laid down by Parliament:

  • The Incidental Expenses Provision (IEP - previously known as the Office Costs Allowance)
  • The Additional Costs Allowance (ACA - to cover maintaining an additional home for Parliamentary requirements)
  • The Communications Allowance (CA - for pro-active communication with MPs’ constituents – which was introduced in 2007)

The dates listed in my full breakdown of costs below are those of claim not necessarily of spend – which is why they occasionally they appear outside the financial year though covering activity in it. Figures for the financial year 08/09 have not yet been finalised and so neither have the overall costs for them for all MPs been published by Parliament.

When I was elected in 1997 as an MP, I already had a home base from which I could commute to Westminster and so I didn't claim mortgage, furniture or any other expenses on that. The House of Commons Fees Office told me that the Additional Costs Allowance should be claimed on the home I had in Blackpool, which I have had since 1996. The costs covered included rent, water rates, utility bills, and food, and between 2004 and 2008 I claimed £35,928 – that is 41 per cent of the 87,729 that was available to be claimed.

It may be of interest to note that over the four financial years covered here my expenditure on the Additional Costs Allowance – the one that has aroused most controversy via media coverage – placed me in the lowest fifth of all 645 MPs’ expenditure in that category. My ACA expenditure was in fact less than half the allowance for each of the four years listed. Additionally, when London MPs (who cannot claim ACA) are excluded, I am in the bottom fifty.

This low expenditure was highlighted in a Blackpool Gazette article on the 19th May – click this link to access the piece.

Please access the detailed breakdown by clicking the relevant year and allowance on the list below - this will open in a new page

Update: February 2010

The latest set of figures for MPs’ expenses under the Additional Cost Allowance for the financial year 2008/09 have recently been published so I am now adding here the detailed breakdown of the costs claimed underneath it.

The total for 2008/09 in this category was £8958.92 that is 37% of the £24,006 that was made available to be claimed.As in the previous years this will place me in the lowest fifth of all MPs expenditure.
 
The recent review by Sir Thomas Legg of all MPs ACA expenses from 2004 to 2008 raised a small query on mine from 2004-05. This concerned whether payments made to me over 5 years ago for mobile phone expenses should have been made under that category or under a different one.

There was no suggestion that this was an excessive or unreasonable claim. Legg merely queried whether it should have been made under the ACA allowance or under a different (IEP) allowance – basically if the right form had been used.

In fact I had taken advice from Parliament’s Fees Office that I should claim on the form that I used. In any case, there would have been no problem claiming on the alternative form as my claims against that allowance were also very low and well under the limit for that year.

So I asked Sir Paul Kennedy, the former High Court Judge appointed to review such issues if he would look again at the details of this set of claims. He has now done so and he’s concluded that ‘what you did, guided by the Fees office was entirely in line with requirements current at that time’ .  He has said my claims would have been paid anyway under the IEP ‘because your total claim fell well short of the annual limit’ and that the advice not to claim under the ACA was not even published at the time.As a result he has confirmed that the claim in question was fully in order and that no further action is required.

Any review like Legg that looks at over 600 individual sets of claims over a 5 year period is bound to throw up points that need clarifying. I am pleased Sir Paul has looked at this thoroughly and confirmed in his full report that I acted entirely properly. What is illustrated are the bureaucratic flaws and muddle in the old system and why we do need the new, independent and transparent one for Parliament which is now being set in train.