Phil Woolas confirms he won’t be talking his case to Judicial Review:

“It is the end of the road – I am out”

The second former Labour MP in court today has pleaded guilty to false accounting for a sum of around £13,000 in mortgage interest.

UPDATE: Guido smells a plea bargain, he will be sentenced on January 7th. When considering sentencing let’s not forget the Fees Office clerk who “came up with a “carefully executed fraud” for £6,000 and was sent down for nine months. One rule for us…

Last month Labour’s new member for Wigan Lisa Nandy was rent-a-quoting to the Mirror about the PM putting his photographer on the taxpayer: “At a time when people are losing their jobs and homes this is outrageous.” All good for brownie points with the whips.

Oh dear, but what’s this in Lisa’s expenses claims published yesterday:

Claim Ref. No. 17322
Financial Year 2010-11
Expense Category: General Admin
Amount: £634.99
Transaction Date: 26/07/2010
Short Description: Good quality images to record constituency engagements and for use on my website

It looks like the personal photographer goes to pretty much every event Lisa does. Charging the taxpayer for vanity shots at a time when people are losing their jobs and homes? “This is outrageous.”

Decision to have him kicked out of Parliament stands.

January by-election in Oldham…

The Mail says he is in south-east England, but Gawker says Wikileaks’ Julian Assange is drinking with a shaved head in Manhattan. So Interpol must be looking for someone like this:

Julian, come to Ireland, we’ve centuries of experience in hiding outlaws and the people are friendly with a soft-spot for trouble-makers. You can sleep in Guido’s barn…

The MPs got to have a good moan about IPSA, some of it justified, a lot of it hot air, in the House yesterday. Amongst the rants and rages was one snippet that stood out from Labour’s Ann Clewyd. She directly accused IPSA’s ironically named communications director Anne Power of leaking details to the press of MPs expenses.

Since IPSA’s inception stories have appeared about MPs and staffers that they certainly wouldn’t be briefing to hacks. An official denial has been sent out, but it’s certainly a leaky organisation. Obviously the accusation was protected by parliamentary privilege, but something tells Guido that she wouldn’t be suing if it was said in the real world…

Rumours are circulating that a member of the Lobby will be going to spin for Ed Miliband after the departure of the gaffe prone Katie Myler. Guido hears the Mirror’s tribal James Lyons is out in front in the running. Nigel Nelson is getting on a bit, but then The People were the only newspaper to back Ed so he can’t be ruled out. Although not really one of the Lobby the New Statesman’s Mehdi Hasan is another name in the fray – he backed Ed and the other Ed too. Miliband needs someone respected and punchy if he is going to avoid being Labour’s new IDS / Hague / Kinnock.

The dire performances of the Leader of the Opposition in the last few weeks have hardly prompted an overwhelming response to the feelers put out by his current team…

Please queue on the left…