Herne Bay MP Roger Gale and his wife Suzy say they’re not ready to “throw in the towel” in the battle against banning MPs from employing relatives.

The couple were speaking as Sir Christopher Kelly, chairman of the committee on standards in public life, prepared to enforce the controversial ban next month.

The measure will affect about 200 MPs who employ wives, husbands, children and more distant relations on the parliamentary payroll.

But Roger and Suzy, who has worked as her husband’s office manager for 27 years, say they are not giving up without a fight.

In a statement, they said: “Perhaps one advantage of having 'been around for a bit’ is that people know us and judge us as they have found us, rather than as, sometimes, the national press would seek to stereotype us.

“We know that not everyone shares our political views and we of course accept that sometimes we simply have to agree to differ.

“Neither do we win all of the battles we fight, but Team Gale does not readily throw in the towel and we will continue to do, as we have done in the past, our best by those that rely upon us for help and representation.”

The row over spouses’ jobs comes as new figures obtained by The Sunday Times show the total spent by MPs on their staff in 2008-9 went up more than eight per cent to £59.96m.

Animal lover Suzy, who says she works 60 hours a week and earns between £30,000 and £40,000, has written to the head of the employment relations body Acas and to the Equality Commission about the ban.

She says the move to ban relatives is discriminatory because it is unrelated to their ability to do their jobs.

She said: “I think the Kelly committee has got it wrong and it should never have been part of the package examined by that committee.

“I actually said to them, if you wanted to reinterview me for my job I believe I’d get it, but they didn’t seem terribly interested. I got the impression they’d made up their minds already.”