He's not always right. And here he's resoundingly wrong. You'd have thought a Cambridge debating education would have removed any temptation to use straw-man arguments out of him, but no. If a "venal" journalist fiddles expenses and gets caught, his employer is free to fire him and - if the scale is sufficiently large - even sue him. If an MP does so, his employers - us - have no recourse whatsoever other than to make a big stink about it in the hope of embarrassing the bastards into something that at least approximates some form of contrition.

Playing fast and loose with public money is something that I just can't bring myself to be flexible about. Fiddling expenses in the public sector amounts to embezzling public funds for private benefit. It may be unthinking, yeah-but-everybody-does-it corruption, but it's corruption all the same. And if we turn a blind eye to the corruption of our representatives, what does that say about us?

Public servants, including MPs, have a mandate to administer our taxes in our best interests, not to use their position to line their own pockets (or moats), and they should be accountable for how every single penny is allocated. If they are unable to call themselves to account, then who else is supposed to do it, if not the media?

and thought he'd got it wrong mainly as he was attending an event to encourage people to vote. The fact Mp's seem to spend their time thinking up innovative ways to diddle money out of us isn't going to encourage anyone to vote. Just now on Today there was MP claiming she had to spend all £24K on rent in London WTF. Believe me I know rents are high but £24K on rent.
Also if they are as slip shod and sneaky with expenses hwo they hell can we trust them to spend the sums of miney of hospital, roads etc.

I suggest we build some flats for them to live in but seeing how their office block opposite the commons went spectacularly over budget may be not. I do think paying people bearing in mind that they may need to pay for 2 homes needs to be considered becuse we the voters do demand they live in their constituency. London mps would have to commute like the rest of us which may have the spin off that they'll do soemthing about the trains.

I'm a Council employee and I don't fiddle my expenses. For one I have to provide receipts for every penny but more important I am here to serve the public of my Local Authority and I wouldn't think of fiddling.

I'm not sure Stephen Fry is really the best person to be moralising about claiming money that is not really your own. I know it was a long time ago and all.

how the opinion of a dicky-bowed and penguin-suited self styled clever dick will appeal to the proverbial man on the Clapham Omnibus.
Is there still a Clapham Omnibus?
Bit like having Tony Blair talking about peace in the middle east, and how daft would that be?

Sorry Charlie but I'm with the others here. Stephen has it spectacularly wrong - seems like he hasn't really looked at the detail of the issue at all; if it was simply about a few garden expenses it wouldnt be so bad, but it's a huge moral issue and I'm disappointed that he's missed this completely, it's not "all our fault". As to the hidden agenda of this all coming out now, it's a mystery; if it was the conservatives' idea it's backfired massively! I hope it encourages people to look at voting for anything other than Tory or Labour, they are destroying democracy.

the media have told you it is.

The problem is he hasn't done a "proper" day's work in his life.

Anyone who has worked for a small company knows it is possible to be sensible with expenses, but it doesn't help when you think the pit the money is coming from is bottomless.

The best way to regulate expenses in parliament is to say "right, we've got £20m to spend on expenses this year, after that it's gone. If there's any left at the end of the year, it will be counted as your bonus."

The MPs don't really care what the country thinks but if it annoys their peers they will think twice about claims.

is very apt. Fiddle them and you are damned. Even if by mistake. I have patients who have faced prison, albeit eventually suspended sentences, for accepting incorrect decisions about their benefit, the problem being made by the DSS, and have then paid back "overpayments" and then still been prosecuted. And all the expensive TV adverts about shopping someone for taking a paper round to supplement their invalidity payments strike it a bit rich by comparison. I accept, of all people, the disparity in the pay of an M.P. against, say, Drs pay, if we are to expect as much and as many hours from our MPs as is expected from GPs. Running the country/representing a constituency should be rewarded sufficiently to negate the need to be imaginative about expenses. Or, for that matter, to take extra work on the side, as "advisers" to all and sundry. Give em' a salary commensurate with a better planned and more manageable and accountable job, with greater understanding of work/life balance, theirs, so that, also the expense accounts don't reflect the need for mistresses, divorces, drugs and alcohol.

He lives in a moneyed celebrity bubble and wouldn't understand the struggle of the man in the street if it bit him on the arse.

And he's a terrible actor.

and see their faces at talking about playing fast and loose with 'public' money.

