Seems that the Mayor of London has a talent for picking the “wonderful”, “brilliant” and scandal-prone when it comes to expenses.
The BBC reports that Boris Johnson claimed on his MP expenses for a website which promoted his mayoral campaign and the sale of his books:
Mr Johnson claimed the £500 from his MP’s communications allowance for redesigning his website homepage in December 2007.
In a letter obtained by BBC London under the Freedom of Information Act, a parliamentary official told Mr Johnson that his claim was rejected because his website fell “significantly outside” the allowance guidelines.
The House of Commons guidance on the Communications Allowance couldn’t be any clearer -specifically:
6.12.4
You must not use your CA funded publications or websites:• to conduct business activities or to obtain inappropriate
private benefit• to promote or campaign on behalf of any person
seeking election
All the same, Boris maintains in an interview with the BBC (video here) that his staff members who submitted the claim were “wonderful” and “brilliant”:
“I don’t really think that I’m disposed to go back to those people, who are no longer working for me, and find out exactly what their thinking was.”
It’s a good thing, then, that the police are disposed to do just that with Ian Clement.
