TWO CHEERS FOR BLEARS..

So, Communities Secretary, Hazel Blears, our leather clad biking Ginger Gerbil, has decided to pay back a wadge of cash to the Inland Revenue equivilent to the Capital Gains Tax she should have paid when she sold a property in Kennington, south London, for a profit of £45,000. I believe the cheque she has written is for something in excess of £13,000, which is fine and something to be commended, even if it is an attempt to save her political skin. If I`ve got this right, though, it was the taxpayer who put up the mortgage for her to buy the place to begin with, which leads to the obvious question as to why Ginger Blears should pocket the balance of about £32,000 and think everything is okay. The `profit` should of course go back to the taxpayer.

There`s a danger that people will start thinking that this MPs expenses stuff is getting boring and diverting Parliament away from the issues affecting the real world. But, of course, in the real world it is people like me who pay our taxes and we are rightly outraged that MPs should take us for granted and abuse our trust in the way some of them have. So I am looking forward to yet more revelations and more MPs trying to regain some semblance of decency by writing out cheques like our Hazel has done. I just hope they won`t think that that makes everything alright, because there`s a long, long way to go yet. I`m reminded of Crowded House and Neil Finn`s lyrics which, being a biker, Hazel would do well to recall - "You`ll never see the end of the road while you`re travellin` with me. Hey now, hey now, don`t dream it`s over......."