There will be a few of them worrying about publicly paid salaries being more transparent.

I'm finding I can't take them seriously reporting this story when most of them are on much higher salaries out of the public purse.

not sure this was the best picture to go with the story from Yahoo

With journalists you can choose not to buy the paper or watch that news channel, but with MPs you have to pay them almost by default?

That said I do agree that there are lots of industries where various people are fiddling the books and their expenses for personal gain, and that a lot of the stuff we've been seeing in the press recently is just an effort to have something to concentrate our hate on over the current economic wossname.

Someone who is on the dole and may be creative with their income could (and have) been put in Jail.

Are they just as bad?

Most of the claims that are being hysterically paraded were actually within the rules. Claiming what is allowed may not be ethical, but certainly not illegal.

What we have is the consequence of trying to fix MPs salaries at a low level (because of public/media outrage at them earning more). So they fix it by providing generous allowances - like company cars came in to avoid pay freezes. What Yes Minister for the reasoning behind it ("we can't increase salaries, but we can increase the London weighting which everyone gets anyway").

We all have our solutions - mine is serviced flats, researchers employed centrally by Parliament, higher basic, minimal expenses. Yours will differ.

I'd agree with you Charlie, he did look a tad peaky. It's probably because he was blinking in the unfamiliar daylight, having spent the last 96 hours running on caffeine, staring red-eyed at his Blackberry whilst catching up on his bloody blogs, tweets and podcasts. His gene sequence almost certainly starts Q,W,E,R,T,Y.

We have expenses at our company for legitimate business outgoings incurred.

Recently, a junior sales rep had a taxi claim queried by Head of Acccounts - big Scottish bloke, careful with a shilling, you wouldn't want to mess.

The rep when questioned explained it was £20 he'd spent down the pub with a contact at a design company that had helped him meet a tight deadline and as "entertainment" is strictly reserved for clients, he submitted a taxi receipt for an equivalent amount. Result: a slap on the wrist and a "don't do it again, sonny".

Another, rather more senior figure, claimed for dinner and drinks with a client. Fair enough. Except that the client in question happened to be with me that night. Result: the sack. Gross moral turpitude. Sufficient grounds to question future veracity on matters fiscal. As an aside, we also took the view that we didn't want anyone dim enough to make such a claim working with us.

There is always a question of degree. However, it seems to me that claiming for a lightbulb is petty, claiming expenses for one place of abode while actually resident at another is gross moral turpitude. Claiming that a property when sold has been the primary residence when that is not the case so as to avoid capital gains tax is a criminal offence.

All of these matters are brought into sharper relief if perpetrated by elected officials who are responsible for the allocation of vast sums of taxpayers’ money.

To put a very pointed note to this – the collapse of western economies is directly attributable to the bursting of the absurd property bubble - and its attendant financial speculation - that was allowed to develop.

If MPs were directly profiting from this bubble through the process of “flipping” properties - then one wonders if this may have impinged at all on their legislative performance? Just a question. Amazing what things people will do when there is money involved - particularly, a lot of money.

to discover that you, Retrop.2, Archie.V, et al and I agree about something.

Thank goodness we're not discussing something really important like whether Robert Fripp or Martin Barre is the better guitarist

Of course, neither can play for toffee. But I wonder how much Peter Wishart, SNP MP for Perth and North Perthshire, and ex keyboard player for Runrig, claims for his expenses?

-

Should have purpose built nearby accommodation block, sort of superior hall of residence, which they do in Sweden thus negating need for second home allowance. Wherever opportunities arise for taking advantage, even though they should know better, a minority always will, whoever they are. So pragmatic the scandinavians. We could learn a lot from the way they do things, in so many ways. Mind you their newish government has had it's share of scandals nevertheless. Yet you try to change things here - always such conservatism, and then it'll be a bodged half-baked solution that works for no one. This country eh? *tuts to self* Sorry, what did Stephen Fry say again?

I find it abhorrent that our political lords and masters, especially the government, have declined to accept any responsibility for the current economic crisis. Unlike the times of boom, when it was down to their masterful management of economic policy, in times of bust it appears we're merely the inevitable victims of a global downturn. It's nothing to do with their failure to properly enforce such banking laws as they did have. It's nothing to do with their lack of foresight and failure to control a credit boom - even though some of them claim they foresaw (in private, of course) the consequences! Oh no. It's all the fault of those nasty, naughty, evil, greedy bankers.

