Baroness found to have breached code over rental income

A House of Lords standards watchdog upheld a complaint against Foreign Office Minister Baroness Warsi yesterday over 
her failure to register rental income.

The peer – formerly co-chair of the Conservative Party – has accepted the finding and apologised, and the matter is now regarded as closed, said the House of Lords Privileges and Conduct Committee in a report.

Two other peers, Labour’s Lord Elder and Lord Willoughby de Broke, of the UK Independence Party (Ukip), were also found to have breached the Lords Code of Conduct.

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Yesterday’s ruling by the independent Lords Commissioner for Standards, Paul Kernaghan, follows a complaint from Labour MP John Mann that she failed to register an interest as the recipient of more than £5,000 from renting out a flat in Wembley after she moved closer to Westminster when she was appointed a Minister in 2010.

However, Mr Kernaghan cleared Lady Warsi of a more serious allegation that she improperly claimed overnight subsistence allowance while staying in the spare room of a flat in Acton, west London, which was being rented by Tory official Naweed Khan.

Lady Warsi referred herself to the Commissioner over the allegation, which relates to a six-month period in 2007-08 after she was made a peer and was waiting to move into the Wembley property, which she bought in September 2007 while it was in the process of being built.

At the time, peers were allowed to claim £165.50 a night for the cost of staying in London to attend the House of Lords.