British politics has been rocked by abundant evidence of its members of Parliament being caught fiddling their expenses. This is believed to have become common practice after it was seen as politically convenient to limit their pay rises. in return it seems that they were given a free hand to pad their expenses claims. This scandal only erupted when the Daily Telegraph was given tens of thousands of documents detailing the abuses. Since then many MPs have decided to step down at the next election, due in the next few months, rather than face the wrath of their constituents. What will remain, is the anger of the electorate and the concomitant low regard the Brits have for their elected representatives. Friday's announcement that three Labour MPs, Elliot Morley, David Chaytor and Jim Devine, and Lord Hanningfield, the Tory peer are to face charges, may just be the first of many. These charges follow Sir Thomas Legg's report into the expenses scandal where hundreds of parliamentarians have been asked to repay sums amounting to over £1.1 million that was wrongly claimed, including the three main party leaders.
In a response that the public will view as trpically shameless, the three MP's are trying to evade prosecution by claiming parliamentary privilege, saying "We maintain that this is an issue that should be resolved by the parliamentary commissioner who is there to enforce any breach of the rules. Clearly Parliament's system of expenses is utterly discredited but we believe there has been a complete inconsistency of approach to different individual cases." The prosecution will go ahead and they are due in court on March 11th.

This has caused real concern in the European Parliament, who fear that a Europe wide scandal would destroy their reputation. The website, EU Reporter, say that there was an in camera meeting of the Budget Control Committee this week to discuss the issue, in the light of events in Britain and the OLAF investigations into several current and former British MEPs. However, some are concerned, believing that fraud is not just limited to the UK representatives and are asking why only the British seem interested in looking into the murky pool of expenses claims.