MPs’ expenses and housing double standards – Yorkshire Post Letters

IT was recently reported that my MP, Kevin Hollinrake claimed £2,925 per month between April and November last year to rent a property in London.

This was to enable him to undertake his parliamentary business. As Mr Hollinrake has pointed out, he accepted a substantial reduction in earnings to become an MP and represent his constituents.

He is perfectly entitled to claim expenses and perhaps rents of close to £3,000 per month are the norm in the parts of London MPs choose to stay in, albeit the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority putting rental caps at under £24,000 per annum.

At the same time, however, Mr Hollinrake’s government has seen fit to freeze the local housing allowance on which many of the poorest in our society depend.

From last month, tenants in privately rented accommodation, including those on Universal Credit, will have their allowance frozen, even though their rents have increased.

In effect, the Government has quietly imposed a real-terms cut and in some parts of the country tenants will lose more than £1,000 a year.

Citizens Advice are already concerned that half a million private tenants will lose their homes when the current ban on evictions comes to an end in May. This new cut to crucial support will only make matters worse.

For the Government to do this at any time is disappointing; to do it in the midst of a pandemic when so many are suffering additional financial hardship seems unnecessarily cruel.

From: Max Nottingham, St Faith’s Street, Lincoln.

The Tory Government uses the phrase rough sleepers to avoid their responsibility for the thousands of people who are actually homeless.

Come on, Boris. You can do better than that. Homelessness is a cruel reality for many vulnerable people.

From: Henry Cobden, Ilkley.

IF Boris Johnson has nothing to hide over the Downing Street refurbishment (The Yorkshire Post, April 29), why the obfuscation?

No responsible person spends these amounts of money on home furnishings without knowing how they are going to be paid.

Margaret Thatcher would be appalled at the current occupant of No 10.

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