Labour has begun an internal investigation after one of the three MPs charged with theft claimed that he was told by one of the party’s whips that he could move money between expense accounts.

The allegation by Jim Devine, MP for Livingston, raises the prospect that further claims of official connivance over expenses abuse will be aired in court.

Mr Devine and two other Labour MPs have embarrassed the party by trying to claim parliamentary privilege. Alan Johnson, the Home Secretary, said that they could not use legal immunities as a “get out of jail card”.

Speaking to The Times last night, Mr Devine said that he had been told by “a whip and other MPs” to “move money around”. He said on Friday: “We have separate accounts — London living, staffing, communication and an office budget. And you can move money around these accounts.

“I was moving money from communications to the staffing budget. I was advised by a whip that I could do this, who said that you could move money about like this. There was stationery . . . other parts of the money went into a staffing account. I was told that that was acceptable. Nobody queried it.”

The allegation has started an internal inquiry by Nick Brown, the Chief Whip. He is understood to have begun calling current and former members of the Whips’ Office.

Mr Devine faces criminal charges of theft by false accounting over claims of £3,240 for cleaning services and £5,505 for stationery using false invoices in 2008 and 2009. He told The Times: “I am not going to name anyone. It is me that is in the firing line. I have given the police everything. I have been hung out to dry. I moved money around. Lots of people did that. I was told to do it by the whips and other MPs.”

A Tory spokeswoman said: “A member of the Government has been accused of approving these expense arrangements. We will be pressing for ministers to make public the results of any internal investigation.”

Mr Devine, Elliot Morley, MP for Scunthorpe, and David Chaytor, MP for Bury North, face up to seven years in jail if convicted of using their expenses to steal from the taxpayer. Lord Hanningfield, the former Tory frontbencher, faces criminal charges on claims for overnight allowances.

The three Labour MPs issued a statement insisting that their expense claims were a matter for Parliament, indicating that they would seek to use the laws of parliamentary privilege to prevent the cases going to trial.

But Mr Johnson said that, while his “colleagues . . . should get a fair trial”, it “should be on the same basis as any member of the public who goes through the courts system”.

A Downing Street spokesman said: “No one believes that an MP has the right to be above the criminal law. Parliamentary privilege was clearly not intended to cover this.”

David Cameron will today accuse Gordon Brown of tolerating the “disgusting sight of Labour MPs \ parliamentary privilege”. The Tory leader will say that he would introduce legislation preventing further attempts by MPs to use immunities designed to guarantee freedom of speech “to evade justice”.

Although the Labour MPs have been formally deselected, Mr Cameron called on Mr Brown to withdraw the party’s whip from the three men. He also asked the party to clarify whether it was helping to fund the legal advice being given.