House of Commons urged to publish expenses details
House of Commons authorities have been urged to publish detailed expenses claims for every MP by Monday.
Black Country MP David Winnick (Lab Walsall North) said receipts should now be published in full, after they were leaked to a national newspaper.
Parliamentary authorities are currently the expenses claims for publication on July 1, after they lost a High Court battle to keep them secret.
But the Daily Telegraph has obtained an advance copy of the receipts and has begun to reveal the details.
Mr Winnick said: “Now that a national newspaper has published some, and intends to publish the rest, I think we should teach the Telegraph a lesson and publish the rest pronto. We should do it by Monday.
“How does the Telegraph justify paying for what appears to be stolen information? Are they really in a position to lecture Members of Parliament?
“This is not a splendid lesson in ethics from a national newspaper.”
Former Home Secretary Charles Clarke has written to Commons Speaker Michael Martin urging him to put the documents into the public domain by releasing them to all media, in order to save Parliament from being “held to ransom” by one newspaper.
In his letter to Mr Martin, Mr Clarke wrote: “It is essential that Parliament responds immediately to the venal intention of the Daily Telegraph to hold Parliament to ransom.
“It seems that the Daily Telegraph now possesses unredacted and uncorrected details of every MPs’ expenses. Apparently that newspaper intends to publish these details in a manner deliberately intended to discredit Parliament and to give them a competitive advantage over other media.
“I believe that Parliament should defend itself against this attack, and that the best way to do this is immediately to publish all these details, to all media.”
Publication of the material has been delayed while Commons officials ensure personal details, such as home addresses of MPs and their staff, are blacked out.
MP Richard Burden (Lab Northfield) said it was important to ensure personal information was removed before the material was published.
“We should not collude in putting people’s personal information in the public domain, But I would like to see the claims published as soon as possible once addresses have been removed.”
