How Seedy and Corrupt Is Our Government?

The following news broke today. You couldn't make it up. It's hard to imagine how our Government could be more corrupt than it is. And the way they lie and lie when they get caught out! What Jack Straw did seems to be close to fraud. And yet again we see Peter Mandelson playing word games to try to get out of trouble! Mandelson's appointment to the House of Lords was pretty much the last straw for me....

It's a small protest but I'm going to cancel my electricity and gas contracts with EDF and sign up with British Gas. I'll save money too!!


Members of the Cabinet have been defending themselves following the Daily Telegraph's decision to print details of their expense claim receipts.

Gordon Brown paid his brother for cleaning services, it has been reported Among the expenses detailed by the Telegraph were Gordon Brown's payment of £6,577 for cleaning work between 2004 and 2006 to his brother Andrew - a senior executive at EDF Energy.

There are also two payments of around £150 in successive months for the same piece of plumbing work.

Justice Secretary Jack Straw is said to have claimed for the full cost of council tax back even though he received a 50% discount from his local authority. He repaid the money last summer, shortly after a High Court ruling requiring the receipts to be published.

There is Business Secretary Lord Mandelson's claim for thousands of pounds for work on his constituency home in Hartlepool after he had announced his resignation as an MP.

Communities Secretary Hazel Blears claimed for three different properties in a single year, spending almost £5,000 of taxpayers' money on furniture in three months. Foreign Secretary David Miliband spent hundreds of pounds on gardening at his constituency home.

Chancellor Alistair Darling changed his official "second home" designation four times in four years. Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon switched his second home in a way which allowed him to improve his family home in Derbyshire at taxpayers' expense before buying a London townhouse.

Although there is no allegation that any of the ministers broke parliamentary rules, the report is certain to raise further concerns over MPs' £24,000-a-year second home allowance.

A spokesman for the Prime Minister said that Mr Brown and his brother shared a cleaner at their two flats. Andrew Brown paid the cleaner and the Prime Minister reimbursed his share of the cost. The double claim for the plumbing bill was an "inadvertent error" by Mr Brown's office and the cash was repaid as soon as it came to light.

A spokesman for Mr Straw said he himself spotted errors in his claim for council tax and repaid the difference. A spokesman for Ms Blears said that all of her claims had been approved as being in line with the rules. Lord Mandelson's spokesman said: "The expenditure on his home was to repair it, not improve it. To create a different impression is not honest."