Watchdog clears Michael Martin
Speaker’s wife has £2,500 taxi allowance
Published:
The wife of Commons Speaker Michael Martin is allowed to spend thousands of pounds a year on taxis to go shopping for the couple’s groceries, it emerged yesterday.
Mary Martin’s £2,500 allowance was set up six years ago because of the pressures on her husband’s time.
The expenses claims — charged to the taxpayer — are defended by the House of Commons on the grounds that they support Mr Martin, a Glasgow Labour MP, in his official role.
The speaker’s office has also previously claimed that Mrs Martin was shopping for official functions.
But in an interview with the parliamentary sleaze watchdog, Mr Martin disclosed that the provisions were consumed by the couple themselves, although they were “also used for hospitality”.
His evidence emerged as Parliamentary Standards Commissioner John Lyon cleared Mr Martin following a complaint about taxi trips.
Mr Lyon said the claims — amounting to £4,139.17 since 2004 — were reasonable and within the rules.
Mark Wallace, campaign director of the TaxPayers’ Alliance who submitted the complaint, said it appeared the trips were “more for food for the Martins than for official functions”.
He went on: “If so, it’s shocking that they are able to use taxpayers’ money for taxis to do their domestic grocery shopping. If this is within the rules, then the rules urgently need tightening up.
“We are all being told to tighten our belts in these tough times. It’s about time the speaker set a good example and stopped indulging himself with other people’s money.”
Mr Martin has faced a storm of controversy over MPs’ expenses and is leading a High Court challenge against their publication in detail. He has also faced questions about his own use of the second home allowance and Mrs Martin’s taxi journeys.
But it was disclosed yesterday that, since 2002, Mr Martin has been entitled to up to £2,500 a year for the use of taxis for “normal official business”.
The allowance was provided by a former clerk of the House to allow Mrs Martin to “ease the burden” on her husband by “doing the shopping to support him in his official duties”, according to the minutes of a meeting between Mr Martin and Mr Lyon.
The row over Mrs Martin’s taxi trips led to the resignation of the speaker’s spokesman, Mike Granatt, earlier this year.
Mr Granatt misled journalists when he said he be- lieved Mrs Martin had been accompanied by a Commons administrative official, when in fact she had been joined by her housekeeper.
The evidence published as part of Mr Lyon’s memorandum to the Commons standards and privileges committee appears to confirm that Mrs Martin was only ever accompanied by her housekeeper.
