It seems that spending on Government Procurement Cards last year increased yet again, rising to £1.15 billion, an increase of £150 million since the Government pledged to cut spending on them in 2010. Freedom of Information requests by The People found that in the financial year 2011-12 Government credit cards were used... Read more...
Last month it was revealed East Riding of Yorkshire Council (ERYC) had a £16.5 million underspend in its budget. At the time I commended the council for making those savings, however my concern was this money would be frittered away on vanity projects. Many roads in the county are crumbling,... Read more...
Matthew Elliott recently congratulated the Government for saving £5.5 billion during 2011-12 in the Daily Mail, as announced by Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude. But he also pointed out that many departments such as the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) are still hiring even more staff, undoing the... Read more...
In a letter to The Times (£) this week, three development experts questioned the effectiveness of Britain’s large and expanding foreign aid budget. Gordon Bridger, a former economic advisor to the Overseas Development agency, Charles Cullimore, the former British High Commissioner to Uganda and Michael Shaw, a former Foreign Office consultant,... Read more...
HMRC's blunders happen so frequently that it's almost surprising that they count as news. The latest reported story is of a Cumbria pensioner who was shocked to open a letter from HMRC demanding £16,022,012 in unpaid tax. Enid Fisher, who was stunned to receive such a massive bill, eventually discovered that... Read more...
Taxpayers are picking up the bill to train trade union activists, the Sun has revealed. Trade unions are billing taxpayers for more than £3 million worth of diplomas and qualifications for their own activists. The courses include diplomas in "organising and recruitment","contemporary trade unionism" and certificate in "collective bargaining and employment... Read more...
Coventry University Hospital has quietly abolished its cap on parking fees paid by visitors and patients who use the hospital's car park. This has unsurprisingly angered residents and patients alike, especially as the health bosses did not announce the change. The cap meant that regular users of the car park... Read more...
Greenwich Borough Council is looking for a Carbon Reduction Officer, paying between £33,510 - £36,306. Here's part of the gobbledegook job description:As part of its ongoing commitment to sustainability and carbon reduction the Royal Borough of Greenwich is seeking to recruit to its well established Sustainability and Renewal service to... Read more...
Wiltshire Council is pressing ahead with plans to switch off or dim 20,000 street lights despite similar schemes in the region proving unpopular with residents—and costly to local taxpayers. ‘Much of financial and carbon savings proposed by the council could be achieved this way,’ says one local councillor. A Wiltshire... Read more...
The BBC reports that Gary Willetts, a Conwy Council taxpayer, has lodged a total of nineteen objections to his council’s 2009-10 and 2010-11 accounts with the auditors. Taxpayers have the legal right to inspect and query their council’s accounts before they are signed off by an independent auditor. They have... Read more...
HMRC plan to make taxpayers legally responsible for checking that the taxman is taking the correct amount of tax. The organisation is proposing to change current rules which waive underpayment of income tax if the root cause is delays and mistakes by HMRC officials.HMRC receive around 166,244 complaints each year... Read more...
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It is often more efficient and cost-effective when public bodies pool resources and share information. That’s why it is welcome news that benefits information from the Department for Work and Pensions will now be shared with local councils to help inform the social services that they provide to residents. The... Read more...
Hertfordshire County Council spent £200,000 on consultants over a proposed street lighting change without bothering to ask local residents for their opinion. But rather than admitting local residents should have been consulted, the Council has refused to apologise instead it insisted that consulting the public would not have been ‘useful’.... Read more...
The Home Office spent around £600,000 putting up staff in some of the world's most luxury hotels, the Sun has revealed. Information uncovered by Shadow Treasury Secretary, Rachel Reeves, shows that Home Office staff have enjoyed stays in exclusive hotels across the Caribbean, the Middle East, North Africa and the... Read more...
Following a flurry of U-turns after March's shambolic budget, it’s business as usual at the Treasury. Recent figures revealed that civil servants in the Chancellor’s department received a total £970,064 in bonuses despite assurances they would only reward success. When Danny Alexander, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury announced earlier... Read more...
Furious car owners in Wimbledon, southwest London, have accused Merton London Borough Council of using a bus lane as a money making venture. The Hartfield Road bus lane in Wimbledon town centre generated a staggering £148,008 in penalty charges in just 10 weeks after it was introduced last November. In... Read more...
How much does it cost to spend a penny? For council taxpayers in Hyndburn, Lancashire, the figure comes in at £18.38, after bungling bureaucrats entered the council into a long term contract with the makers of the Universal SuperLoo. The self-cleaning convenience in Accrington town centre has only been used... Read more...
It is vital that councils look at their own spending before cutting back on services that are of importance to taxpayers. This advice could be no more apt than at Brent Council which has recently placed an advert for an artist to create ‘outdoor sculptural pieces’ for the local Chalkhill Park. The... Read more...
According to the Daily Telegraph the Scottish Government is spending £25,000 every single day during the Olympics on hiring out an exclusive gentleman’s club to entertain businessmen and dignitaries. The First Minister officially opened the Army and Navy Club on London’s Pall Mall, which he has renamed Scotland House for the duration of the... Read more...
Thanks to Guido Fawkes blog, I've discovered the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) is looking for a Deputy Director, Stakeholder and Ministerial Engagement. Paying £80K a year, this is essentially another PR man for the department. Here's part of the job description:The success of BIS and its policies... Read more...
The Government should have kept on with abolishing National Insurance, Ross Clark has said in The Spectator magazine:What about working towards the eventual abolition of National Insurance contributions — which as everyone knows are a blatant tax on jobs? Merging income tax with NI contributions is a policy which George... Read more...
As the West Country trend for cutting the pay of incoming chief executives picks up pace—following recent success in Bath—the new boss of Plymouth City Council is having her pay cut by £20,000 in order to reduce the gap between top and bottom earners. ‘On a number of occasions we... Read more...
My colleague Babatunde Onabajo wrote last week about a proposed scheme in Hull that would see those guilty of drunken behaviour rewarded with free gym passes. Thankfully, at a meeting of the Humberside Police Authority yesterday this scheme was rejected.Hull & East Riding TPA was very vocal in its opposition... Read more...