MORTGAGE interest and rent claims will be capped at £1,250 a month under interim reforms to MPs’ expenses, Speaker Michael Martin  announced.

He said all parties had agreed on an immediate ban on second homes claims for furniture, cleaning and stamp duty.

And MPs will not be allowed to ‘flip’ the designation of their second home during 2009/10.

The statement came after Mr Martin became the first Commons Speaker forced out of office for more than 300 years as the expenses scandal claimed its biggest scalp yet.

In a brief but dramatic statement, Mr Martin said he would be standing down next month to preserve ‘unity’ after a near-mutiny by MPs from all parties.

Pledge

Within hours, Gordon Brown was pledging to end the Parliamentary ‘gentlemen’s club’ by bringing in external regulators.

 Mr Martin had told the Commons that a ‘fundamental reform’ of allowances would result in the system shifting from self-regulation to regulation by an independent body.

He said all parties were committed to accepting the recommendations from Sir Christopher Kelly’s Committee on Standards in Public Life.

‘We have agreed a robust set of interim measures which will take effect at once and do not pre-empt any more substantial changes to be put forward by the Kelly Committee,” he said.

 Mr Brown said he believed the keystone of any reform had to be the switch from self-regulation.

“Westminster cannot operate like some gentlemen’s club, where the members make up the rules and operate them among themselves,” he said.

“If MPs continue to set their own codes and rules, the public will always question the transparency and standards they rightly demand.”

Abuses

Mr Brown said ‘comprehensive measures’ would be taken to reassure the public that all the ‘abuses and misjudgements’ of the past would be corrected and dealt with.

MPs would no longer set their own pay, but the Senior Salaries Review Body would, said Mr Brown.

“These are big changes, they change centuries of history for Parliament, but to move from self-regulation to statutory independent regulation is in my view the only way forward now,” he said.

“The biggest task we have is to restore the public’s support and trust in our political system as a whole.”

He said the functioning of Parliament needed to be looked at ‘much more deeply’, so
the public could have trust and pride in it.

He urged MPs to get out into their constituencies during next week’s Whitsun recess and ‘hold themselves to account’.

'Radical surgery'

Mr Brown also said the changes would apply to the Lords as well as the Commons. While ‘radical surgery’ was under way to reform the system, he stressed MPs had to take personal responsibility for their own failings.

“A few MPs have made terrible mistakes and they will pay a very heavy price for this because transparency is the means by which all these things are known,” he said.

Mr Brown said the Speaker had shown he was behind the necessary reforms and added: “I think that on reflection, people will want to thank the Speaker for what he’s done.”

Tory leader David Cameron said of Mr Martin’s decision: “I think it was, in the end, the right thing for him to do because obviously he’d lost the confidence of the Commons.

“But what we need is not just a new Speaker, we need a new Parliament, we need people to have the chance in a general election to pass judgment on their politicians.”

But Mr Brown dismissed calls for an immediate election so voters could punish wrongdoers, insisting it would not help because all parties had been tainted.

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg welcomed the changes agreed by the party leaders at their meeting.

Judgement

“The days of MPs being judge and jury of their own pay, judge and jury of their own expenses, are over,” he said.

Mr Martin stood up in the House to deliver a resignation statement which lasted little more than 30 seconds.

“Since I came to this House 30 years ago, I have always felt that the House is at its best when it is united,” he said.

“In order that unity can be maintained, I have decided that I will relinquish the office of Speaker on Sunday June 21.
This will allow the House to proceed to elect a new Speaker on Monday June 22.

“That is all I have to say on this matter.”

A by-election is expected in Mr Martin’s Glasgow North East constituency next month and Labour will be braced for a tough fight to hold the traditionally safe seat. By custom, Mr Martin would then be given a peerage.

He will walk away with the ultra gold-plated pension given to all former Speakers, equivalent to £39,000 a year index-linked, on top of his MP’s pension.

However, he will miss out on an allowance of up to £65,000 that is handed to members who depart or are defeated at a general election.