Second homes for instance. Probably when the rules were written governing the allowances, the writers were thinking only of London lodgings for legislators from out of town. But quite a few of the lawmakers who had modest places in London and expensive ones in their constituencies decided that the latter were their actual second homes, not the London places. This worked to their advantage since the upkeep, taxes and mortgage interest on the out-of-town houses were high enough to justify more reimbursement than the London spots. In time the location of the rural homes mattered less and one lady got expenses for a country home which was more than 200 miles away from her constituency.

The ingenuity expended on these “fiddles” as the British call them, should have been enough to keep the whole Empire going if applied to the purpose. “Flipping” is a word used a lot by Andy Capp as a substitute for the real word but it also has a meaning which is the same as it has here. It means quick sales of property for a price higher than the last sale. It usually carries an implication that some hanky-panky has taken place in connection therewith. In the English case “flipping” as practiced by the parliamentary prestidigitators involved the alternation of city and country homes according to which was in greatest need of subsidy at the time. So one year the out-of-town home would be the “second” or subsidized home and the next year the London home would be. Nothing to it once you got the hang of it. A chap named Ed Balls and his wife (Mrs. B?), both M.P’s, did it three times. Well, no surprise there.

Some serious lawbreaking was involved in all of this. At least four M.P’s. didn’t pay capital gains when they sold their places -- for six-figure profits. The profits were obtained by beautifying the houses beyond recognition using taxpayer money. There were also cases of avoiding local taxes on sales. There were several cases of claiming interest payments on mortgages which had expired. Jack Straw, the Lord High Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice, somehow claimed reimbursement for full payment of local taxes when he only paid 50% of them as an official. He admitted “errors” saying accountancy wasn’t his long suit, ha-ha, even though he was a member of the National Statisticians Society.

Straight-out tax evasion like this is a criminal offense in any country. Ordinary citizens are arrested for it often. When they plead that it was all a mistake, they are laughed at. It’s considered strange that so many “mistakes” and “errors” occur and they’re always in favor of the taxpayer and never of the government. It looks like Straw has feet of…clay.

Most of the major politicians of the three leading parties have fairly clean skirts themselves. They took their allowances but kept their imaginations for their speeches, not for crazy claims for things like moats around their homes or “duck houses” twelve feet high or for flats never occupied by them but by their children, or “second homes” ten miles from their “main homes” or any other pie-in-the-sky fantasies normally confined to sweepstakes winners and meth fiends.

All the above swindles were worked by the honorable members and have now been condemned by their party leaders. At this time at least eight sitting M.P’s. have announced they won’t be running for re-election. Any accused M.P. who does run is more than likely to be defeated. He’ll be lucky if he’s not also mobbed, barracked, mafficked, ducked, gated and otherwise abused in a British way, possibly leading to a stretch in chokey. These things can’t all be defined but they sound bad.

Our American members of Congress have never gotten their housing costs in Washington reimbursed by the government, only their traveling expenses. These come in for criticism at times, but not often. George H.W. Bush’s Chief of Staff got into trouble for using a White House limousine to take a trip to New York for a stamp auction. He lost his job.

I myself once had a department car I wasn’t supposed to take out of the city. Naturally I adhered rigidly to this order at all times. The only time I had trouble was the night I went to Madison Square Garden with it. That was in the city limits after all. When I came out it wasn’t there. It had been towed. With the I.D. on display. With that kind of luck it’s just as well nobody ever offered to pay me for my housing expenses. I’d have had my fifteen minutes of fame all right.

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