The Legg report published yesterday was supposed to mark the end of the MPs' expenses scandal. Unfortunately it is leading to a new round of recriminations and buck-passing.
There is no doubt that the pace of the inquiry has led to mistakes. A few individual MPs have been unfairly treated. But the overall thrust of Legg's approach is correct.
In the end, Parliament only has itself to blame: there have been ample warnings about abuses in the expenses system. But with a few honourable exceptions, it was only when the crisis was provoked by the leaked publication of expenses that MPs finally reluctantly took action. Parliament should have heeded the warning and taken action to put its house order.
The fear is that this problem will now drag on into the new Parliament. It shouldn't have been too hard to agree a new tight and transparent expenses regime. But we are still stuck slowly plodding forward amid pointless political points scoring.
Even an agreement on expenses – necessary as it is – will not restore lost trust. Parliament needs to embrace more fundamental reforms that hand back power to voters. These include a power of recall for MPs who break the rules; fixed term Parliaments; reducing the number of ministers as well as MPs and ending a safe seat culture which means that a large number of MPs can serve their time confident they will never face a real challenge to their seat.
