Why Alan Duncan got a bollocking

You have to feel for Alan Duncan. He's in all sorts of shit - as he would put it - for telling prankster-journalist Heydon Prowse, while chatting on the House of Commons terrace last month, that in the light of the clampdown on expenses MPs were "underfunded" and living "on rations".

"No one who has done anything in the outside world, or is capable of doing such a thing, will ever come into this place ever again, the way we are going," said the senior Tory frontbencher. Asked by Prowse why no one would want to be an MP, Duncan replied: "Basically, it's being nationalised, you have to live on rations and are treated like shit."

Under orders from his furious boss David Cameron, Duncan had to row back fast yesterday, telling the BBC: "It is a huge honour to be an MP and my remarks, although meant in jest, were completely uncalled for. I apologise for them unreservedly."

Of course, his remarks were not made in jest. They were deadly serious. Nor have similar remarks made in recent months by many MPs of different parties - though not to men wearing hidden cameras - been made in jest.

What's interesting about the Duncan cock-up is that it should be a Tory who's got into this kind of trouble first when it is Labour who had the most to fear from the public backlash over MPs' expenses.

This is how a senior Labour advisor put it to the Mole last night: "For the sake of argument, let's imagine a family on jobseeker's allowance reading about their local Labour MP spending two grand of taxpayers' money on velvet curtains. They are going to be angry and shocked. It's a total extravagance in their view.

"Now move to the Surrey stockbroker belt, where a constituent reads the same report about his Tory MP. Will he be angry and shocked? Probably not: the worst he's likely to think of his MP is 'cheeky bugger'."

So, more incumbent Labour MPs are likely to have a hard time of it on the doorsteps at the general election - partly because there are more incumbent Labour MPs than Tories, and partly because of the class gap outlined above - and so the electoral advantage is with the Tories.

Which is why David Cameron has taken such a tough line on the expenses issue from the word go. And why Duncan got a bollocking while the majority of MPs were secretly saying "Hear, hear".

By the way, here's a tip from the Mole for all MPs in the light of Duncan's embarrassment: never take on a prankster. Prowse, the online editor of the magazine Don't Panic, was the man who snuck into the garden of Duncan's constituency home in Rutland, dug a hole in the shape of a pound sign in the middle of the lawn, and planted it with flowers.

A friend filmed him doing it and, complete with the theme tune from the gardening show Ground Force, the clip was posted on YouTube.

Prowse did it because Duncan who had been exposed in the great Daily Telegraph expenses leak for claiming £4,000 for his gardener over a three-year period.

Duncan, presumably thinking it would get him some good PR, decided to invite his tormentor to meet him at the Commons - not realising that Prowse was wearing a pinhole camera and recording their meeting.

The Mole knows a thing or two about sneaking into people's gardens and digging up the lawn - but he also knows he would never have invited Prowse back for more. ·