It’s taken less than three weeks for the Con-Lib coalition government to get its first scandal… except that this one was probably a hangover from the scandals of last summer.
Liberal Democrat MP David Laws had been forced to quit his post as Chief Secretary to the Treasury, working with Chancellor George Osborne, for allegedly failing to declare claims of around £40,000 in expenses to pay rent on a flat for his partner. He apologised and said he would pay back the money. His colleague, currently Scottish Secretary Danny Alexander, has been appointed to replace him.
I wonder how many column inches were written about Mr Laws’ misdemeanors compared with the millions of column inches written on the claims of minor Labour ministers in the last parliament. A lot of attention has now been focused at the Daily Telegraph, the newspaper which first broke the parliamentary expenses scandal, and which published the Laws story.
However, I suspect the British people may not hear many more revelations on the coalition’s alleged wrongdoings for a while, considering the fact that according to the majority of the media, the country is still recovering from the fact that Labour are no longer in power.