After first been forced into scraping his plans to introduce a per day payment for MPs based on attendance, Gordon Brown has been forced into yet another humiliating climbdown over MPs expenses. Commons Leader, Harriet Harman stunned those in the Chamber when she accepted Sir George Young’s amendment which aims to refer everything to the Committee on Standards in Public Life.

As it became clear that the government would not win any vote, the Whips must have advised Brown that this was the only solution to extract himself from the debacle.