Expenses and Allowances
All MPs expense claims and receipts, up to and including the 2008-9 financial year, are now available for scrutiny and download. You can view Alan's receipts here.
May 13th 2009
To view Alan's Parliamentary receipts, click on the links to the right -->
- Alan's summary of his Parliamentary expenses
- Questions from constituents
- Results of the Legg inquiry
- Parliamentary working hours
I know constituents are worried about the current news reports on MPs’ expenses. I also know many are probably wondering whether the stories in the national press bear any relationship to how their local MP has behaved.
Every year since I was first elected as the MP for Southampton Test, I have set out my expenses and allowances in my Annual Reports. These expenses include the cost of living away from home, the payment of staff, the rent and running of the constituency office, and travel.
The House of Commons ‘Green Book’ gives guidance on the maximum overall claimable cost of living away from home (this year it is £24,222) and on claimable items related to the renting or mortgaging of a flat or house designated as the second home These include furnishings and the cost of food and other household items. The maximum claimable for the latter category is currently set at 10% of the total living away from home allowance.
My main home is in Highfield, in the constituency and my second home has always been my London flat, except for one year (2001-2002) when my position as a Minister in the Department of Local Government, Transport and the Regions required my main home to be designated as not more than 30 miles from London
My claims for this second home have routinely covered mortgage interest (currently at about £400 per month), the service charge for the flat, council tax, insurance, TV licence, water rates and utility bills. The mortgage interest I currently pay is less than the cost of renting a similar small flat in London (the reason the mortgage interest claim is relatively low is because the mortgage itself was only taken out on about half the value of the property- the rest of the cost is borne by me personally).
In the past five years I have additionally replaced in my second home two items of furniture (a table and chairs) and a blind, and have replaced flooring. I have also replaced a boiler that blew up. I have submitted claims for food and other household items running to just over half the claimable amount when Parliament is sitting.
The amounts claimed for from the Additional Cost Allowance (the Allowance from which second home payments are made) against the maximum claimable for the past five years are:
Year |
What I claimed |
Maximum Claim Allowed |
Difference between my claim & maximum allowable* |
% of maximum allowance claimed |
2004-5 |
£15,129 |
£20,902.00 |
£5,773.00 |
72.38% |
2005-6 |
£11,916 |
£21,634.00 |
£9,718.00 |
55.08% |
2006-7 |
£15,391 |
£22,110.00 |
£6,719.00 |
69.61% |
2007-8 |
£14,190 |
£23,083.00 |
£8,893.00 |
61.47% |
2008-9 |
£12,647 (provisional) |
£24,006.00 |
£11,359.00 |
52.68% |
* (all unspent money is paid back to the Treasury)
(NB- The difficulting of predicting the split between capital and interest on mortgage payments results in overpayments and underpayments in particular years. These are recovered subsequently either by a retrospective payment into the ACA or a retrospective additional claim from the ACA. This may marginally distort the figures set out above)
You can read a full breakdown of my claims for each financial year in the ‘On the Record’ section of this website, by downloading each of my Annual Reports.
You may also be interested in my work to make Parliament and MP’s allowances more transparent. I work as a member of the Standards and Privileges Select Committee, which is responsible for examining complaints against MPs and produces recommendations for changes in the way the Parliamentary Code of Conduct operates.
If you have any queries about my Parliamentary expenses, please get in touch and I will give you a full and honest answer about any of my claims.
Alan Whitehead MP
Southampton Test
Your questions answered
Since I published my expenses here and offered to answer any further questions that might arise I have had a few enquiries. Here are the answers to the questions that have been received.
Why is your mortgage payment so low? You can’t get a flat in London for that price.
Because I only took out a mortgage on part of the value of my flat in London – almost half the cost of the property. The rest of it I paid for myself.
Have you ever ‘flipped’ your home?
Once, when I was required to so do by the rules which applied at the time. When I was a Minister in 2001-02 , I was required to have a “first home” within thirty miles of London. My Southampton home was then designated as my “second home”. This was unfortunate since the mortgage in Southampton was lower than in London! Other than this my home in Southampton has always been my first home.
Have you always lived in the same flat in London?
No, I bought a flat in Wandsworth when I was elected. This proved rather far from Parliament, almost an hour’s journey on some days. I moved to a flat in the Oval in 2004, which is much nearer Parliament.
At a much higher price?
No, the difference between the sale of the first and the purchase of the second was about £25,000.
So you made a capital gain on your first flat?
Yes, and of course I paid tax on it.
Even so, you’ll still walk away with a profit when you cease to be an MP.
I have committed myself to returning any profit from the mortgage interest payments paid for by the taxpayer to the House authorities when I leave Parliament
Did you claim stamp duty and legal fees on your second flat when you purchased it?
