More Expenses BS

The Times and Guardian front pages today: PM ordered to repay £12,000 of expenses.

On reading this, you naturally assume he's done something wrong, broken the rules. This isn't the case. He has not flouted any of the regulations that were in place at the time. Sir Thomas Legg, the retired civil servant who was given the task of auditing MP's expenses, has imposed a completely arbitrary retrospective cap on what MPs should have claimed. This is like changing the law and then penalising anyone who broke it before it was in place.

I'm all in favour of changing the system so that these limits apply in future, but penalising MPs for claiming benefits they were perfectly entitled to at the time by applying a seemingly random limit is totally ridiculous. Now MPs and ministers are trapped into repaying this money, because refusing will result in a massive media backlash.

Telling MPs to repay money in this way gives off the impression that they were doing something wrong, which of course reflects badly on them.

David Cameron has told his MPs that they must repay this money or face not being able to stand at the next General Election (source). They have every right to be upset, since they are having their reputations sullied for effectively following guidelines.

If they broke the rules, they should be sacked. If they haven't, they should obey the new rules in the future, not be penalised for the past.