Ex-MP Devine jailed over expenses

Former MP for Livingston sentenced for submitting false invoices for cleaning and printing work totalling £8,385 The former Labour MP Jim Devine has become the third MP to be jailed over the expenses scandal after being sentenced to 16 months at the Old Bailey. Devine, who succeeded the late foreign secretary, Robin Cook, as the MP for Livingston, was found guilty last month of two charges of false accounting. The 57-year-old had submitted false invoices for cleaning and printing work totalling £8,385. He was the first MP to plead not guilty and face trial over expenses fraud . A former psychiatric nurse and union convenor of Bathgate, Lothian, Devine was alleged to have submitted the claims to clear an overdraft. He used a blank receipt he had requested from the landlord of his local pub in London, who also ran a cleaning service and provided Devine with a Polish cleaner. He subsequently submitted three further fraudulent blank receipts, all purporting to be signed “with thanks” by the landlord, Tom O’Donnell, who had no idea that money was being claimed in his name. Devine also submitted claims for printing costs amounting to £5,505, using receipts from a printing company. The court heard he had contacted the company to ask them to write out the receipts in advance for work. Initially hesitant, the company agreed in the belief that the work would be forthcoming, but it never came. He was cleared of a third count relating to a further £380 of cleaning work. Devine had denied the charges and his defence counsel, Gavin Millar QC, told the court that, if he had wanted to clear his debts, he would not have falsified invoices for just a few hundred pounds. During the trial, Devine claimed his former office manager, Marion Kinley, paid herself more than £5,000 from his staffing allowance without his knowledge. But an employment tribunal in Edinburgh last autumn found in her favour, and after the trial she said: “Far from receiving anything I was not entitled to, the employment tribunal judge ruled fully in my favour and, in November 2010, Mr Devine was ordered to pay me £35,000.” Devine was formally declared bankrupt last month after failing to pay Kinley £35,000 for unfair dismissal. Kinley ran his constituency office in West Lothian after being elected to parliament in 2005. The employment tribunal heard he bullied and harassed her and made up stories to justify firing her. Devine, who claimed to have been given advice on his expenses “with a nod and a wink” from a fellow MP, was Scottish health organiser for the Unison union. He was chairman of the Scottish Labour party from 1994 to 1995, and election agent for Cook, whom he succeeded after Cook’s death during a walking holiday in Scotland . Earlier this month, David Chaytor, 61, lost an appeal to reduce his eighteen month prison sentence to 12 months . The former Labour MP for Bury North pleaded guilty in December to submitting bogus documents to falsely claim £18,350 for rent and IT work. Eric Illsey, 55, who pleaded guilty to dishonestly claiming £14,000 relating to insurance, repairs, utility bills and council tax at his second home, was jailed for one year in February. The former MP for Barnsley Central, he stood down before sentencing, with his resignation triggering a byelection. The former Tory peer Lord Taylor of Warwick is awaiting sentence after becoming the first member of the House of Lords to be convicted . In January, the 58-year-old was found guilty of making £11,277 in false claims in relation to overnight subsistence and travel costs, claiming a residence in Oxford when he in fact lived in Ealing, west London. MPs’ expenses House of Commons Caroline Davies guardian.co.uk

Posted by on March 31, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.