It has been fun mocking the abuse of second-home stipends by British Members of Parliament, but the weight of the scandal is now becoming an impossible burden for the ruling Labour Party.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown is facing the front of the attack, but to some extent he is heir to a culture of entitlement that has been developing for years--at least since the cheery era of "New Labour" under Tony Blair. The latter got out and handed off the festering problem to Brown, just as Prime Minister Chretien, in a somewhat similar situation, did to his sometime rival and Liberal successor as PM in Canada, Paul Martin. Mr. Martin suffered from the scandals of his party, and, alas for Mr. Brown, the same seems fated for him.
The capper for the current British scandal is the seriousness of Members' reported failures to pay taxes. A little petty spending greed is one thing (using taxpayer funds to pay for dog food or videos), but claiming a tax break for two houses that is meant for one house -- that's really annoying to the voters.
