Hungry? Last week Guido brought you the rib-eye steak and hand-cut chips with béarnaise sauce that cost MPs a mere £7.80, thanks to the handy £5.93 top up from the taxpayer.  This subsidy works out at some £20,000 per day…

As lunchtime approaches and the first greedy members saunter back into town, they can head to their exclusive riverside restaurant today for seared breast of pigeon with aubergine purée and spiced couscous. It will set them back £4.15. The rest of us, eating al desko, will pick up the extra £3.15 subsidy.

Choking… 

UPDATE: Tory backbencher Chris Kelly gets in touch to say:

“Every day I have been an MP I have made my own sandwiches for lunch & brought them in. I used to take a packed lunch to work when I worked in my family businesses &, when I was campaigning flat out ahead of the general election, I did the same. I don’t see why it should be any different now that I’m an MP.”

Cheese and mustard today, in case you were wondering…

UPDATE: Elizabeth Truss MP responds with a call for the Commons catering to be outsourced to the private sector:

@MrHarryCole @daisymcandrew @GuidoFawkes I would to see franchises bid for on Parliamentary estate from the likes of Pret/Cafe Nero. #VFM—
Elizabeth Truss (@trussliz) January 09, 2012

Hungry? Fancy a rib-eye steak and hand-cut chips with béarnaise sauce served in the agreeable setting of a restaurant in an historic building on the riverside. Waited on by liveried waiters bringing silver service to white linen tables? It will cost our MPs a mere £7.80 and you’ll chip in £5.93 in subsidy for that lunch. We are all in it together.

If you are a vegetarian or dieting for the New Year perhaps you would like an artichoke and tomato salad drizzled with truffle dressing? Only £2.05 in the MPs’ dining room thanks to the £1.56 that minimum wage taxpayers have contributed to the MPs lunch in subsidy. The 646 MPs have their lunches subsidised to the tune of £8,823 each per annum.  Three years after the expenses scandal, MPs are still troughing at our expense…

The Right Honourable Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath has finally woken up to the fact there is a crisis in his constituency and it might be an idea for him to actually do the job he is paid for. Guido brought you the news a month ago that part of Gordon’s Fife constituency contained radioactive material. Now with a lack of action, not least from the local MP, the beach could be designated the UK’s first stretch of Radioactive Contaminated Land. Finally today Gordon managed to haul himself in front of a camera.

So what has he been doing instead of representing his constituency? Well:

• £48,166.00 for a speech to Visa International.
• £36,639.66 for a speech to Credit Suisse in Miami, Florida.
• £36,018.18 for a speech to Comtec Med in Geneva, Switzerland.
• £35,873.94 for a speech to World 50, Inc in New York.
• £36,174.63 for a speech to PIMCO in Newport Beach, California.
• £36,174.63 for a speech to Economic Club of Michigan.
• £36,146.29 for a speech to Skybridge Capital in Las Vegas.
• £36,292.84 for a speech to Citi Latin America in New York.
• £36,224.88 for a speech to Pershing LLC in Miami.

It must be a little painful for the former Prime Mentalist that Blair can command the combined total of that for a hour of his time, but do you know what hurts more Gordon? Radiation poisoning…

This morning we  learn that youth unemployment has hit 1.016 million. Luckily it is a Wednesday, so there is the perfect opportunity to hold the Prime Minister and the government to account in the House at noon. But hold on, what’s this:

“The House of Commons adjourned on Tuesday 15 November for the Autumn recess. The Commons will return on Monday 21 November.” 

The Sunday Times reports this morning that after fiddling £125,000 from the taxpayer Baroness Uddin plans to return after her 18-month suspension to the House of Lords to claim expenses, which she will use to pay back what she fiddled over three years. The Lords authorities claim they are powerless to force her to pay back the money before she sits on the red benches again. Ridiculous.

Allegedly she has the right to sit in House of Lords regardless of her outstanding debts. Allow Guido to explain to the authorities how this situation can be resolved. Send her a statutory demand for repayment, if she doesn’t sell one of her many properties to repay the £125,000, apply to bankrupt her, then apply for a restriction order. She will as a result be disbarred from sitting in the House of Lords. It isn’t rocket science.

Former Minister for Dirty Tricks Tom Watson thinks he can redeem his past sins on the back of pummelling Murdoch. The media are too terrified to say a negative word about him, so not for the first time it falls to Guido to highlight some hypocrisy ignored by the craven Old Media. A Labour Party press release in Watson’s name yesterday bleated:

“At a time when David Cameron is squeezing the income of millions of hard working families, he has decided to show off his grace and favour accommodation which he has lavishly and unnecessarily refurbished at the taxpayers’ expense. £30,000 of taxpayers’ money was reportedly spent on refurbishing the flat – more than most workers earn in a year… This is blatant hypocrisy and shows just how out of touch Cameron is.”

What our Tommy fails to mention, “wilfully” you might say, is that the refurbished flat will last far longer than Cameron’s premiership and will remain the property of the people. Unlike someone else’s lavishly fitted out residence…

The personal flat that Watson shares with fellow former Minister Iain Wright has seen them claim over £100,000 for refurbishments and such like for their pad including their shares of the legal costs involved in buying it, as well as the fees to buy the freehold. Unlike the PM he will be able to sell and keep the profit from his taxpayer feather-bedded nest. Interesting to note that Watson is suddenly willing to bring Cameron’s family into play. Given that the Watson clan have collectively taken £300,000 off the taxpayer you might wonder whether Tom is really one to be criticising anyone…

Radioactive material has been detected in Dalgety Bay, Fife. The Scotsman reports:

“The Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (Sepa) found 17 radioactive particles on Friday, 33 on Saturday and a further 31 on Sunday. Contamination in the area is believed to originate from radioactive aeroplane dials, burned and buried in reclaimed land.”

UPDATE: For those wondering where Gordon is instead of representing his constituents – he’s sucking up to hedgies and investment bankers at the UNEP Finance Initiative 2011 Global Roundtable in the Meridian C Room of the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center, Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, Washington, D.C. No risk of radiation poisoning there…

First non-liquid, non-canape nourishment in 24 hours. Normal service will be resumed…

Guido had to share this one. His heart bleeds:

This little piggy cried all the way home…

Ealing MP Virendra Sharma when accused of taking a bung for a dinner celebrating his victory protested:

“I vehemently deny the false allegations that you refer to in your email and that have appeared in various media. I have never received a donation from Indiatourism and have therefore never been liable to make a declaration in the Parliamentary register of members’ interests.”

Subsequent to this blanket denial Guido obtained the cheque below from India Tourism made out to the Monsoon Banqueting Suites in Southall where the celebration dinner was held:

Accepting donations from foreign sources is illegal under the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000. Gotcha!

See: Labour MP Denies Illegal Donation From the Indian Government