The "golden goodbye" payments for David Chaytor and two other MPs facing criminal charges over their expenses will be suspended until legal proceedings are over, Commons Speaker John Bercow has announced.

Mr Chaytor, together with co-accused Labour MPs Elliot Morley and Jim Devine, would have been entitled to resettlement grants on stepping down from the Commons at the general election.

But Mr Bercow wrote to the Clerk of the House, Malcolm Jack, telling him to “suspend any payments which would otherwise be due and attributable to the Resettlement Grant in any case where criminal proceedings are brought in relation to any claim for expenses until the criminal proceedings have been finally disposed of”.