Meacher’s £2,000 council tax exes

Oldham MP Michael Meacher paid back more than £2,000 to the taxpayer after claiming twice for council tax.

Since the expenses scandal broke in Westminster 182 MPs from all parties have repaid a total of £478,616.

Included on the published list is the Oldham West and Royton MP who said he handed back £2,009.70 after spotting the duplication.

He said: “This was a mistake. I clamed the amount twice and when I noticed it I paid it back. I always do my expenses every month as I have done for the last 10 years.

“Oldham council sent me a letter asking for payment because I had not paid the council tax straight away so I claimed the whole amount and put it through my expenses.

“Then, due to the massive amount of paperwork I have mistakenly continued to claim monthly.”

Mr Meacher said the overclaim was a genuine mistake, especially given he claims about one-third of the allowed additional cost allowance so MPs can have two homes to do their job. Last year he only claimed £8,944 from almost £24,000 available and was named by The Daily Telegraph — who bought a leaked copy of expenses — as one of the ‘saintly’ MPs for being so frugal.

The Labour MP added: “The reputation of parliament has been very tarnished by the expenses revelations and it will take a long time to recover. We have the chance when we elect a speaker today to chose a radical reformer who can bring back life to Parliament and earn the respect of the public.”

The “spending spree” has led to more than a dozen MPs saying they plan to stand down. Treasury Minister Kitty Ussher became the latest casualty of the expenses scandal last week. She stepped down amid reports that she had changed the designation of her constituency home to avoid capital gains tax.

The long-awaited MPs’ expenses were published on Thursday after a long legal battle. But the House of Commons has been accused of spending more than £2 million on a bungled cover-up after publishing details of MPs’ expenses with huge swathes blacked out.

Oldham East and Saddleworth MP Phil Woolas and Ashton MP David Heyes gave the Chronicle advanced copies of their expense claims allowing us to see every detail.

Records of more than a million claims were finally put on the Parliament website on Thursday.

To view expenses visit www.parliament.uk