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The Democracy Deniers at Westminster

78 Labour MPs (including 25 Labour ministers and most of 'open government advocate' Gordon Brown's allies) and 18 Tories backed the Freedom of Information (Amendment) Bill's third reading on Friday, May 18th, 2007.

The bill was introduced by Tory MP David McLean, allegedly to prevent correspondence between MPs and their constituents from being dragged into the public domain. Except that this information is already protected by the existing provisions of the FoI Act.

So why did this Opposition back-bencher's bill get the support of the Labour party and the Labour speaker Michael 'Gorbals Mick' Martin? Because many MPs have been embarrassed by details of their expenses (particularly their highly abused travelling expenses) reaching the public domain. In short, they don't want the taxpayer to know how vigorously the Westminster scroungers are abusing the public purse.

The Roll of Shame of Guilty Parties

LABOUR:

Bob Ainsworth (Coventry North East)
Graham Allen (Nottingham North)
** Janet Anderson (Rossendale &
    Darwen)
Adrian Bailey (West Bromwich West)
Sir Stuart Bell (Middlesbrough)
Clive Betts (Sheffield Attercliffe)
Liz Blackman (Erewash)
Nick Brown (Newcastle upon Tyne East
    & Wallsend)
Colin Burgon (Elmet)
David Cairns (Inverclyde)
Alan Campbell (Tynemouth)
Ronnie Campbell(Blyth Valley)
David Clelland (Tyne Bridge)
Harry Cohen (Leyton & Wanstead)
Wayne David (Caerphilly)
Parmjit Dhanda (Gloucester)
Brian Donohoe (Ayrshire Central)
Frank Doran (Aberdeen North)
Jim Dowd (Lewisham West)
Angela Eagle (Wallasey)
Maria Eagle (Liverpool Garston)
Clive Efford (Eltham)
Jim Fitzpatrick (Poplar & Canning Town)
Caroline Flint (Don Valley)
Michael Foster (Worcester)
Mike Hall (Weaver Vale)
Tom Harris (Glasgow South)
Doug Henderson (Newcastle upon Tyne
    North)
John Heppell(Nottingham East)
Keith Hill(Streatham)
Huw Irranca-Davies (Ogmore)
Kevan Jones (Durham North)
Martyn Jones (Clwyd South)
Fraser Kemp (Houghton & Washington
    East)
David Lammy (Tottenham)
Bob Laxton (Derby North)
Tom Levitt (High Peak)
Ivan Lewis (Bury South)
Tony Lloyd (Manchester Central)
Tommy McAvoy (Rutherglen & Hamilton
    West)
Stephen McCabe (Birmingham
    Hall Green)
Ian McCartney (Makerfield)
John McFall (Dunbartonshire West)
Shona McIsaac (Cleethorpes)
Tony McNulty (Harrow East)
Khalid Mahmood (Birmingham
    Perry Barr)
David Marshall (Glasgow East)
Gillian Merron (Lincoln)
Alun Michael (Cardiff South & Penarth)
Laura Moffatt (Crawley)
Elliot Morley (Scunthorpe)
George Mudie (Leeds East)
Meg Munn (Sheffield Heeley)
Denis Murphy (Wansbeck)
James Plaskitt (Warwick & Leamington)
Stephen Pound (Ealing North)
Ken Purchase (Wolverhampton
    North East)
John Robertson (Glasgow North West)
Frank Poy (Motherwell & Wishaw)
Joan Ryan (Enfield North)
Martin Salter (Reading West)
Jonathan Shaw (Chatham & Aylesford)
Jimmy Sheridan (Paisley & Renfrewshire
    North)
Sion Simon (Birmingham Erdington)
Angela Smith (Sheffield Hillsborough)
Anne Snelgrove (Swindon South)
John Spellar (Warley)
Ian Stewart (Eccles)
Mark Tami (Alyn & Deeside)
Dari Taylor (Stockton South)
Gareth Thomas (Harrow West)
Desmond Turner (Brighton Kemptown)
Claire Ward (Watford)
Tom Watson (West Bromwich East)
Dave Watts (St Helens North)
Malcolm Wicks (Croydon North)
Phil Woolas (Oldham East &
    Saddleworth)
David Wright (Telford).

CONSERVATIVE:

Peter Atkinson (Hexham)
Simon Burns (Chelmsford West)
Sir John Butterfill (Bournemouth West)
James Duddridge (Rochford & Southend
    East)
Tobias Ellwood (Bournemouth East)
Julie Kirkbride (Bromsgrove)
Greg Knight (Yorkshire East)
Julian Lewis (New Forest East)
David Maclean (Penrith & The Border)
Bob Neill (Bromley & Chislehurst)
Andrew Pelling (Croydon Central)
Mark Pritchard (the Wrekin)
John Randall (Uxbridge)
David Ruffley (Bury St Edmunds)
David Tredinnick (Bosworth)
Ann Widdecombe (Maidstone &
    The Weald)
Ann Winterton (Congleton)
Sir Nicholas Winterton (Macclesfield)

** "Sir P. Mawer, the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner, is looking into some of the more outrageous (travel expenses) claims, including the one for £16,612 from J. Anderson [Labour, Rossendale & Darwin]. She reckons that she drove 60,000 miles last year which, at an average of 30 mph for urban and rural driving, means that she had to have spent five and a half hours driving on every single day of the year!"

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