On Friday afternoon, she closed all comments on her site, published a further accusation of this nature, and then swanned off for a three-day weekend, fully expecting to get away with this.

The Telegraph instructed lawyers, who contacted Nadine Dorries and the hosts of her website. Dorries was either unable or unwilling to make specific edits to her site at the time, and so her host was forced to stop it from broadcasting.

Bloggerheads

‘Twould appear therefore that the blog was temporarily taken down in order to remove one or more posts which had been suggested were libellous: once this/these were removed, the site is back up again.

It would also appear, as I said previously, to contradict Nadine’s previous assertion that there was a request to take it down. This rather looks like a forcible demand.

Wonder if the Telegraph will have anything on this tomorrow?

[Edit: However, I also reserve the right to edit or remove comments I don't like. I generally don't, or only edit for language I find offensive, but I do reserve the right to do so, should I wish. Also to remove links to political parties/other sites I disagree with too. Although I do support the right of those parties to campaign, and have people vote for them if they wish (even though I personally would rather people didn't), I do draw the line at hosting links to those sites on my blog. Apologies if any offense has been caused].

http://is.gd/CDQd

This winter our Income Support was frozen because we told them in advance about a change in circumstance that they took three months to process - they froze the money to avoid overpaying us because it was better that we might struggle and go into debt than we be trusted to pay money back in the event of being overpaid. As it was, we managed okay, just.

Now that’s harsh; that’s a system that really can make you paranoid and fearful. I’m not altogether unsympathetic with MPs because I also know how “expense account cultures” can come about - I am concerned that this might bring the downfall of a government which has done far worse things than fiddle expenses. But for any of them to present as victims in this… grrrr.

If this is the case, then I would hope to see either an announcement that they are taking her to court over the allegations or to see her blog return, as anything else smcks of bully-boy tactics.

Of course, all this is merely a suggestion I have come across; I have heard no official statement saying that this actually is the case…

It would also seemingly contradict Dorries own statement — that they have been “asked” to take it down — as a notice of this nature would be more in the way of a demand, surely?

@CllrBrody: good point - Duck houses are presumably one of those ’security measures’!

Cllr Brody, J

The Green Book makes it clear that the “allowances” are definitely the latter:

“Parliamentary allowances are designed to ensure that Members are reimbursed for costs properly incurred in the performance of their duties.”

and

“Claims should be above reproach and must reflect actual usage of the resources being claimed.

Claims must only be made for expenditure that it was necessary for a Member to incur to ensure that he or she could properly perform his or her parliamentary duties.

Allowances are reimbursed only for the purpose of a Member carrying out his or her parliamentary duties.”

http://www.parliament.uk/documents/upload/GreenBook.pdf (Part I, “Principles governing Members’ allowances”)