Hereford and South Herefordshire Liberal Democrats

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Sarah Carr's View on MPs expenses

9.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Mon 18th May 2009

I believe it should be established as a basic principle that MPs do not gain financially from expenses, which should simply be about reimbursing legitimate and relevant expenditure for their work.

If I am fortunate to be elected as the next MP for Hereford, Ross and South Herefordshire our house in Hereford would immediately be designated as our 1st property - indeed family home - this is where my husband and I live. My daughter will attend our local Hereford school. I currently do not own or rent any other property. I understand that an MP requires a place to stay in London to do their work in the House of Commons and I believe expenses for such a property should be limited to claiming genuine running costs such as rent - certainly no mock Tudor beams, swimming pool or moat maintenance.

I believe the following action should be taken without delay.

· Firstly, the House should immediately release all the expenses material, with an "uncorrected" label if it wishes. There is no point dragging this out until July.

· Secondly, the three party leaders should commit themselves to accepting, without reservation, the recommendations of Sir Christopher Kelly's committee on standards in public life inquiry. MPs should accept his recommendations in their entirety, warts and all, and not cherry-pick the good bits as they have done before.

· Thirdly, MPs should accept that the House of Commons Commission, the body of senior MPs nominally responsible for handling expense matters, has failed to give the appropriate leadership on this issue going back years - indeed, they have been part of the problem, blocking wherever they can the release of information - and the entire membership of that body should be changed.

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Previous news story: Sarah Carr - letter to the Speaker of the House of Commons (Sun 17th May 2009).
Next news story: Carr condemns steep rise in public transport costs (Tue 19th May 2009).

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