In September 2007, the married couple and Labour Cabinet ministers, Ed Balls, the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families, and Yvette Cooper, then the Housing Minister, used the Commons' allowances system to pay for a £655,000 house in Stoke Newington, North London. The couple subsequently declared this to be their second home, despite spending most of their time in London in order to fulfil their ministerial responsibilities and their children attending London schools.
The declaration of the Stoke Newington property as their second home meant that they became eligible for a reported Additional Costs Allowance (ACA) of £44,000 a year to cover the property's £438,000 mortgage.
The Conservative MP Malcolm Moss made a complaint to the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, who agreed to launch an investigation into the matter. The commissioner ultimately found that the couple had acted in accordance with parliamentary rules and as such dismissed the complaint against them. The Committee on Standards and Privileges agreed with the Commissioner's dismissal of the complaint.
The politician who famously Tweeted his own name thus spawning a thousand memes has actually now been caught four times breaking the rules of the road.
In December 2012 Balls ran a red traffic light, at this time also admitted to using his mobile phone while driving.
In April 2013 he was caught driving at 56mph in a 50mph zone, accepting the offer to attend a speed awareness course rather than see his licence endorsed.
On the 5th August 2014 Balls was given a £900 fine, and 5 penalty points on his driving licence for failing to stop after a car accident. In his defence he claimed ‘I knew the cars had touched, but did not stop to check as I did not think any damage had been done.’
During a podcast where Balls and Osbourne were reminiscing about the 1997 election run-up Balls admitted the influence the Rupert Murdoch owned media machine had with swaying the electorate of the UK during the 1997 election.
Balls nonchalantly admitted to 'schmoozing' up to representatives of the sun news paper, because during this time 'the reality of British politics is that you have to court the editors of Murdochs' newspapers' adding 'that's what you have to do.'
This highlights the way politics works in the UK - give the press what they want and they will support your campaign.
It's interesting to note once Blair had won this election (1997) all subsequent elections saw a huge drop in eligible voters actually taking the time to vote. From the 1940's until 1997 the average turn out was roughly 86%. After 1997 the average turn out was only 62%, with Theresa May pushing it up to near 69% during her campaign of 2017.
Murdochs' newspapers during this time regularly ran headlines designed to put people off voting with slogans such as 'Wasted Vote!' and 'No Point Voting', etc. Headlines clearly designed to put off all but the most ardent activists. The Labour supporting activists.
When concerns were raised about this later on Twitter (now X) Ed Balls responded with the remark 'Oh come on Aaron (Bastini), don't be such a wally...' when Aaron posted 'I think this podcast is doing a fantastic public service in exposing the uniparty and the absence of any meaningful difference between the two parties - encapsulated by these two. A former chancellor mockingly saying the former Sun editor had been running the country for 20 years...'