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Iain Duncan Smith: "I'm supportive of Maria, because I feel if we're not careful we end up in a witch-hunt"
MPs should do "whatever it takes" to stop rows over their expenses "eating away at the credibility of Parliament", a cabinet minister has said.
Iain Duncan Smith was speaking after the independent parliamentary watchdog has said MPs should "no longer mark their own homework" on ethics.
It comes after a committee of MPs overruled investigators probing Culture Secretary Maria Miller's expenses.
Mr Duncan Smith also backed Mrs Miller, warning of a "witch-hunt" against her.
The row over the culture secretary's expenses dates back to December 2012 when the Daily Telegraph reported she had claimed £90,718 in expenses towards mortgage payments on a house in south London that the MP shared with her parents.
The parliamentary commissioner, who conducted an investigation into the culture secretary's expenses, ruled she should repay £45,800 but the House of Commons Committee on Standards, which is mostly made up of MPs, cut this to £5,800.
'Reasonable and honest'Mr Duncan Smith, who is Work and Pensions Secretary, told the BBC's Andrew Marr that MPs expenses and the wider issue of standards was corrosive.
Asked whether he backed an independent system, he said: "I am very happy for that to be debated. I am among a number those who feels this goes on and on eating away at the credibility of Parliament.
End Quote Sir Ian Kennedy Ipsa chairmanTo avoid further damage to Parliament in the future, it should have the confidence to give away powers in regulating itself "
"Whatever it takes to restore the credibility of Parliament is right. Personally the sooner we can get rid of this nonsense the better."
Mr Duncan Smith said he believed that Mrs Miller was an "reasonable and honest" person and had apologised.
He said there was a "lot of antipathy" towards Mrs Miller because of her role in drawing up tougher regulation of the press in the wake of the phone hacking scandal and the Leveson Inquiry recommendations.
Asked whether she should stay in the Cabinet, he said it was a "matter that the prime minister has to take consideration of and she herself".
"I am supportive of Maria because if we are not careful, we can end up in a witch-hunt of somebody".
Speaking to the Sunday Times, Sir Ian Kennedy - chairman of the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority - said an end to the current system of self-regulation of standards was "the only way forward".
MPs "marking their own homework always ends in scandal", he said.
Mrs Miller's mortgage claims were made before Ipsa took over overseeing MPs expenses in 2009 and her case "couldn't happen under Ipsa", he said.
He said "great progress" had been made under the new regime, put in place after the MPs' expenses scandal.
But he went on: "There is a lesson from Ipsa which ought to be learnt with the commissioner for standards too.
"She should be given the freedom to carry out her work and not have her wings clipped by MPs.
"To avoid further damage to Parliament in the future, it should have the confidence to give away powers in regulating itself and see that independent regulation is the best, most transparent way forward."
BBC political correspondent Gary O'Donoghue said Ipsa had always had a "frosty relationship" with most MPs.
'Irrational'In addition to ordering Mrs Miller to repay £5,800, the Commons Standards Committee said Mrs Miller's submission of "incomplete" evidence to the inquiry had breached the MPs' code of conduct and said she should apologise to MPs "for her attitude to the commissioner's inquiries".
Emails released by the committee revealed Mrs Miller told the commissioner investigating her that she might go over her head to ask MPs to intervene.
In one email, Mrs Miller said: "It may be that I shall need to refer this to the supervisory jurisdiction of the standards committee but I hope this can be avoided."
In another, she said a decision to uphold the complaint would be "irrational", "perverse" and "unreasonable".
Mrs Miller made her apology on Thursday, which the Conservative Party said had drawn a line under the incident although Labour says she still has questions to answer. A number of newspapers have called for her resignation.
A poll carried out by Survation for the Mail on Sunday suggested 78% of the public think that Mrs Miller should resign as a cabinet minister.
The survey was conducted online on Friday among 1,001 people.
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