A former MP who was jailed for fraud lost a legal bid to challenge his four-year jail term.

Jared O'Mara, 41, tried to obtain £52,000 of taxpayers' money to fund a cocaine habit by submitting bogus claims for parliamentary expenses.

He was jailed after he was convicted of six counts of fraud following a trial at Leeds Crown Court.

O'Mara, the ex-Labour member for Sheffield Hallam, applied for permission to appeal that jail term but was refused by Court of Appeal judges.

Mrs Justice Lambert, sitting with Lord Justice Holroyde and Mr Justice Jeremy Baker at the Royal Courts of Justice in central London, said the challenge raised "no arguable ground that the sentence was manifestly excessive," adding that it was "wholly proportionate" to the offences committed.

She said judges had concluded "without hesitancy" that the application "is not meritorious".

O'Mara was elected to Parliament in June 2017, unseating former deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg.

He quit the party the following year and became an independent after he was suspended by the party over comments he had posted online before becoming an MP, before standing down in 2019, the same year the fraud offences took place.

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