WILL swathes of Labour MPs be swept away by the expenses scandal engulfing Westminster, perhaps ending the party’s near-monopoly of North-East seats?

Attention is already switching to the impact on next year’s General Election, with predictions of a populist backlash against all “incumbent” MPs suspected – by association – of riding the gravy train.

It may not matter that some of the worst revelations – those claims for moat-clearance, chandeliers, swimming pool upkeep and horse manure – suggest the Conservatives are also up to their necks in this sleaze.

Most incumbents – and, certainly, most in marginal seats – are Labour MPs, which means a voters’ war on sitting MPs will be calamitous news for Gordon Brown.

Furthermore, Tory leader David Cameron has been typically fleet-footed in ordering a clean-up in his ranks, while the Prime Minister – equally typically – has not.

Already, Ashok Kumar (Middlesbrough South and Cleveland East), Dari Taylor (Stockton South) and Alan Campbell (Tynemouth) are extremely vulnerable to Labour’s ongoing turmoil.

More North-East MPs will be job-seeking if the pent-up fury triggered by all the tax-dodging and furniture-scrounging is released, next May, in a wipe-out of those stained by their years at Westminster.

Memories are still fresh of the last such backlash in 1997, which saw former BBC reporter Martin Bell sensationally defeat Tory Neil Hamilton in true-blue Cheshire. If the Tories could lose in the Cheshire “footballers’ wives belt”, could Labour lose in working class heartlands such as the North-East?

Thus far, only Stephen Byers (Tyneside North) and Ronnie Campbell (Blyth Valley) have been linked heavily to the expenses row, with lesser accusations lobbed at Vera Baird (Redcar) and Ian Wright (Hartlepool).

Therefore, we should resist the temptation to scream “they are all the same”, even as the number of MPs who have abused the system tots up day-by-day.

I spend time with the region’s MPs. I know they are hardworking and enter Parliament to improve the lives of constituents – not to enrich themselves at taxpayers’ expense.

However, it will be a miracle if there are not some highly dubious purchases and practices somewhere in the mountain of 700,000 receipts on that stolen CD bought by a national newspaper.

So, if serious wrongdoing is revealed by any of our local MPs, then they should pay the price of losing the honour – if it is still an honour – of sitting in Parliament.

But that punishment should be meted out against those MPs alone, either through deselection by party activists, or at the ballot box next May. Kick out the rotten apples, but not the whole barrel.

HEARD the one about the MP turned down for promotion at Northern Rock – because she was too Northern?

It happened to Gateshead East and Washington West MP Sharon Hodgson, whose bid to rise from personnel clerk to training officer was rejected 20 years ago. She revealed: “I was told that the reason I did not get the job was that my accent was thought to be too strong for the branch staff in the South, who would not be able to understand me.”

Happily, Ms Hodgson added that “people seem to like the North-East accent now” – a transformation she attributed to the success of TV presenters Ant and Dec.