Hmmm. What we see now is that the bankers were in fact taking their cue from politicians. They were operating within the rules. It might not appear proper behavior but it wasn't illegal. And no-one told them to stop so they carried on.

Unbelievable but true: this government has ceded the moral high ground to bankers and estate agents.

concerning a Labour MP who claimed £800 a month for a mortgage that didn't exist. I wonder what Mr Fry thinks of that? More important things to worry about? Still, we pay all of this and more to the Royal Family and Mr Fry is a good chum of Prince Charles, so it doesn't surprise me that he would defend this sort of behaviour.

"Oh, I'm such an arse. Why can't I keep my mouth shut? Miserable all day at being portrayed as 'the MPs' friend'. As if. My own fault tho..."

with particular attention to "MP's Pay and Conditions" in the chapter "The Attack on Parliament". "The readiness of ministers and MPs to sit idly by while Mrs Filkin was pilloried and driven from her job is one of the most morally disgusting episodes I have witnessed as a journalist and as a human being. I tried to expose it at the time, but no one wanted to listen," Oborne writes (page 214). Elizabeth Filkin was appointed Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards ten years ago to investigate allegations of corruption made against MPs. Guess what happened next. Of course, in those days, the press was quite prepared to do the Government's dirty work for them.

A few pages later Jon Cruddas, Labour MP for Dagenham and Barking, explains how New Labour excluded its core working-class vote and left them to find someone else to speak up for them. I'm a bit worried how that might turn out next month.

Nick Cohen's "Pretty Straight Guys" is another useful collection of the many other instances of 'sharp practice' that came to light during the Blair years.

As for Stephen Fry. There are millions of workers in the UK who have never completed an expenses form. I didn't see one until I started going to Union meetings: I have to produce every receipt, I have to convince the Treasurer that I took the cheapest available route and, if I'm out all day, I receive £6 towards something to eat. Luxury.

If they find themselves with a story that makes people go out and buy their paper then they've got every right to string it out for as long as they can. The idea that "It's all got up by the press" is nonsense. They tend to publish things that people want to read.

Sorry, only just caught up with this one. Fry's concern that politicians are tied up in the expenses row when they could be doing something about the recession is shaky on one key point. There isn't an awful lot they can do about the recession or global warming or Darfur or half the problems that they pretend they can affect. The one thing that they clearly have the means to do is sort out the mess of the way their expenses are paid.

Obviously MPs from outside London have to have somewhere to live while they’re at Westminster and it’s fair enough that this should be provided by the taxpayer.
Here’s a simple solution to what’s become a thorny problem: give every constituency a one-off lump sum to buy outright a suitable London property that then becomes the constituency’s “MP’s house”, available to whoever is the MP at the time. All maintenance - cleaning, refurbishing etc. - to be done by a Parliamentary Housing Dept. and all upgrades (new furniture etc.) to be done only with the PHd’s approval. Should the MP choose not to live in his/her constituency’s London house because, for instance, they want to live somewhere grander, or want to buy a property themselves, they would be entitled to sublet the property for the duration of their stint as MP and use the money towards their own housing costs.
This is how it works in the church, the military and even used to be quite common in football clubs. A friend of mine is a local parish priest and has a house that comes with the job. If he wants to do up his kitchen or paint his hall a bloke from the Diocese office comes round and checks that he’s not being too extravagant and they come to an agreement.
When Ian St.John moved to Liverpool from Motherwell he took over a “club house” from another Scottish player who was heading back home. When handing over the keys etc. this fella pointed to a shed full of coal in the alley next to the house and struck a deal for “the Saint” to buy this coal stock from him for £5 (a pretty large sum in those days). When he was shovelling some coal into his scuttle the next day his irate next door neighbour came round and pointed out - with some force - that the coal was actually his.

for that Saint story - v.funny and kind of poignant too.

interviewed Phil Hope at his house before he was elected MP. He was a keen juggler. Perhaps he still is...

The BBC said last night that the average cost of renting a domestic property is £813. The sensible thing is to allow MPs who need a second home to claim this each month, and then all subsequent living costs can be funded from their salaries; as is the case for us plebs. If they are exposed to real-world cost-of-living, then they might perhaps be more motivated to tackle such issues as housing, transport, etc.

