Expenses reform is right - Brown

Gordon Brown said Parliament could not longer regulate itself

Reforms to clean up Parliament are justified because the Commons could not continue as it was after the expenses scandal, Gordon Brown has told MPs.

Mr Brown said the public were "disgusted and appalled" by some of the expenses claimed by MPs and they had to lose the right to regulate themselves.

External regulation would "not breach Parliamentary legitimacy", he added.

He also suggested the weekly prime minister questions was not the best "vehicle" for debating serious issues.

'Big issues'

Asked by the Liaison Committee of senior MPs whether he agreed with calls for reform of PMQs, he said he did not necessarily believe it was the right forum to debate subjects like Afghanistan and major moral issues.

However, he said all previous efforts to overhaul the set-piece Parliamentary session had failed.

"There is always going to be banter and knockabout in a place like the House of Commons.

"The sadness is that we have not been able to show that the Commons is the most effective place for debating the big issues which affect the country."

Mr Brown defended reforms to MPs' expenses against accusations they were being rushed through Parliament.

Ministers want the Parliamentary Standards Bill, which will establish an external body to authorise and police MPs' expenses, on the statute book by next week.

Answering questions from the committee about the controversial bill he said he supported the introduction of criminal offences for MPs found guilty of financial misconduct as MPs could not be above the law.

On the wider issue of constitutional change, he denied that government efforts had "fallen off the radar".

He said a constitutional reform bill would be published before Parliament breaks for its summer recess.

He said he believed the bill, which proposes excluding the remaining hereditary peers from the House of Lords, had widespread support in Parliament.