The MPs' expenses row has taken a turn today with some attention to MPs who have the use of grace-and-favour properties. Geoff Hoon came under the spotlight first, and the latest name to be hitting the headlines is none other than the Chancellor's. Darling spends time at 11 Downing Street (note to foreign readers: the traditional Downing Street property that comes with the job), and claims expenses for a second home in his Edinburgh constituency. There's just the question, however, of his own London flat, designated for the purposes of expenses his principal residence, which he rents out at a profit. It's all legal. But is it ethical? Should - perhaps - the earnings from the flat off-set the money he claims in expenses? Summary, here.

Meanwhile, the Daily Mail wonders whether hanging might be "too good for them". Distasteful?

Asked by the Mail on Sunday if it's 'moral' to claim a second-home allowance while living rent-free in a grace-and-favour apartment, Hoon says he wasn't the first 'and I assume I won't be the last'. Had he manipulated the system? 'I don't accept that for a moment.' Fetch the piano wire!

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