 ELLIOT MORLEY, the most senior politician to face trial over the expenses scandal was sentenced yesterday to 16 months in jail for fiddling more than ?30,000.  The former Labour MP, who has been praised by environmentalist as one of the best "green" ministers to serve in any British government, left court in a prison van, a man ruined by what his lawyer, Jim Sturman QC, described as "an absolutely ridiculous and inexplicable course of criminal conduct". Mr Morley sat hunched in the crowded courtroom during the two-hour hearing, and twice wiped tears away. Once was after Mr Sturman had pointed out his client was facing judgment alone, because he did not want his wife and children to have to pass the cameras outside the court.  He was also reduced to tears after Mr Sturman had read from a tribute to his ministerial career by The Independent's Environment Editor, Michael McCarthy, written soon after he had been exposed as an expenses cheat.  Mr Morley pleaded guilty to the largest fraud by any MP to come before the courts, but drew a comparatively light sentence, partly because the crime was so unsophisticated.  He was entitled under Commons rules to reclaim the interest paid on the mortgage on his second home, near Scunthorpe. For three and a half years he submitted claims for ?800 a month, which, despite written requests from the Fees Office, were never backed by any documents.  Between May 2004 and February 2009, the mortgage he was paying varied between ?52 and ?5.85 a month. In February 2009, the mortgage was paid off, and Mr Morley was told in writing by his building society that there was no longer a charge on the property. But he carried on claiming, and the Fees Office carried on paying, despite the absence of any evidence to back his claim, until he had defrauded taxpayers of more than ?30,000.  He rapidly repaid the money after the fraud was uncovered by the Daily Telegraph in May 2009, explaining he was "horrified" to have discovered he had committed "an embarrassing and inadvertent oversight". But passing sentence, Mr Justice Saunders said: "I am satisfied from the nature of the mortgage transactions and the correspondence that the excessive claims were made deliberately and are not explicable, even in part, by oversight."  Mr Morley was Labour MP for Scunthorpe from 1987 to 2010, and served for nine years as an environment minister, before being abruptly sacked in 2006 after a dispute with the treasury about government policy on climate change.  Mr Sturman pointed out that, at the age of 59, Morley faced an "uncertain future". Because of his dishonesty, he has forfeited the ?64,000 re 