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RICHARD LITTLEJOHN: It's time to rein in these Town Hall truffle hounds

By Richard Littlejohn

PUBLISHED: 22:45, 17 June 2013 | UPDATED: 23:25, 17 June 2013

More than 150 council leaders have issued an apocalyptic warning about the impact on �services� if the Chancellor orders more cuts in local government spending.

Libraries, children�s centres and sports clubs will all have to close. Entire towns will be plunged into darkness as street lights are switched off to save money.

In a plaintive letter to the Observer, they insist any further reductions in council budgets will be �bad for the country, bad for people and bad for our prospects of economic recovery�.

Cue violins.
More than 150 council leaders have issued an apocalyptic warning about the impact on 'services' if the Chancellor orders more cuts in local government spending

More than 150 council leaders have issued an apocalyptic warning about the impact on 'services' if the Chancellor orders more cuts in local government spending

We�ve heard it all before. Town Halls are always pleading poverty. There�s never enough money to fill the potholes, sweep the streets or empty the dustbins once a week.

If savings have to be made, �frontline� services will inevitably suffer. Behind the scenes, however, the gravy train trundles on oblivious to economic reality.

As they prepare to turn off the lights and board up old people�s day centres, flog off the libraries to Tesco Express and sack home helps, councillors continue to fill their boots at the taxpayer�s expense.

On the very day the letter appeared in the Observer, a parallel report was also published highlighting the staggering extent of extravagance in local government.

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Between 2007 and 2012, a total of �440 million was spent on credit cards issued to councillors and staff, who treated themselves to everything from Caribbean holidays to meals in Michelin-starred restaurants.

At the same time as they were slashing public services because of the �savage cuts�, they were jetting off to exotic locations, including Puerto Rico, Brazil and Australia. Town Halls spent �3.7 million on foreign travel to no less than 90 different destinations.

One of the worst offenders was the disgraced Tory peer Lord Hanningfield, who was jailed for fiddling his parliamentary expenses.

In his capacity as leader of Essex County Council, he used his official credit card to fly business class to a meaningless conference in the Bahamas. He claimed he couldn�t travel economy because he had a bad back.
Lord Hanningfield, who was jailed for fiddling his parliamentary expenses, in his capacity as leader of Essex County Council, used his official credit card to fly business class to a meaningless conference in the Bahamas

Lord Hanningfield, who was jailed for fiddling his parliamentary expenses, in his capacity as leader of Essex County Council, used his official credit card to fly business class to a meaningless conference in the Bahamas

Hanningfield racked up hefty bills stuffing his face at celebrity restaurants owned by Rick Stein and Jamie Oliver.

Only the best will do when these Town Hall truffle hounds dine out on the taxpayer. Essex council staff also ran up a �467 bill at Gordon Ramsay�s restaurant at the five-star Connaught Hotel in London.

These drunken sailor antics aren�t confined to Essex. Birmingham lavished �319,000 on �fact-finding� trips to 43 countries, taking in Kuwait, China and Jamaica.

Sunderland spent over six grand sending staff to the World Cup in South Africa in 2010. Why? How did that jaunt benefit the hard-pressed taxpayers of Wearside?

Freedom of Information requests submitted by Channel 4�s Dispatches programme also revealed that �30 million was spent on maintaining a luxury fleet of local government limos, including Jaguars, Bentleys and Rollers.

For example, Glasgow�s bill for chauffeur-driven cars is just shy of �1 million. York spent �180 on pedicures and Fenland council �invested� �205 in golf lessons.
Between 2007 and 2012, at the same time as councillors were slashing public services because of the 'savage cuts', they were jetting off to exotic locations, including Puerto Rico, Brazil and Australia

Between 2007 and 2012, at the same time as councillors were slashing public services because of the 'savage cuts', they were jetting off to exotic locations, including Puerto Rico, Brazil and Australia

Barking and Dagenham, one of Britain�s most deprived boroughs, frittered away an astonishing �10,000 on flowers for the chief executive�s office. This in an area which has the seventh highest level of child poverty in the country.

These sums are outrageous but they�re only the tip of a very large iceberg. Most of the cost of local government goes not on �services�, as they try to pretend, but on keeping councillors and staff in the manner to which they have become accustomed.

Even in the poorest areas, senior local government officers are paid astronomical salaries in comparison with most of those they are employed to serve. Their gold-plated, inflation-proof pensions are padded with money which could be spent on schools, or social services or employing a few more dustmen.

The biggest racket is the system of �allowances� which means it is not uncommon for councillors to receive �20,000 a year from the public purse. Some council leaders are on �50,000 plus.

Despite the economic downturn, they have continued to grant themselves substantial pay rises. Between 2010 and 2012, the latest figures available, allowances rose by up to 28 per cent in some areas.

I�ve never understood why we pay councillors anything at all, apart from reasonable travelling expenses. When I started out as a young reporter, the local council leader was an engine driver who ran the city in his spare time without claiming a penny from the ratepayers.

As councils have grown out of all proportion, building grotesque empires and moving to hideously expensive new headquarters, what passes for public �services� has declined inexorably.

Just look at the ludicrous job titles they grant themselves these days � �Cabinet Members� and �Portfolio Holders� � to feed their exaggerated self-importance and justify their lucrative allowances.

I�m sure there are still plenty of people in local government with a selfless ethos. But the impression emanating from our Town Halls is that public service has been replaced by an all-consuming sense of entitlement.

Next time they plead poverty or bitch about the �savage cuts�, remember the hundreds of millions of pounds of our money they have lavished on themselves in the shape of �fact-finding� sunshine holidays and five-star feasts in fashionable restaurants.