South Down MP Eddie McGrady is to pay back more than £6,000 to parliament as part of Sir Thomas Legg’s investigation into MP’s expenses.

South Down MP Eddie McGrady is to pay back more than £6,000 to parliament as part of Sir Thomas Legg’s investigation into MP’s expenses.

The total of £6,112 is the highest amount returned by any Northern Ireland MP, although Mr McGrady has said he shall be querying some disputed amounts at a later date.

The senior SDLP figure was the last local MP to reveal that he had been asked to pay back expenses. Yesterday Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness revealed that he is to return £3,000 for overpayment of rent on a London property.

Mr McGrady’s expenses relate to his London hotel bills for the last five years. The MP does not own a home in London and, he said, Sir Thomas Legg had come to the figure by refusing all hotel bills higher than his average over the five years.

He said: “In agreement with my parliamentary Party colleagues, Mark Durkan and Alasdair McDonnell, I too believe that there should be full transparency and accountability in all public offices and especially at Westminster where there has been ambiguous and inconsistent guidelines.

“Despite disputing some of the amounts as calculated and having certain reservations about what appears to be excessive but necessary zeal in the retrospective application of non existent rules, I too, shall be making full repayment of the schedules outlined in Sir Thomas Legg’s letter to me for the full amount of £6,112

“In the present circumstances it is right to make a full payment now; notwithstanding my intention to query the disputed amounts with Sir Thomas and his team at a later stage.”

Earlier Sinn Fein announced that a £3,000 overpayment of rent on a London property used by the Deputy First Minister is to be returned.

The money relates to two months’ rental payments — mistakenly credited to Martin McGuinness’s expenses by the Fees Office at Westminster.

Sinn Fein confirmed there had been no request for its four other MPs to repay any expenses.

On Tuesday night the DUP confirmed that seven of its MPs had been asked to return a total of £14,000, while Lady Sylvia Hermon (UUP) and Mark Durkan (SDLP) have also been told to repay money.

Some 600 MPs have received letters containing the interim results of a review of their second homes expenses claims over the last five years. It follows a long-running probe by Sir Thomas, a former senior civil servant, and a team of accountants, who have spent months examining every form submitted by Westminster MPs.