Mark Pritchard, the Tory MP for Telford, has made a cryptic announcement on his website:

Under Parliamentary rules governing the pre-election period, this website will not be updated from 1st January 2010 until the General Election.

What rules say that a sitting MP can’t update their official website before an election has been called?  I’m not aware of any but I am aware of new rules on election expenses during a “long election campaign” which are the rules that I suspect he is misleadingly referring to.  These rules cover the 6 month period prior to an election and place strict limits on the amount of money that can be spent on an election campaign.  His website would, of course, be included as election expenditure which would limit the amount of money he can spend on leaflets, public meetings and driving tanks up the wrekin.

If those are the rules he’s referring to then I’m sure his constituents would prefer that he was spending money telling them what he’s doing for them rather than saving up a few quid for leaflets.