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News and Comment September 2011

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8 September (Part 2) - It’s party time

When the new Mayor, Ray Sams took office he spent £1,350 on tea and sandwiches for his mates. You thought he was being extravagant with our money? He was barely getting into his stride, and by comparison with others he is a bit of an amateur.

There was a knees up organised by the mayor’s office at the Marriott Hotel which cost £10,171.04. That was just for refreshments, the sound system cost another £528.

Not to be out done, councillor Craske’s lot (Environment and Wellbeing) managed to spend rather more on sandwiches and the like. A mere £10,754.64. That’s an awful lot of grub to be stuffed down the favoured ones’ necks. I nudged my neighbour at Tuesday’s meeting to draw his attention to a certain red faced little man’s growing paunch. Now I find I helped pay for it - and again - because the very same gourmet went back for second helpings. But he wasn’t greedy. Only £7,490.40 second time around. The cheapskates in Customer Services weren’t invited so arranged their own nosh on the quiet. Nothing extravagant, only £1,830. Just peanuts. But they captured their fun on camera, the photographer cost them £736.

Down at the Thames Innovation Centre they had something to celebrate too, goodness knows what but they gobbled their way through £1,260 and put it down to Social Care.

Craske’s crew got jealous and munched their way through another £10,754.64 of… well caviar I assume. To wash it down, £1,436 and sixteen pence went to The Coffee Company.

That’s just for one month (June). At that rate Bexley council is spending more than twice as much on their own “refreshments” than they do on Meals on Wheels for the vulnerable. (Assumption derived from News Shopper which reported that the £275,000 cost in 2008 was too much and was to be cut.)

Note : The data provided by the council does not reveal who ate all the pies or why, only who paid the bill and its size. The council’s website does not reveal which department is responsible for Meals on Wheels but ‘Environment and Wellbeing’ does not claim to be.

 

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