Cleaning the face of politics
Updated on 12 October 2009
Gordon Brown is told to pay back excess house expenses, Nick Clegg pays back nearly £1,000 in gardening charges, and David Cameron must provide more information on his mortgage claims. Meanwhile former home secretary Jacqui Smith apologises for breaching expenses rules. Gary Gibbon reports.
Never known to have been the tidiest of men, Mr Brown has agreed to repay £12,415 in excess cleaning expenses, gardening and other maintenance costs he has claimed for his second home over the last five years.
Mr Brown urged all MPs to pay back any sums demanded by auditor Sir Thomas Legg, after his inquiry into parliamentary expenses. Both the other main party leaders have already followed suit.
The Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has paid back nearly £1,000 in gardening charges. And David Cameron? The man investigating it all wants more information on his mortgage claims.
After a separate inquiry, former home secretary Jacqui Smith claimed she slept 37 nights more than she really did in her sister's house. Now she has made a perfunctory public apology in parliament.
The leader of the Liberal Democrats Nick Clegg spoke to Jon Snow.
He said: "I think there are understandable question marks being made about the retrospective nature of Sir Thomas Legg's rules but the bigger reality - the important one - is that people are fed up to the back teeth of yet another spectacle of MPs quibbling about expenses.
"All of this will prove to be yet another delay in moving to what we need to do most of all which is revamp the rules, clear out the rotten old rules and replace them with new ones.
"What I'm saying is that once you get a reasoned and reasonable request of payment you should repay it."
MP Stuart Bell who sits on the ruling Commons Members Estimate Committee told Jon Snow that the process had only just begun.
He said: "What the MPs will be looking for is justness and fairness to the rules that applied at the time.
"They will be looking to see whether Sir Thomas has applied other rules than the ones applied at the time.
"Let us take this as a process that has begun today and will continue for a while.
"At the end of the day all of these matters will be resolved and we will seek to regain the confidence of the British people."
