Smith apologises over expenses claims

FORMER British home secretary Jacqui Smith yesterday apologised for wrongly designating her family house as a second home for expenses purposes – a move that ended up costing her job.

She also apologised “unreservedly” to Parliament for claiming the cost of adult movies on expenses.

Smith was ordered to make the public apology in the House of Commons following an investigation by the Commons Standards and Privileges Committee.

An inquiry was launched into Smith’s expenses claims after it emerged she had designated her family home in the West Midlands as her second home for expenses purposes, while listing a room at her sister’s London house where she lodged as her main home.

Between 2006 and 2009, Smith claimed £64,240 in Additional Costs Allowance for the Redditch property, including mortgage interest, utility bills, council tax, telephone, servicing, maintenance, repairs and cleaning.

She said: “I want to apologise unreservedly to the House – as I have to my constituents – for wrongly claiming for the cost of films alongside my broadband and cable connection.

“This claim should never have been made and, as the committee notes, I paid back the claim in full as soon as it was brought to my attention.”

The inquiry looked into complaints over Smith’s expense claims for a cable TV, telephone and broadband package over an eight-month period, which included additional sums for pay-per-view films and sporting events. Among these were pornographic movies which her husband Richard Timney watched while she was away.

Turning to her second home claim, Smith said: “On the issue of second home allowances, the commissioner and the committee recognise that my London home is indeed a home.

“They dismiss the most usually repeated newspaper descriptions of my living arrangements and I welcome this judgment.”

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Gordon Brown is torepay more than £12,000 in expenses for cleaning, gardening and maintenance at his second home, his office announced yesterday.

The repayment came after auditor Thomas Legg wrote to all MPs to highlight concerns which have arisen during his inquiry into expenses paid out over the past five years.

Brown is to return £10,716.60 in relation to cleaning and £302.50 for gardening in the period 2004/05 to 2008/09, as well as a £1,396 bill for painting and decoration in April 2006, which was inadvertently submitted twice.