While it does not surprise me I doubt it will amount to a row of beans with Tory voters. Not one Tory will lose their seat at the next general election because of the expenses scandal. Why?

Because the Tories want power, and they will not vote for anyone else over an issue like this. For all the hot air generated by this scandal the Tory party will not lose a single vote. Their supporters have no interest in anything but power at all costs, and so will vote Tory despite the crooks in their party.

It will be the Labour party who looses out because their voters are much more principled and are disgusted with what Labour Mps have been doing.

I have to agree wit Sally on this.

But Muzz Norris does shout a lot in her blog post. “)

Nadine Dorries, Michael Gove…It’s a checklist of my most detested.

She’s not claimed for that ladyshaver, has she?

I think even though some of the individual claims are worse on the Tory side (moats, anyone?? I mean, MOATS?!!??!?!?!?!), most normal people hated Labour anyway and just want them out. So whilst a lot of people might not vote at all or might vote for a smaller party, many will vote for the Tories just to give Labour a kicking – and that includes former Labour supporters. Not sure how principled Labour’s voters are in practice, given that many of them (although a lot less than in 1997 & 2001) turned out to vote for Labour in 2005 after it was clear Labour had lied to the country about WMD.

The financial crisis, emailgate, the Gurkhas, and now this – another nail in the coffin not just for New Labour, but the entire Labour Party.

“Their supporters have no interest in anything but power at all costs, and so will vote”

And what about the floating voters they need to win?

“Nadine Dorries, Michael Gove…It’s a checklist of my most detested. ”

Blears too, of course. Shahid Malik has never impressed me, either. It really is a vote of confidence that one’s personal morality is based on more than petty minded bias and bitterness.

[at which point someone will doubtless find some upright hang-em-and-flog-em Tory grandee who's never claimed for anything so much as a teaspoon]

Sorry, I know this is a completely gratuitous observation, but Dorries increasingly resembles Egg-wina Curry (wearing a blond whig) – can anybody else see it?

Dorries’ further statements miss the central point.

She is defending claiming the additional costs allowance on her constituency home, and the argument seems to be that overall she spends more time away from it than there, if you add up being abroad and being at the nominated ‘main home’ (the Cotswolds). But the rule is simply a matter of fact: at which home do you spend most time. She does not seem to claim that she does

Bizarrely, she makes a virtue of the fact that she has to pay for her London costs out of her own pocket. But this is precisely what the ACA is for – to meet the costs of London or constituency home. So she should be claiming those, and not the Bedford house

And she says that she has done this because she didn’t want constituents to know she had a base somewhere else. But there was a simple way to do that – make it her main home, not her second home. (She could then claim London costs as appropriate when in Westminster; and make her Cotswolds or foreign boltholes her own private affair).

So the defence seems v.confused – on the facts as the Telegraph and ND have put out.

If any further proof were needed that the Member of Parliament for Mid Bedfordshire is a liar, the following is from her website, 22nd September 2005. It speaks for itself.

http://www.dorries.org.uk/Story.aspx?ID=14

Nadine Dorries, MP for Mid Beds, and her family are to make their new home in Woburn.

“The decision was very much taken out of my hands by the kids” said Nadine. “They fell in love with the town and it didn’t matter where else we went they kept coming back to Woburn.

As any parent will know, a move is a huge thing especially 3 lively girls. It helps with the process when the children have a big say and feel they an input in to what is happening.

It also makes sense logistically. My constituency office is in Shefford and I am in the House of Commons four nights a week so it is manageable”.