Clive Efford MP declares his expenses

Clive Efford's expenses are declared

I am sure that you share my disgust and anger over the scandals surrounding MP’s expenses. I assure you that I am as angry as anyone, particularly as the action of some MPs has called into question the integrity of all MPs.

Since I became an MP, I have always tried to behave in a manner that would never give my constituents cause to feel that I have let them down. They may disagree with me on some issues, but I hope I command respect for the way I do my job and the work I do on behalf of the people I represent.

I do not have a second home and have never claimed a single penny form the tax payer towards my home in Eltham. Nor do I pocket the money from allowances provided to pay my staff and run my office. Last year, in addition to my salary I received £2,169 for rail and car travel costs and £2,812 London Allowance. The latter is an allowance paid to all inner London MPs and I receive no other additional payments.

David Cameron recently devoted his entire European election broadcast to the issue of MPs’ allowances whilst claiming over £1,000 per month from the tax payer just to pay the interest on his mortgage. I find it extraordinary that someone who is profiting in this way should feel free to suggest that they have the answers to solve this scandalous problem. I do not believe that MPs should be allowed to profit from houses paid for out of public money.

I am appalled by MPs who claim that the reason they made extravagant claims is because the system allowed it. These are matters of personal judgement and it is no good MPs trying to blame officials of the House of Commons for their failure of judgement.

I believe we need a root and branch change to the allowance system, but not one designed by those who are profiting from the current one and intend to continue doing so from anything that replaces it.

The vast bulk of my expenses goes on staffing costs. This money is paid directly from the House of Commons' Fees Office direct to my staff who are all based in my constituency office. They help with the thousands of cases i deal with each year helping constituents with all sorts of problems and issues. They also help organise the walkabouts, coffee mornings and surgeries that I hold regularly.

Because I believe in transparency I am happy to provide full details of the invoices and receipts for my Allowance Expenditure for the last four months. In 2007/08 a Communications Allowance was introduced to help Members of Parliament keep in touch with their constituents for which I am also providing full details.

The documents attached have been “redacted” (edited) by the Fees Office. They have removed things like account numbers, telephone numbers, bank details, tax information and other personal information.

These figures will be published on the House of Commons website soon and the versions here are only a first draft. Some receipts have mistakenly been omitted but fortunately I have kept copies and so I hope they will be included in the final version.

The format is that normally you will see a C2 Direct payment form listing the items then the relevant receipts backing up the form.

If you have any questions about these documents then don’t hesitate to call me on 020 8850 5744.

Some of these are quite large files so may take a few minutes to download.

Clive Efford MP