POLICE have launched an inquiry into the House of Lords after Lord Hanningfield was found to have claimed a £300 allowance for days on which he did no parliamentary work.

The former Essex County Council leader was suspended for the rest of the current Parliament in May by the Lords Privileges and Conduct Committee.

He was also ordered to repay £3,300 which he had wrongly claimed. After a complaint, the Lords Commissioner for Standards, ex-Hampshire chief constable Paul Kernaghan, carried out an inquiry focusing on 11 days in July 2013 when he spent less than 40 minutes in the parliamentary estate.

In his report, Mr Kernaghan found that in making the incorrect claims, Lord Hanningfield '”failed to act on his personal honour”.

It has now emerged the Conservative peer was questioned earlier this year as part of a police investigation.

The Metropolitan Police confirmed that “a review of allegations of unlawful claiming of allowances at the House of Lords” began after Mr Kernaghan's report.

A spokesman said: “We can confirm a 73-year-old man attended by appointment an east London police station and was interviewed under caution in relation to an allegation of fraud.”

LordHanningfield’s case followed an investigation by the Mirror, which monitored his movements on 19 days in July 2013. On 11 of them, the paper alleged he travelled to Westminster from his home in West Hanningfield, but spent less than 40 minutes in the Lords before returning.

Lord Hanningfield said he regarded the allowance as a “de facto salary”, which earned him around £30,000 a year and was unaware what he was doing was wrong. He made clear he intends to return to the House of Lords after his suspension.

The disgraced peer was jailed for nine months in 2011 for fraudulently claiming for overnight stays in London when he was going back home to Essex.