Full marks to Labour foghorn Tom Blenkinsop, who is missing no opportunity to line the pockets of his paymasters with taxpayers’ money. Blenkinsop is a classic ‘re-renter’, he claimed £4,000 last year for constituency office rent in a building owned by his own local Guisborough Labour Party. Apparently fleecing the taxpayer by recycling cash to his party is not enough for Blenkinsop, however.

The Middlesbrough MP also claims £10,200-a-year on expenses to rent his London home. IPSA documents show that Blenkinsop’s landlord is one Christian Matheson, who also happens to be Unite’s industrial officer and the Labour ­parliamentary candidate for Chester, one of Unite’s infamous list of 41 seats they planned to take over. Coincidentally, Unite have given Blenkinsop £2,000 since 2010. A prime example of a Labour MP pushing the limits of the rules to sort out his party and his trade union with taxpayer cash…