Eric Illsley claims he was a scapegoat for expenses scandal

Former Labour MP is released from jail and says his treatment was inconsistent with that of David Laws The former Labour MP Eric Illsley, who was jailed in February for wrongly claiming £14,500 in expenses, has been released, highlighting differences between his treatment and that of the former Lib Dem cabinet minister David Laws. Within hours of leaving jail, Illsley made pugnacious comments about his imprisonment, comparing it to the treatment of Laws. Laws is to be suspended from parliament for seven days but will ultimately be allowed to carry on with his career. Leaving prison on Friday Illsley said he had been made a scapegoat. A year-long inquiry ruled that Laws “seriously and extensively” broke the rules to claim rent which was paid to his partner over a period of seven years. He has already paid back nearly £60,000 and was forced to apologise to the Commons. In February, Illsley pleaded guilty to three charges of false accounting, admitting to dishonestly claiming payments for insurance, repairs, utility bills and council tax at his second home between 2005 and 2008. Speaking at his home in Pogmoor, the former MP for Barnsley told Radio 5 Live: “It does seem rather strange that I have done that and then the next person who was found to have broken the rules in relation to expenses is simply allowed to carry on with his career by apologising to the House. “I ask the question, why couldn’t I have been taken the same way?” “What a lot of people didn’t know, and still don’t know, is that only a handful of MPs were ever investigated. My case didn’t allow me to highlight the fact that I hadn’t done anything different from a lot of other MPs who had simply kept their heads down and carried on with their careers and were quite happy to see me as a scapegoat.” Illsley went to jail for claiming on a second home £100 more per week than he was entitled to, over a three-year period. He will serve out the rest of his 12-month sentence under home curfew. Eric Illsley MPs’ expenses David Laws House of Commons guardian.co.uk

Posted by on May 13, 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.