Very interesting Tim"11. In the Commissioner’s view, Mr and Mrs Keen should have sought advice from theDepartment of Resources early in 2009, soon after the Brentford house was boarded up.17He continues:By the early spring of 2009, it should have been clear to Mr and Mrs Keen that they were in danger of not being able to return to the home for quite some time and they should either have ensured that their building problems were resolved quickly or started to make alternative arrangements. While this is a matter of judgement,my judgement is that by June 2009 they had been out of their Brentford home for too long for it to have continued to be considered their main home for allowance purposes. They had by then been out of the property for seven months and the work had yet to re-start. The arrival of the squatters was another serious setback, but by then the reasonable leeway had in my view run out.1812. The Commissioner concludes:... from June 2009 to October 2009, Mr and Mrs Keen did not have more than onehome for the purposes of their claims against parliamentary allowances. Since they did not have two homes in which they could stay overnight over that period, they were in breach of the rules of the House in continuing to claim from their parliamentary allowances for their flat in London.1913. Allowing for the possibility that we might not agree with this conclusion, the Commissioner has also considered whether, if Mr and Mrs Keen did have two homes throughout the 18 months when their Brentford house was affected by building works, they effectively received a personal financial benefit. He suggests that they did.This is because, had they not made use of their London flat, they would have had to rent a property or perhaps stay in a hotel, and meet the cost from their own resources. For these reasons I consider that Mr and Mrs Keen obtained a personal financial benefit from this arrangement which was not in accordance with either the rules for the additional Costs Allowance or those for the Personal Additional Accommodation Expenditure.20The Commissioner concludes that the period during which the benefit lasted was from the beginning of December 2008 (when the house was boarded up) to October 2009 (when theKeens moved back in).14. In his overall conclusion, the Commissioner describes as a mitigating factor the advice given to Mr and Mrs Keen by the Department of Resources on two occasions that theycould continue to claim allowances in respect of their London flat. However, he also points out that Members are responsible for their own actions and suggests that “A more rigorous examination of their circumstances might have led Mr and Mrs Keen to take a different view.” The Commissioner upholds the complaint, describing the breaches of the rules by Mr and Mrs Keen as “serious … involving significant public funds.” In his view, both Mr and Mrs Keen were “equally responsible for … a serious misjudgement.”
Steve Taylor ● 5851d