David Cameron forced members of his Shadow Cabinet to pay back thousands of pounds in “excessive” expense claims today and overhauled the Tory party's system for handling allowances.

The furious Conservative Party leader read the riot act to MPs as the party reeled over a series of eye-watering disclosures, including claims for a swimming pool to be refurbished and a moat to be cleaned.

He gave his top team no choice. In separate meetings this morning he told them what he expected them to pay back. Refusal to do so would have meant immediate dismissal from the Shadow Cabinet. No one refused.

Mr Cameron had been going through the claims one by one over the past two days.

Those not on the front bench will have to go before a new panel headed by Patrick McLoughlin, the chief whip, to have their claims reviewed. Anything considered excessive will have to be paid back. Anyone refusing would "no longer be a Conservative MP", Mr Cameron said.

After yesterday's disclosures concerning Michael Gove, the Shadow Children's Secretary, and other Shadow Cabinet members, Mr Cameron was incandescent at the latest revelations about eight "grandees", which suggested that they were using taxpayers' money to finance a lifestyle beyond the reach of most voters.

Appearing before the press today, Mr Cameron was clearly determined to show the smack of firm leadership. He said that he was “sorry for the actions of some Conservative MPs" and added: “I don’t care if they [some of the claims] were within the rules, they were wrong.

“I am angry about what has happened. It is out of order and some of it is abuse of taxpayers’ money and I am going to deal with it.”

When he heard about claims for moats and swimming pools he was appalled, he added.

The Shadow Cabinet members were publicly humiliated, but had little choice but to accept the decision. How the episode will affect their future relations with Mr Cameron is unclear.

One former frontbencher said after the meeting that he now questioned why he had bothered to go into politics.

Under new party rules, a scrutiny panel will be set up to assess all “excessive” expense claims by Tory MPs and where necessary order them to be repaid. All Tory MPs will also be required to publish all their expense claims on the internet as they file them.

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