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Redditch MP Jacqui Smith caught up in porn film claims scandal

The bill also included two viewings of the film Ocean's 13 - at £3.75 each - and an additional £3.50 to watch the film Surf's Up.

News of the claim is an embarrassment to Ms Smith who last month faced criticism for claiming taxpayer-funded allowances for her family home while living with her sister in London.

Ms Smith said she had "fully abided" by the rules by designating her sister's house as her "main" residence, allowing her to claim payments on the Redditch constituency home she shares with her husband and children.

The Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, John Lyon, accepted a complaint about Ms Smith's claims and has called on her to explain the £116,000 which she has claimed since becoming an MP.

Foreign Secretary David Miliband said that Ms Smith was an "outstanding" Home Secretary, but refused to be drawn on the disclosures about her expenses.

Asked on BBC1's The Andrew Marr Show if it was "final straw time" for Ms Smith, he said: "I am never going to get into individual cases.

"What I am absolutely confident of is that Jacqui Smith is doing an outstanding job as the Home Secretary with some of the toughest responsibilities in government."

Chief Secretary to the Treasury Yvette Cooper said she did not know the particular circumstances surrounding Ms Smith, but said there had to be "greater transparency" regarding the expense claims of MPs.

"I don't know any more than you have just had on your bulletins," she told the Sky News Sunday Live programme.

"It is difficult for me to comment on any individual case. All I heard...was that Jacqui Smith has apologised so I know no more than that, so it is difficult to comment on individual cases.

"I think there is a wider issue, that there has got to be greater transparency, greater independent checks in terms of MPs' expenses across the board, that is why I think this new review that is taking place...is exactly the right way forward.

"You have got to have a system that people can feel confident in."

She added: "My view is that actually those checks and that scrutiny and those independent checks need to be increased as a minimum in terms of reforms that need to take place."

Liberal Democrat MP Lembit Opik (Montgomeryshire) said the revelations were "immensely embarrassing" for the Home Secretary.

He told Sky News: "I have no issue with the genre, I do have an issue with one thing, which is he shouldn't really be claiming this back and he just obviously wasn't thinking about this.

"This is immensely embarrassing for Jacqui on a personal and domestic level, I haven't got any particular issue about what they watch in their own time, I do have an issue about the fact that he has compromised her."

He added: "My personal view is we should get away from the whole thing so that we can claim our travel expenses, because that is very variable depending on where you live, but the rest of it should be put on salary and then it's up to us."

Former shadow home secretary David Davis told Sky News: "It is very hard to believe. My first response was under what category would this expense claim be?

"I didn't even know films were that expensive...claiming for films? I can't believe it."

Asked if she should resign Mr Davis said: "I don't call for people to go unless I think there is absolutely a smoking gun but I just do think on this circumstance the sympathy for her will be even less than it otherwise would have been because she is not that good at her job."

Today's apology came as Labour left-winger Harry Cohen, who was said to have claimed more than £300,000 in second home allowances on his house in the capital, insisted that he had done nothing wrong as it was "part of my salary".

Mr Cohen said that MPs had been told "Go out boys and spend it" when the present system was introduced under Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s.

The Mail on Sunday reported that the MP listed a single-bedroom schoolhouse in Colchester, Essex, and a caravan on nearby Mersea Island as his main home.

The paper said that it meant that over the past five years he was able to claim the maximum allowance of £104,701 on his constituency home 70 miles away in Leyton and Wanstead, east London.

It calculated that since 1990, he had received a total of £310,714 in allowances.

Mr Cohen told the Press Association that the arrangement had been cleared with the House of Commons authorities.

He said that the former Conservative minister John Moore had told MPs "Go out boys and spend it" when he introduced a big uprating of the allowance in the 1980s to head off a pay revolt by backbench Tories.

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