Thanks to Mike for this from The Lancashire Evening Post.
By David Coates
The daughter of a former Preston MP is to stand against Mark Hendrick at the next general election.
Valerie Wise, whose mother Audrey represented the city in Parliament for 13 years until her death in 2000, has said she is “appalled” at revelations over Mr Hendrick’s expenses claims.
She has announced she will stand as an independent in the Westminster elections, which will be held next year.
Mr Hendrick has paid back £6,850.52 of taxpayers’ cash he received on his second home allowance for a mortgage covering both his homes in Fulwood and London and claimed £1,500 for a new bed after arguing it stopped him “aching in the morning”.
Mrs Wise, a former leader of Preston Council and the director of the city’s women’s refuge, said she intends to stand as an independent candidate at the next election, which must be held by next year, promising to “give people an alternative”.
She said: “I want a return to honest politics and give the people of Preston a real choice; they feel betrayed by all the major parties.
“I have not jumped straight in because I wanted to wait and see what Mr Hendrick’s situation was. I have given it a lot of thought and now I feel the time is right to do this.
“We have the people running the country and those who want to run it showing us they are incapable of doing the simplest things.
“I want to be the sort of MP who stands up for ordinary people in Preston.”
She said she will call a meeting in the next week to gather support from local political activists.
Mrs Wise worked for her mother during her time in Parliament, including filing her expenses claims, and said she would have been “utterly appalled” at the revelations currently coming out of the House of Commons.
She said: “She never flipped her home, she had a home in London but Preston was always her first home, and the idea our MP is claiming up to £300-a-month for food is just outrageous.
“That is more than a lot of people in this city have to live on for a month. It should be his responsibility, it is too easy to just blame his staff.
“The buck stops with him and the fact he has paid this money back shows he knows he has done wrong. If someone living in a normal home in Preston overclaimed benefits they would come down on them like a tonne of bricks.”
Carl Crompton, chairman of the constituency Labour party in Preston, said he believed Mrs Wise’s candidacy was “just settling old scores” after she missed out on being selected as the party’s candidate to Mr Hendrick in 2000.
Mrs Wise quit the Labour party in 2006 over the war in Iraq.
Coun Crompton said: “As far as I can see Mark has done everything within the rules and been up front with us as a party. Obviously, if it turns out he has not been completely truthful with us then our view may change.
“At the moment the party is quite happy with Mark as our MP.”
Audrey Wise, a staunch defender of women’s rights who often rebelled against the Government, died at the age of 65 in September 2000 after a battle with a brain tumour.
Coun John Collins, leader of the Labour group on Preston Council, said: “Mark Hendrick has opened up his finances for us to look at and it’s unfortunate that errors have occurred.”
Mr Hendrick said: “I do not want to comment on Valerie Wise – no comment.”
Liam redux 
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