Smith faces allowance probe
Updated on 18 February 2009
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith is to face a Parliamentary "sleaze" investigation over her second home allowance, it has been disclosed.
A spokesman for the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, John Lyon, said he has accepted a complaint against Ms Smith.
Previously, Mr Lyon turned down two requests to investigate Ms Smith over her decision to designate her sister's house in Nunhead, southeast London - where she stays when she is in the capital - as her main home.
The decision has enabled her to claim at least £116,000 in second home allowances on her constituency home in Redditch, Worcestershire, since becoming an MP.
A spokesman for Mr Lyon said: "He has accepted a complaint against Jacqui Smith and is following the procedure laid down for him."
According to London's Evening Standard newspaper, the latest complaint was made by neighbours of Ms Smith's sister - Dominic and Jessica Taplin.
Mrs Taplin was quoted in the Mail on Sunday as describing Ms Smith's claim that she spent most of the week there as a "fabrication" and that often she was there for just two days a week.
The Evening Standard said that Mr Lyon had now written to Ms Smith asking her to justify her allowances.
© Independent Television News Limited 2009. All rights reserved.
These news feeds are provided by an independent third party and Channel 4 is not responsible or liable to you for the same.
