The Duck House The Duck House The Duck House is a 2013 comedy farce play written by Dan Patterson and Colin Swash. It is based around the events of the 2009 UK parliamentary expenses scandal, and made its world premiere at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre in October 2013, at the start of a five-week UK tour. The production then transferred to the West End's Vaudeville Theatre, where it ran until 29 March 2014. The play is set in May 2009, one year before the General Election, Gordon Brown's Labour government is unpopular. Robert Houston is a Labour backbencher seeking to defect to the
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State ministers can be paid the salary of a minister senior to a Parliamentary Secretary. Thus if 50 senior ministers are appointed, the maximum number of paid Parliamentary Secretaries is 33. The limit on the number of unpaid Parliamentary Secretaries is given by the House of Commons Disqualification Act 1975 ensuring that no more than 95 government ministers of any kind can sit in the House of Commons at any one time; there is no upper bound to the number of unpaid ministers sitting in the House of Lords. The position should neither be confused with the Permanent Secretary which is