We haven't had time at The TaxPayers' Alliance to sift through all 93 pages of the 'Review of Allowances' published by the House of Commons Members Estimates Committee at 10am this morning, but we have been through all the recommendations and on our initial reading there is one glaring omission from the proposals - Transparency.
All the tough talk in the report will mean nothing if the public is denied access to the details of expenses claims. For example, the report proposes that MPs should to be banned from using taxpayers' money to buy new kitchens, televisions and other household goods for their second homes in London. Good.
It also says that there will be tighter checks on how they spend their expenses, including spot checks by the National Audit Office and a complete external audit once a Parliament. Again, good.
But nowhere in the report does it say that the recent advances in transparency, won through the hard-fought Freedom of Information battle spearheaded by Heather Brooke, should be recognised and officially adopted by the Commons.
The most recent high-profile abuses of the expenses system show that the Fees Office cannot be trusted to monitor expenses and enforce the rules on our behalf. Any member of the public should be allowed to sift through their MP's receipts (or any other MP's receipts) to ensure that their tax money is being carefully spent.
If the system continues to operate behind closed doors, away from the gaze of taxpayers and voters, it will be all to easy for the abuses to creep back in. Without this guarantee, the majority of MPs who are honest and hardworking will continue to be tarred with the same brush as the small minority who have, to be frank, acted like crooks.
