Douglas Alexander - My home, your expense.

Strike a light, even Douglas is at it....
Declaring that he had been “under-insured,” Mr Alexander sought permission from the fees office to kit out a new home at taxpayers’ expense. He stayed there for six months while his 120-year-old house was being repaired.
In the end, the MP repaid nearly £2,000 for items including bedding, a television, DVD player and an oven roasting tin after his insurance company agreed to reimburse him for property lost in the fire.
The fire, in September 2007, broke out while Mr Alexander was at his London home with his wife Jacqueline, and their two children. As the £210,000 detached home in Houston, Renfrewshire, was yards from a house rented by the terrorists who had attacked Glasgow airport a few months earlier, police initially classified it as “suspicious”.
The damage was so extensive that Mr Alexander and his family were forced to move into a nearby house.

(Monopoly board pic from Dazed & Confused...)
He was told by the fees office: “It would be in order for you to continue to claim interest payments on your second home whilst claiming other expenses, excluding rent, for temporary accommodation. This arrangement will continue whilst your second home is being repaired.”
The International Development Secretary took that to mean that he could replace items lost in the fire. Five months later, he wrote to the fees office, enclosing a cheque for £1,923. He said: “I am due to be able to return to my property. The October 2007 Additional Costs Allowance claim included £1,373 and £550 for items purchased as replacements for items lost in the fire. Although it turns out I was under-insured for house contents, payment from the insurance company for contents has now been finalised.
“I enclose a cheque for those sums in lieu of these replacement items claimed in October to the ACA but which have been covered by the insurance payment.”
The fire followed extensive redecorations at Mr Alexander’s home running into tens of thousands of pounds.

Oh this will cheer you all up, the Rt. Hon. bastards have voted themselves an extra £16 million quid of your money in expenses this year. No recession for them, no short time, no reduced hours, no worrying about keeping the rent/mortgage paid; in fact no worries at all...

So lets see, a wage starting at £64,766 - more for ministers. The additional costs allowance, which is tax-free and worth £24,006, a staffing allowance of £100,205, the incidental expenses provision of up to £22,913, food allowance of £400 a month. 

Oh an free travel as they are reimbursed for all travel to and from their constituencies/holiday homes/other properties they have in their taxpayer funded property portfolio.

Then a lump sum of upto £40,000 when removed from office, a redundancy payment of between £32,000 and £65,000. Then a cushy final salary pension....

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