MPs have declared more than £6m in ‘freebies’ since 2010
Calls for urgent reform after figures show almost half of the donations since 2010 were given in the last two years. MPs have declared more than £6m in “freebies” since 2010 with the cash price of gifts given almost tripling over two years, analysis reveals, leading to calls for urgent reform.
The value of “gifts, benefits and hospitality” declared by MPs was £1.3m in 2023, analysis shows, up from £483,507 in 2021. And the amount of gifts increased to 768 from 337 during the same period.
MPs have declared more than £6m in ‘freebies’ since 2010, analysis shows but questions arise as to how much has been undeclared and hidden.
The total sum of gifts will be even higher because the figures do not include those received by ministers, who are not required to declare them on the register of MPs’ interests. Nor does it factor in interest-free seven-figure loans made to parliamentarians.
Figures show that almost half of all the donations accepted by MPs since 2010 were given in the last two years. They included tickets for football matches and concerts, badges for horse race meetings, honorary club memberships, helicopter rides and payment of legal fees.
There is continuing controversy around Keir Starmer and the “passes for glasses” scandal. The prime minister, who has declared more free tickets and gifts than other party leaders in recent times, initially failed to declare designer clothes and spectacles given to him and his wife by the Labour peer Waheed Alli.