Parliament is being overrun with vermin, according to new figures that reveal the growing number of sightings. The House of Commons’ dedicated pest control team was called 541 times last year to deal with vermin. The figure represents a large jump on the 412 in 2022, and a significant rise on the 227 spotted in 2021. The figures were revealed after a Commons question from Lib Dem MP Sarah Olney, which also set out the wider workplace crises that those who work at the UNESCO site have to deal with on a daily basis. 901 mechanical incidents – largely broken lifts – were reported to the Commons authorities between December 2021 and 2023. Similarly, 11,182 plumbing incidents were reported across the same period, with 5,211 of them documented in 2023 alone. On the plumbing crisis, the Commons added: “We have had multiple issues with toilets in Portcullis House due to the quality of the water in the system”. “To address this, new equipment, including a filtration system, was installed in Autumn 2023. An initial fault …