Claims used to pay more than £150,000 to Tory party

Liam Fox

Alan Duncan, the shadow leader of the House of Commons, paid £42,000 to the Rutland and Melton Conservative Association, while Michael Gove, shadow children’s secretary, paid £27,000 to Surrey Heath Conservative Association.

Alan Duncan

Meanwhile, Liam Fox, the shadow health secretary, pays £9,000 a year to the Woodspring Conservative Association in Bristol. On Monday it emerged that three Cabinet ministers had paid tens of thousands of pounds to the Labour Party through their local party associations.

Michael Gove

The large sums of money – which the MPs attribute to rent, office space, telephone services and personnel – are likely to raise concerns about the way in which political parties are funded by the public purse.

Andrew Mitchell

According to The Green Book, MPs “must avoid any arrangement which may give rise to the suggestion that public money is being diverted for the benefit of a political organisation”. There are fears that the money could be funnelled into general accounts, which could be used to fund campaigning.

Kenneth Clark

The expenses claims seen by The Telegraph showed that two Tory shadow ministers had to pay money back to the fees office because their associations had been overpaid.

Eric Pickles

But last night, each shadow cabinet member insisted their claims were legitimate. Andrew Mitchell, the shadow international development secretary, has paid Sutton Coldfield Conservative Association an annual payment of around £8,000 for the last four years. He said: “The rent I pay is below the market rate and has been carefully set as a percentage of the cost of the office which reflects the use I make of it.”

Mr Duncan, who repaid £750 in 2005 after the overspend was noticed, said the mistake had been made by the fees office and described his rental arrangements as “exemplary”. He said: “There is the most clear distinction between the parliamentary and the political, and all rental and service costs have always been determined at arms length by an independent professional surveyor.” Mr Gove said a reference to “rent token amount of £1 p.a” in his invoice from the association in 2007 was because he paid below the market rent, as he had for the last four years. “I pay less than the market rate for rent,” he said. “My contribution is intended to reimburse my share of the cost of utilities and other bills.”

Mr Fox, who had to repay £6,000 in August 2004, blamed an administrative error by the fees office. He said he believed his £9,000 annual payment was good value for money: “They arrange my surgeries, they do some of my casework, and they do a huge amount of secretarial work which probably represents an underpayment for the amount of work they do.” Kenneth Clarke, the shadow business secretary, said the £6,000 he paid to Rushcliffe Conservative Association between 2006 and 2008 was not rent but the cost of hiring a room at £50 an hour. “We fixed this rate after my officers made local enquiries to ascertain the market rent in the area,” he said.

One claim between April and June 2007 totalled £750. An official at the fees office wrote on the expenses form at the time: “Seems expensive, though no basis to challenge member”. Eric Pickles, shadow secretary for communities and local government, said the £1,000 payment he made to the Brentwood and Ongar Conservative Association for “administration, storage and equipment” in 2007 was a one-off.