Geoffrey Cox, the highest-earning MP in the Commons who earns hundreds of thousands of pounds a year for his work as a QC, has resigned from parliament’s sleaze watchdog for doing something if not sleazy exactly, definitely slack. Cox has on at least one occasion failed to register his outside earnings within the 28 days required, compelling him to resign from the Commons Committee on Standards and refer himself to the Standards Commissioner.

The Standards Committee polices the conduct of MPs and oversees the maintenance and accessibility of the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. The very same Register of Members’ Financial Interests that Mr Cox forgot to register the £325,000 he earned for 500 hours work. What a cox up…