The British political establishment faced another wave of public anger today after Commons authorities launched a new era of transparency on a sea of black ink.

Tens of thousands of MPs' expenses claims – totalling more than a million documents in PDF format – were posted on the Parliament website at 6am, more than a year after the High Court ruled that MPs should not be exempt from freedom of information laws.

As voters soon saw, the year has been well spent. Both the claims and the receipts accompanying them have been heavily "redacted" – censored – to remove personal details such as addresses, regular travel schedules or names of suppliers.

What was left was a mixture of the petty and the money-grabbing:

* Tony Blair spent £260 on shredding as he wound up his parliamentary affairs. He also submitted a claim for £6,990 for repairing the roof of his constituency home two days before leaving No 10.

* The Tory leader David Cameron was charged £150 by Tory whips to replace a lost pager shortly before he became party leader in 2005. Taxpayers picked up the bill. Mr Cameron had already agreed to pay back £680 claimed for repairs to his constituency home in Oxfordshire, including for clearing wisteria and vines from a chimney. His spokeswoman said today that he would now be paying back £947 after noticing other errors.

* George Osborne, the Shadow Chancellor, claimed £47 for two copies of a DVD showing him giving a speech on "value for money".

* Ed Balls, the School Secretary, claimed £33 for two wreaths bought from the British Legion

* Jeremy Hunt, the Shadow Culture Secretary, submitted a phone bill for 1p in October 2005

It also emerged tonight that taxpayers were charged more than £14,000 for legal advice over an attempt to force Mr Blair from office for his handling of the war with Iraq.

The cash claim came to light through Westminster expenses receipts lodged by the SNP leader Alex Salmond. A spokesman for Mr Salmond said that he claimed a £790 share of the £14,100 total, split among nine Scottish and Welsh Nationalist MPs.

The attempt to force the former prime minister from office was launched in August 2004 by the SNP and Plaid Cymru in Westminster under an impeachment procedure which had not been used in 150 years.

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