NORTH Ayrshire’s two constituency MSPs claimed almost £68,000 in expenses last year.

SNP MSPs Kenny Gibson (Cunninghame North) and Margaret Burgess (Cunninghame South) took £68,898 from the taxpayer over the 2013/14 period writes Eddie Harbinson.

Ms Burgess, who is the Scottish Government’s Minister for Housing and Welfare, claimed over £680 on window cleaning, £169 on ‘fire safety’ and £22.50 for key cutting at Timpson’s, while she also claimed £1585 for printing and photocopying Parliamentary reports.

Mr Gibson meanwhile, claimed £517 for ‘mailing costs’, £186 on a ‘WC cistern repair’ and listed Fairy Liquid and black bin bags amongst his other expenses.

He said: “About 80 per cent of the ‘expenses’ are ‘allowances’ – office rent, phone bill, postage, gas, electricity and stationery, I just send invoices for these – like all MSPs – to the Parliament’s Allowance Office. The money doesn’t come to me!

“Two years ago, I persuaded the Parliament’s Chief Executive to introduce one phone account – rather than 129 individual ones – which around 60 plus MSPs signed up to, reducing our collective phone bills by thousands of pounds each year.

“Door-to-door mailing costs are for delivery of Parliament newsletters.

"None were for the referendum.

"The Allowance Office checks what is being sent out before agreeing to fund it.

"Most, if not all MSPs and MPs do these. I tend to hand deliver most of mine, so you’ll find my costs here to be lower than average.

“I don’t buy Fairy Liquid or bin bags for the office.

"Those will have been bought and claimed back by my staff, through my office cost allowance, like any other office expense.” He added: “The Scottish Parliament carries out quarterly audits of MSP expenditure and so there is never anything untoward.

“I sometimes wonder though why the focus is not on those with low expenditures.

"How can they fail to utilise their full office or postage allowances given the needs and demands of constituents?

“We have switched our gas and electricity suppliers, cut back massively on stationery, ditched the fax and frank most of the mail to reduce office costs but the weight of constituency work means we still reach our annual limit each year.”