Public standard bearers

The Telegraph has decided to milk the mole. That conjures up an image doesn't it? They want to release the dirty details of MP's expense claims on a daily basis. This helps them sell papers but it also means that the public is assailed relentlessly with waves of corruption. If you want to make someone angry, repetitive irritation to the point of combustion is a far more effective tactic than a short, sharp shock. I am already boiling hearing about the Luton consituency MP Margaret Moron who claims for repairs to her Southampton home. This person feels that the tax payer has responsibility for preserving her work life balance. "She is important, we are not. We should pay to treat her  dry rot" as outgoing dogerel expert Andrew Motion might have put it. 

Well there is definitely some rot that needs treating. She is saying she should not have to make ANY sacrifices. Those of us who don't work where we live, make those sacrifices all the time. And we don't ask others to pick up the bill. I pay £4,500 pa on train fares out of my own pocket to work 12 hour days in London, because I can't afford to live there. My family see less of me because of this. But there is no job with my skill set where my family lives (believe me, I applied for the only one that ever came up). Do I expect other people to make sacrifices in order to provide me with a flat in London? No I don't. If someone offered me a flat at tax payers expense by bending the rules, would I take it? No I would not. It would be wrong. I know the difference. 

Moran says  has not done anything outside the rules, and acted in good faith. That self-righteous indignation she displays is reminiscent of Ashley Cole. She sums up the modern view - "I'm entitled" - that suggests it is only right to milk the system for whatever you can get out of it, because it is set up for your benefit, and it would go to waste if you didn't use it; like there was a mountain of free cash somewhere which dissolves if it goes past an expiry date unclaimed. Moran is implying one would be stupid not to claim. I must ask how we teach our children to listen to their conscience and act with self discipline, if the leaders of our country conflate conscience with stupidity?

What I would have preferred would be for a single newspaper article to come out listing the MP's who are NOT making impertinent and immoral personal expense claims that stretch the definition of allowance to its absolute limit. That would be nice. I'd be keen to know how long that list is as well. If  it is a minority of parliamentary members, then that would suggest an endemic lack of conscience amongst those in public service. It would also be nice to hear one of our representatives come out and say "actually you know I had serious misgivings about claiming for something as frivolous as scatter cushions. It has bothered me ever since. I have decided to resign". What does it actually take for someone to fall on their sword? 

It is doubly distressing to hear someone like wounded paraplegic RMP officer Maj Phil Packer talk about how guilty he feels leaving behind 120 troops in Iraq that he was responsible for. Packer has just completed the London marathon on crutches, taking  13 days to do so. Shame the route of the marathon didn't go through Westminster. I would like to have seen Major Packer's stately and noble progress within shaming range of that anthill full of mercenaries. 

Phil Packer walked the marathon route for charity and hopes to raise £1m for Help for Heroes.

Home Secretary Jacqui Smith claims public money to pay for porn and scatter cushions. You decide which of the two is setting the better example.

If it turns out that more MP's have made spurious personal expense claims for second homes than haven't, can we campaign for the right not to refer to them as Right Honourable any longer?