Supreme Court ruling to see former MPs stand trial over expenses claims
The Supreme Court has ruled that three former Labour MPs must face a criminal trial over their expenses claims.
Nine Supreme Court justices upheld a decision handed down by the Lord Chief Justice Lord Judge in July that rejected arguments that the case should be heard by parliament rather than open court.
Steel & Shamash named partner Gerald Shamash instructed counsel to act for the trio.
Doughty Street’s Gavin Millar QC acted for James Devine; 39 Essex Street’s Nigel Plemming acted for David Chaytor; and the third appellant Elliot Morley was represented by Edward Fitzgerald QC of Doughty Street.
Blackstone Chambers’ David Pannick QC was instructed to act for the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) at the hearing.
The Supreme Court rejected arguments that the appellants benefited from parliamentary privilege and therefore charges of theft by false accounting should be heard by parliament.
Pleming argued that because the expenses scheme was created and administered by Parliament for parliamentarians, their case should be heard by Parliament.
Supreme Court president Lord Phillips this morning rejected the appeal and said reasons would be given at a later date.
The trio will now stand trial at Southwark Crown Court.
The ruling comes after two High Court judges told Labour shadow immigration minister Phil Woolas to vacate his constituency seat in Oldham East & Saddleworth (OES) after he was found to have breached election laws.
Shamash instructed Millar to act for Woolas in that case (5 November 2010).
Readers' comments (3)
Anonymous | 10-Nov-2010 5:29 pm
I am not a litigator but if there was, as it seems, a single and general point of law in question why did each appellant need his own QC?
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Anonymous | 10-Nov-2010 6:15 pm
"There will be no fighting fund for the three former Labour MPs who have been told by the Supreme Court that they must face a criminal trial over their expenses claims. They will have to go it alone." says The Lawyer's Litigation Weekly bulletin.
Go it alone? Shurely shome mishtake? You mean no fighting fund apart from taxpayer-financed Legal Aid, to which the Labour Party has made such savage cuts as to leave many in real need unable to secure proper representation to defend their rights.
The same Legal Aid, eligibility for which is now means tested in the Crown Court, meaning defending a case can be punishingly expensive even for those falsely accused. How fortunate means testing wasn't yet in place at Southwark Crown Court when these men applied, resulting in the taxpayer footing the whole of their legal bills.
And how fortunate that these publicly-funded defendants are sufficiently high profile to have secured the servies of some very eminent (and no doubt usually very expensive) counsel.
I'm sure any moderately-earning defendants falsely accused of crimes, funding their defence out of their own pockets and not being able to instruct decent counsel because legal aid rates are now so low as to have dissuaded many able barristers from undertaking publicly funded work, are delighted they voted Labour.
Happy to swindle the expenses system whilst in office, and screw Legal Aid, and seemingly happy to swindle again when brought to task.
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Anonymous | 11-Nov-2010 3:38 pm
An excellent result. There is no parliamentary immunity for common crime. That's the difference between Westminster and the Duma.
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