‘The senior MP in charge of Labour’s response to the floods crisis spent last week on an all-expenses-paid junket to a luxury resort in sun-kissed Mexico.

As Britain struggled to recover from the devastating deluge, Shadow Floods Minister Barry Gardiner – who is also Ed Miliband’s ‘special envoy on climate change’ – jetted off to Cancun with his wife.

The £3,650 jolly was paid for by pharmaceuticals tycoon Bharat Shah, a multi-millionaire Labour supporter and friend of Mr Miliband.’

Read more: Hard at work in… Mexico: Miliband's flood supremo basks in 29C on sun-kissed jolly as Britons count the cost of the deluge