So we’ve heard Anthony Steen claim that voters are only angered by his expenses because they are envious of his “very, very large house”. We’ve heard Alan Duncan declare that MPs are “treated like shit” and “forced to live on rations”. But we’ve now heard what is indisputably the most absurd statement on the expenses scandal.
The Tory MP David Wilshire has compared the treatment of politicians to that of the Jews in Nazi Germany. Wilshire’s use of the reductio ad Hitlerum came in a letter to a constituent:
The witch hunt against MPs in general will undermine democracy. It will weaken parliament — handing yet more power to governments. Branding a whole group of people as undesirables led to Hitler’s gas chambers.
The Telegraph has the full story here. David Cameron will be relieved that Wilshire, who paid £100,000 in expenses to his own company, plans to stand down at the next election.
Update: Cameron has ordered Wilshire to retract his comments. He said: “It’s a frankly ludicrous thing to say and I think he should withdraw it. MPs have got to understand that the public do not have confidence in our expenses system. The expenses system needs to change, MPs need to understand that.
“People don’t want to hear MPs sounding off like that.”
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