Two Tory MPs who have other jobs outside Westminster have come under the spotlight in the wake of the parliamentary expenses scandal.

The Sunday Telegraph reported yesterday that Robert Goodwill spent up to one hour a week digging graves and cutting the grass at Mowthorpe Garden of Rest, an environmentally- friendly cemetery he helps run on his family farm, in Terrington, near Castle Howard.

The 52-year-old shadow transport minister told The Press he only spent a minimal amount of time on cemetery business. “I do the administration, but I usually do it on a Sunday evening,” he said. The MP for Scarborough and Whitby was reported to own all the preference shares in the firm, which had a turnover of about £25,000 a year, but did not take a salary from it.

In addition, he worked on the rest of the farm, which made less than £10,000 a year in profit and would have an income of around £80,000 this year, but was likely to make a loss because of a major drainage project.

He told The Press that, during a normal week, the work he did on the farm only amounted to “a couple of conversations” on the phone with the person who ran the farm.

Meanwhile, Ryedale MP John Greenway is reported to register an income of between £15,000 and £40,000 from positions including president of the Institute of Insurance Brokers, parliamentary adviser to the incentives industry, and a director of Combined Insurance Company of America Ltd.

The Press contacted Mr Greenway yesterday, but the MP, who has just left hospital following a successful operation to remove a tumour from his leg, said he did not want to comment, although he added that all such information was already available.