Former Sheffield MP Jared O'Mara illegally applied for publicly-funded expenses, partly to fund his extensive cocaine habit, a court has heard.
O'Mara, 41, of Walker Close, Grenoside, who was Labour MP for Sheffield Hallam between 2017 and 2019, is charged with eight counts of fraud for allegedly filing fraudulent expenses amounting up to 30,000 during that time. His former lead aide Gareth Arnold, 28, is charged with six counts of the same offence. John Woodliff, aged 42, of Hesley Road, Sheffield, is charged with one offence of fraud. All three deny the charges.
Woodliff and Arnold appeared in the dock at Leeds Crown Court on Monday where prosecutor James Bourne-Arton outlined the case. O'Mara appeared via a video link from home.
The court heard a number of applications for expenses relating to work and roles that had not been carried out were filed to the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (IPSA), which was set up in the wake of the MP expenses scandal [2009] as an independent body charged with administering the payment of legitimate office and other costs incurred by MPs in the discharge of their roles. All of the applications made in the case were rejected by IPSA, the court heard.
Mr Bourne-Arton said: "The prosecution say that defendant Jared O'Mara viewed IPSA, and the tax payer's money that they administered, as a source of income that was his to claim and use as he wished, not least in the enjoyment of his extensive cocaine habit."
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