Office queries for former Tyne Tory Derek Conway

May 25 2009 The Journal

THE disgraced former Tyneside Tory Derek Conway is facing fresh controversy after it was reported he was able to spend thousands of pounds in public money on two homes by designating his main residence as an office.

Mr Conway, who was expelled from the Conservative Party last year over payments to his sons for parliamentary work, took advantage of the expenses system by saying he worked from his family home, hundreds of miles from his constituency, The Sunday Telegraph claimed yesterday.

As well as claiming mortgage interest and household bills for his designated second home in London, the independent MP for Old Bexley and Sidcup reportedly spent hundreds of pounds in office expenses on his family house in Morpeth, Northumberland.

Mr Conway, who employs his wife as his PA, also had a home in his Bexley constituency in south-east London, more than 300 miles away from his Northumberland office, the paper reported.

Some of the more unusual items put on expenses - all of which were rejected by Commons officials - included £160 for a Smythson pigskin wallet, a £165 Mont Blanc rollerball pen, and £84 for an engineer to retune the television at his London home.

But he successfully claimed a number of purchases for the Northumberland property, including a £669.96 digital camera, a £573.99 television, a £199 Zanussi fridge freezer, a £174 “low radiation“ telephone, a £399 sat nav device, a £31 Smythson diary, a £249 vacuum cleaner, £220 for repairs to a brief case and a £229 Nespresso coffee maker.

These were funded by the incidental expenses provision, an allowance intended to cover the costs of running a constituency office.