91Èȱ¬

I doubt whether there's any sympathy for MPs at the moment but imagine this.

You're an MP who happens to marry your long-time secretary.

You both own part of a flat in London you use as your second home.

You decide to buy her share of the flat out just to be above board on your mortgage interest claims for the property, and are given advice from the Commons that it's the correct thing to do.

.

.

.

And finally at the same time .

Sounds positively nightmarish, but that's exactly what's happened to the Tyne Bridge MP David Clelland.

The one concession at least is that he has five years to divest himself of his flat and his wife (only as secretary mind).

Perhaps you can understand why he's feeling a bit sore even if you might not be weeping any tears for him.

I suspect it's the intrusion of the expenses saga into his relationship with wife Brenda that particularly irks him.

That was the reason he says he bought her share of the flat out in the first place.

Mr Clelland is now disputing the request by Sir Thomas Legg to pay the money back.

But you can read in just what he feels about the decision to stop MPs' spouses working for them.

Others are also unhappy.

Sedgefield MP Phil Wilson employs his partner as his Parliamentary Assistant.

.

He accepts that this may be the price to pay for the abuse of the system by the likes of Derek Conway, but he doesn't have to be happy with it.

The expenses issue also seems to have claimed, at least in part, another casualty.

The .

He says expenses are only part of the reason for his decision.

But he's another who's been asked to pay money back by Sir Thomas Legg.

• Bookmark with:
• |
• |
• |
• |
• - What's this?