The best expenses cartoon yet

Despite Nadine Dorries' best efforts at emotional blackmail, Matt continues to enjoy the funny side of this scandal, along with most of the country.

What did they all expect? Thanks to the apparent Fees Office-inspired confusion of meum and tuum, some MPs were apparently convinced the money was an inalienable part of their entitlement to spend as they liked, and it turned out that what they liked was 40-inch plasma TVs and little houses for ducks.

These are (supposedly) intelligent people; surely the fact that they had to provide receipts should have alerted them to the potential for public disclosure. And as for the ones moonlighting as property developers with a vested interest in rising house prices, how did they think we were going to react when our children can't afford to get on the housing ladder?

Or perhaps, like the Admiral from HMS Pinafore;
I grew so rich that I was sent
By a pocket borough into Parliament.
I always voted at my party's call,
And I never thought of thinking for myself at all.
(W.S Gilbert 1878)

Some things never change.