Any British Labour MP found to have made improper expenses claims could be automatically deselected and barred from standing at the next general election as the party tries to overcome the crisis facing parliament.
The radical proposal is expected to be agreed to next week by Labour’s national executive, a move that acknowledges the deep sense of anger among voters to the escalating scandal over MPs’ claims.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown has also given ministers a deadline of tomorrow night to ensure that their expenses claims for the past five years are lodged with the parliamentary authorities and ready for publication.
Any deselection would happen after the parliamentary commissioner for standards had ruled that an MP had been found clearly guilty of improper claims.
The prime minister, who is expected to give a major TV interview today, is to resist an even more punitive grassroots proposal that would compel every sitting Labour MP to go though a fresh selection process so the public can be reassured all candidates are “fit and proper persons” to stand at the election. Labour officials met on Friday and said the move would be unfair.
Scotland Yard and the Crown Prosecution Service announced they were setting up a joint panel to consider multiple allegations that MPs have broken the law. The police said they were acting because they had received so many complaints from the public.
Lord Foulkes, a close friend of the Speaker of the House of Commons, Michael Martin, gave a broad hint that Martin has decided to stand down.
Shahid Malik, the justice minister and the first Muslim minister in the government, was forced to stand down from his post by Brown pending an investigation into whether his rental of a home in his Dewsbury constituency represented a breach of the ministerial code. He is the first minister to be disciplined since the allegations started.
William Hague, the opposition Conservative party deputy leader, announced that he was going to divest himself of the vast bulk of his outside interests, a decision that will put pressure on the other shadow cabinet members
David Cameron, the Conservative leader, struggling to keep ahead of the allegations of sleaze, told his Scottish Tory party that this was a time of “great danger” for democracy in the UK. He told delegates he understood “how deep the damage goes” and said: “Our politics is reviled. Our parliament is held in scorn. Our people have had enough.”
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
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