How much would you spend fitting out your kitchen? You can get a pretty decent one from Ikea for between £1,000 and £3,000. But apparently that's not good enough for our MPs who can claim up to £10,000 for a new kitchen on expenses, plus another £12,000 on other household items. The Sun brands the allowance as a "massive 'makeover' perk", and it is not alone in noting, with barely disguised outrage, that it's all at the taxpayers' expense.
Several papers, including the Guardian, print in full what MPs from outside London can treat themselves to under the Additional Costs Living Allowance to furnish their second homes.
After a new kitchen, the most expensive items are a new bathroom (up to £6,335), a suite of furniture (£2,000), a bed (£1,000), a sideboard (£795), and a TV (£750). The Sun notes that the "John Lewis list", so called because the costs are based on goods that can be bought from the department store, is beyond the means of what most ordinary voters can afford for their first and only home.
The Daily Mail splutters with outrage that "MPs can shop till they drop... on the taxpaper", noting that the maximum claim of £300 for rugs could buy you "a luxury hand-knotted Pakistan Bokhara rug", which is described on the John Lewis website as "soft and velvety".
The Telegraph observes that disclosure of the 38 item list of luxury goods MPs from outside London can choose from to furnish their second homes in the capital only came as a result of a Freedom of Information Act request that parliament spent months trying to supress.
The paper says the House of Commons director of resources, Andrew Walker, had previously refused to make the list public, claiming it would encourage MPs to take advantage of the system by submitting expenses at the upper limit.
But MPs' days of lavish living could be numbered as a full list of allowances they've claimed since 2004 is set to be made public by the end of the year. Disgraced Tory MP Derek Conway might want to disappear in Panama before then - just as long as he doesn't claim the flight back.
As for the rest, basing their expenses on the price list of the Argos catalogue might be a good place to start.
