Thread by @thetimes

Fourteen MPs – nearly all of whom are Conservatives – are using the parliamentary expenses scheme to rent homes while also letting out properties that they own in London for at least £10,000 a year thetimes.co.uk/article/mps-fi…

A loophole in the expenses system, created after the last expenses scandal, allows MPs to let their own homes while using taxpayers’ money to rent another property in the capital

Sir Geoffrey Cox QC, the former attorney-general who is facing scrutiny over the £1 million a year he earns as a lawyer, began letting his home in Battersea, south London, in 2017

He subsequently rented another property for £1,900 a month

Other MPs, nearly all Tory, who rent properties in the capital while letting their own homes include:

🔵 John Whittingdale
🔵 Liam Fox
🔵 Robert Goodwill
🔵 Philip Davies

The loophole allowing MPs to do this was created in 2010 when the expenses watchdog, Ipsa, banned MPs from claiming mortgage interest payments

The move was intended to stop them from making capital gains on taxpayer-funded properties

To simplify the system, Ipsa said it would pay only the cost of renting a property in the capital. But a number of MPs who already had London properties said the rule was unfair because it forced them to subsidise the cost of a second home

To get around the new system — and not to lose out financially — some MPs decided to let the homes they owned in London while renting another property and claiming up to £22,920 per year

The expenses watchdog has argued that it cannot, in effect, means-test MPs

“We recognise that there can be a perception of personal gain if an MP receives rental income from their own property while living in an Ipsa-funded flat,” it said

After the Westminster expenses scandal, the newly formed Ipsa set out to reform what was widely seen as one of the more egregious aspects of the system

MPs were banned from making claims for mortgage interest payments and instead allowed to make claims to rent — though not buy — a second property

However well intentioned, the move created a significant loophole
thetimes.co.uk/article/mps-fi…