No.
Is anyone living in your flat with you?
No, but family members have stayed from time to time and both my children were living in my Southampton home when it was briefly designated as my ‘second home’ (see Question 2). The longest stay of a family member in my London home was for part of 2004 and 2005 when one of my children got a job in London after leaving university. I said they could stay until they were able to find suitable accomodation. I considered this was a reasonable arrangement as I personally owned half the flat.
But they cost extra in utilities which you claimed for?
No, I claimed only half of the utility bills in 2004-05.
Have you ever claimed for an accountant to do your tax claims? If so did you pay tax on him or her?
I have employed and accountant but I have never claimed for his services.
Any gardening claims?
No, but to be fair, I don’t have a garden.
Why did you claim for a new boiler in your London flat?
Because the previous one broke down, was repaired and then blew up.
You’ve claimed for a table and chairs. Where has the rest of the furniture come from?
I did claim for some furniture when I was first elected in 1997, and a sofa I think in about 2002. Other than that furnishings and other household goods have come from my home in Southampton, or have been bought by me in London.
You’ve said your claims “aren’t perfect” what does that mean?
It means that I have made some mistakes in my claims, and my team have sometimes made mistakes in claiming for office expenses. But no claims that should not have been made are outstanding and mistakes have always been rectified.
What’s the worst mistake then?
I took out a repayment mortgage on my flat rather than an interest only mortgage, because I felt this would offer the taxpayer better value for money because MPs are allowed to claim for interest, but not for capital. With this kind of mortgage every year in February you receive a mortgage interest statement which breaks down your overall payments into capital and interest. I worked from these statements and estimated my payments for each year. I have twice over-estimated and twice under-estimated. In 2004-05 and 2005-06 I overestimated and consequently repaid the difference. In 2006-07 and 2007-08 I underestimated and recovered the difference. I will have overestimated for 2008-09, which has now been rectified.
I can now get monthly written breakdowns of capital and interest from my mortgage provider (for £10 a time!) to prevent the problem occurring in future.
Do you employ any family members ?
No.
Your council tax claims seem quite high for a small flat even in Lambeth!
Yes they do. This is because, until half way through 2005-6 I did not claim separately for water rates, which were included in the 'Council Tax/Rates' category of claim. I did separate them out in the second half of 2006, and balanced the overall claim out over a period of time.
For the four years 2004-2008, the liabilities and claims are as follows:
Council Tax liabilities: £4075.89
Water rate liabilities £1257.48
So the total council tax/water rates is from 2004-2008 is: £5332.37
And my total claims against council tax and water rates were: £5260.24
So, my total claims for council tax and water rates from 2004-2008 were £72.13 less than the total liability.
Why have you claimed for eye-tests?
The eye tests were for a member of staff, not for me. The House of Commons has a duty of care obligation to contribute towards eye-tests for staff members who use computer screens. Staff can claim for the cost of an eye-test and a contribution towards a pair of glasses. These are rights for all workers, not just MPs staff- for more information about your right to a free eye-test see here.
What happened as a result of the Legg inquiry? Were you told to repay anything?
Yes. I have explained above how if the fees office ever made an overpayment to me via the additional cost allowance, I notified them of any mistake and reduced my subsequent claims so that they balanced out over the following year (see 'What's the worst mistake then?'). The Legg inquiry has now decided that that in the interests of transparency, overpayments should be paid back to the fees office via a cheque, rather than via under-claiming by the same amount over a financial year. In order to comply with this new ruling, I have volunteered to pay the fees office £1040- i.e. the total amount of payments they have overpaid to me in the one year where this is an issue (2005-6), and ignoring completely my subsequent under-claiming to substantially the same amount.
As a result I have now twice paid back the same money to the fees office, in order to satisfy both the 'old' guidelines and what are, in effect, the ‘new’ guidelines. I have volunteered to do this because I want my all my claims to be 100% above reproach, and you can never be too careful!
Parliamentary Working Hours
I normally start work at 8.30am when Parliament is sitting. This is necessary among other reasons for the sittings of Parliamentary Select and Bill Committees, which convene at 9.00am. Business in Parliament runs until at least 10.30pm on Mondays and Tuesdays, and often ends later. Business does not end before 7.30pm on a Wednesday 6.30pm on Thurday and 2.30pm on a Friday, if the House is sitting.
None of these 'end' times apply if business is of a constitutional or financial nature, and can run much later on any day other than Friday, as was the case for example on the 12th and 13th May. The end of the Parliamentary day in the chamber is, not, however the automatic end of all business in the House, even if evening meetings associated with but not directly attached to Parliament are discounted. Bill committees, for example, will sit on a Thursday on a number of occasions after the main business has finished.
What do you think about this story? Email Alan