THE truth is that there's nothing the media loves as much as a good, juicy scandal it can sink its teeth into. Once on the trail of crooks in high places, reporters are like hounds on the scent of a wounded fox, while columnists and editorial writers sound the bugles, urging the pack on.

Or at least that's what things are presently like in Britain as the grotty drama of parliamentary claims drags on, fuelled by the daily offerings from the Telegraph. The newspaper is alleged to have bought the details of claims lodged by MPs for a sum rumoured to be in the region of 300,000 pounds. And it appears determined to recover every pound, with fresh headlines detailing the shame of the public representatives cowering out of sight.

Had the story broken only in terms of amounts claimed, there might have been less embarrassment all round. But for the last five days, the Telegraph has been carrying details of items MPs have entered in their forms, duly signed and presented to the House of Commons Fees Office. Clearly, here is where the leak must have taken place, and currently, a police inquiry is being considered. But even if the informant is arrested and the Telegraph is taken to court, the damage has been done.

While the claims are often petty - and downright laughable in some cases - at the heart of the corrosive scandal is the repeated use of 'flipping' to spend government funds on upgrading private housing, and then selling it at a profit. In order to permit MPs to spend more time in parliament, the government assisted them to buy or rent houses or flats close to Westminster. MPs were asked to declare their 'constituency homes' as their primary residences, and their London accommodation as their secondary homes.

Over time, this system became more and more open to abuse as MPs began to buy property, declare it as their secondary home, obtain official funds to improve it, and then sell it at a profit. One minister changed her secondary home three times in a single year. Other MPs claimed on properties belonging to relatives. Few of the 646 MPs in the House of Commons have escaped from this scandal untouched.

And it's not that MPs are poorly paid they each receive an annual salary of 64,766 pounds (with the 100 or so members of government drawing between 90,000 and 194,000 pounds); then there is a tax-free additional costs allowance of 24,000 pounds; there is also a staffing allowance of 100,000 pounds; and finally, there is the incidental expenses provision of nearly 23,000 pounds. MPs are also reimbursed for all travel to and from their constituencies. And if they lose an election - as many will, after this scandal - they get a lump sum of 40,000 pounds and a redundancy payment of between 32,000 and 65,000 pounds. And then there's the pension that varies according to the number of years served in the House.

Although the Telegraph story has also tarnished Tory reputations, it is the Labour government that is feeling most of the heat. Many of the rules now being abused were framed by it, and despite many promises, it has failed to reform them. Understandably, there is a lot of public anger over the scams, especially at a time when so many Britons have lost their jobs, and Gordon Brown has been urging people to tighten their belts.

The defence adopted by MPs caught with their hands in the cookie jar has been to insist that 'no rules were broken.' This is similar to Nazi party officials who claimed they were only following orders. But clearly, the offenders crossed a line when they lodged their spurious claims what, for instance, are we to make of a claim for five pence to reimburse one (Scottish) MP for the purchase of a plastic carrier bag? John Prescott, ex-deputy prime minister, claimed for two broken toilet seats.

In its editorial on the subject, the Observer wrote 'The standard defence has been that claims were made in accordance with the rules, an approach that ignores and distinction between the spirit and the letter of the law. Perhaps it is human nature to claim up to the limit of what is permitted, but the ability to conquer the baser aspects of human nature is in most people's understanding of what it means to be a good public servant. Besides, in the case of expenses, the spirit is clearly written into the law. MPs are told to consider whether their claim could 'damage the reputation of parliament.'

Members of one profession must be quietly enjoying the spectacle of MPs swinging in the wind for months, bankers and hedge fund managers have been regularly castigated for their greed. Even as their financial institutions sank deeper into the red, these fat cats have been collecting bonuses running into millions. So when taxpayers were asked to bail this class of kleptocrats out, there was an understandable howl of protest. And now they are being asked to reimburse an MP for getting his lawnmower serviced (for a mere 600 pounds); and pay 9,000 pounds on the upkeep of a garden belonging to a multimillionaire Tory MP.

For Gordon Brown, a politician who has tried to maintain his image as a dour, honest Scot, the ongoing scandal has been a personal nightmare. His sister-in-law was forced to write an article in the Guardian defending the PM of the charge of misuse of public funds when it was revealed that he had claimed over 6,000 pounds to pay for a cleaner he shared with his brother. Perhaps the most devastating depiction of a politician's woes in modern journalism comes from Charlie Brooker, writing in the Guardian G2 magazine on 11 May

'...Assailed from all directions, stumbling, bumbling, droning, punch-drunk, hapless, hopeless, and aching with palpable misery, he [Gordon Brown] increasingly resembles a depressed elephant, slowly being felled by a thousand pin-sized arrows fired into his hide by a million tiny natives, still somehow moving forward, trudging wearily towards its allotted graveyard-slot with morose resignation...'In fact Brown's extended drubbing has gone far beyond mere eeriness, and now teeters on the verge of harrowing spectacle - a protracted humiliation so total, so crushing, that merely witnessing it feels almost as terrible as being the man on its receiving end. It's like somebody dropped an indignity bomb directly on his head, and we're all caught up in the blast...'

After being on the receiving end of this diatribe, I wonder how much longer Brown can hang on.