Tory MP David Curry ordered to repay £28,000 in expenses

Tory MP David Curry was today ordered to repay £28,000 and issue an apology after the Commons standards and privileges committee ruled that he had broken rules relating to parliamentary expenses. The findings are particularly embarrassing because Curry was chairman of the committee until he stood down in November last year after he called for an investigation into the expenses allegations made against him. He was ordered to repay £28,000 because he used the second-home allowance to fund a cottage in his Skipton and Ripon constituency even though he hardly ever stayed the night there between July 2005 and March 2009. During that period his total second-home claims were worth £38,000. Curry used the cottage as a daytime base while he was visiting the constituency. But in a report the committee said that he was in breach of the rules because the second-home allowance is specifically supposed to cover the costs incurred by MPs when they stay overnight away from their main home. Curry minimised his overnight stays in his constituency because he preferred to return to his family home in Essex. "We conclude that Mr Curry was in breach of the rules when he claimed additional costs allowance in respect of his constituency home between July 2005 and March 2009, when the evidence is that he stayed there overnight very rarely," said the committee, which also found Curry guilty of two other breaches of Commons rules. "We believe that this reflects careless behaviour on Mr Curry's part and that there was no intention on his part either to deceive or to derive an improper personal benefit. Mr Curry made some use of the property while on parliamentary business, which mitigates his failure to observe the rules." As well as ordering Curry to repay £28,000, the committee also said that the MP should apologise in writing for breaking the rules. In evidence to the committee, Curry said he would be willing to apologise unreservedly if he was in breach of the rules. Curry had a second job as chairman of Dairy UK and he was criticised for failing to provide the Commons authorities with a copy of a contract showing that it contained a no-advocacy agreement. The committee accepted that Curry had no intention of breaking the rule banning MPs from engaging in paid advocacy for a client, but it rejected his claim that this was a "technical infringement" and accused him of "deliberately" breaching the registration rules. The committee also said that Curry broke the rules in 2004-05 when he continued to nominate his property in Essex as his main home even though he was not staying there because he had temporarily separated from his wife. But the committee said that Curry "gained nothing" from this breach and that there was no loss to the taxpayer.