Is she allowed to dissolve Parliament and call a general election?
"My Government & Opposition are useless, greedy, self-serving tossers and should be put out on their arses." I'd love to hear that in the unique Mrs.Windsor tones.

Mrs.Adman thinks it is all a scam concocted by G.Brown to make EVERYONE in Parliament look back, so we all stop looking at him.

I'm no monarchist, but distrust the idea of a republic, given the track record of our elected officials.
In the same way I received a fantastic educational start at a C of E school, but I'm no Anglican. (Not even a Christian...)

I'm just disgusted that public officials, who are elected on trust, can waste our money in this way. I'm a public servant (a teacher) & I would lose my job in an eyeblink if I behaved like our MPs.

You might laugh, but I happen to think that the Queen is one of the few people in high profile public life who has any real integrity.

Arguably, Parliament should never have restored the monarchy in 1660, but what would we have ended up with instead? Our own Emperor Napoleon? I'm no jingoist, but actually her majesty makes me proud to be a Brit. Life is more complex than it looks. History will call us the New Elizabethans - our elected representatives will be mere footnotes.

I can quite appreciate how, to many people (such as Charlie G and Stephen F), this seems like a storm in a teacup. But after pondering this for a few days I'm coming round to the idea that the political class' control-freakery is ultimately bringing these chickens home to roost.

- Concerned about police-state intrusion? Too bad
- Worn out by ludicrous "elfinsafety" rules? Tough
- Disagree with going to war in Iraq? Well you don't think anyone gets to vote on that do you?
- Unconvinced about ID cards? What have you got to hide, then?
- Quality-based public spending? You must be joking

I'm in danger of sounding like Jeremy Clarkson, but I really think there's been a few years worth of brewing discontent among the general public, firstly about various issues such as the above, and subsequently about the public's inability to really do anything about any of them. Government just doesn't listen and doesn't have any intention of doing anything other than what they think.

This has consequently produced a kind of voter "kettling" effect, where all the frustration and disagreement has boiled over in the one area where our views most definitely do count: any MP (of whatever party) now knows exactly what the public thinks, and more to the point knows that this is personal.

Finally, does anyone else think it hugely ironic that, after all these years of spin-doctored presentational politics, it never seemed to occur to any of these "fingered MPs" to ask themselves "I wonder how this will look to the voters?".

... that politics is too important to leave to others. I suspect that when you get a growing apathy politicians are more likely to feel that anything goes. (i.e. No-one cares that much so we can get away with it.) It is up to everyone to demand far more than the bland convergence which we have seen in recent years with both Goverments and opposition parties singing from more or less the same hymnn sheet.
They may play fast and loose with their expenses but that is dwarfed by the amounts which are thrown at gimmicky schemes such as the Academies programme in education which is anti-democratic, unproven and designed to undermine Trade Union inflence. Incidentally it is mainly poorer communities in inner-cities which are subjected to this type of disruptive experimentation. They get away with it because they are allowed to. Stand up and be counted!

...for the first time in years.

My vote has never been that assiduously courted by anyone. I have never lived in an area which regularly changes its political allegiance. No swing votes, no point in campaigning the main parties all seem to think and I still don't think my MP will change. Living, as I do, in a central london area my MP doesn't even have a second home, so the chances are she'll be fine.

But imagine if loads of safe seats switch allegiance at the next general election? Or imagine if genuine independents get in during the European elections? Under those conditions my apathy would evaporate. Hell politics would be more like sport!

on question time desperately trying to create an era Defining Tagline? ...some of his vainglorious attempts included "The Duckhouse Parliament" and "The Hazel Blears test".... good effort.

Down. Are you the Charlie Gordon Labour politician? If so, it says a lot about your postings so far. If not, I`m sorry but still disagree with you anyway.

All you need to know about that twat Fry is that he backed the woefully hypocritical John McCain. Both are (were) embrassing one trick ponies. Fry is, admittedly, a very clever man.
But Fry did say (while promoting his farcically lightweight US travel series): "There's the joke figure of Sarah Palin, who is laughably dreadful, but John McCain, for all his faults, is also a remarkable man." He's not.
He also said: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/the_real_american_idol/article...
I would audio boo about how much I dislike Fry, but he would love that. Odious, hateful self satisfied..... grrrrrrr