Senior Conservative MPs used their taxpayer-funded expenses to cover the maintenance of private swimming pools and gardening on their country estates, it has been revealed.
The latest tranche of embarrassing revelations about MPs' allowances come amid evidence that the controversy has hit confidence in both main parties.
According to reports, James Arbuthnot, Michael Ancram and Stewart Jackson claimed for pool maintenance and backbencher David Heathcoat-Amory claimed more than £380 for horse manure.
Douglas Hogg, a former agriculture secretary, spent more than £2,000 expenses clearing the moat on his Lincolnshire estate.
Sir Michael Spicer, chairman of the powerful Tory backbench 1922 Committee, spent £5,650 of taxpayers' money having his garden maintained.
Sir Alan Haselhurst, Deputy Speaker of the Commons, also claimed for gardening - £12,000 over five years.
Former home secretary David Davis claimed for more than £10,000 of home renovations and furnishings, including a new £5,700 portico.
They were the latest Tory MPs to have their claims exposed after the Conservative front bench had its allowances laid bare in the Daily Telegraph.
Ministers, other Labour MPs, Commons Speaker Michael Martin and Sinn Fein have already faced embarrassing revelations about their expenses.
Tory leader David Cameron has said every MP will have to put their hands up and explain why they claimed what they had and Prime Minister Gordon Brown earlier offered a public apology on behalf of all MPs over the expenses scandal which has shaken Westminster.
