Westminster council refuses to disclose details of 400 hotel stays for staff
A London council has refused to reveal how much money it has spent on hotel trips abroad for staff.
Around 400 hotel trips were made by Westminster council officers between October 2020 and October 2021 – a Freedom of Information request found.
But the authority will not say how many trips were made outside the UK, why they were made, who paid for them, or how much they cost.
The council also refuses to reveal the hotel names and length of stay.
The Tory-led council says it would cost too much money and take too much time for them to provide the information.
A letter signed by the authority attached to the refused request said: “The data relating to the detailed information requested by the FOI is held locally by the many different card holders.
“There were approximately 400 uses identified where potentially a hotel stay was purchased, whilst the vast majority, if not all the hotel stays, would have been within the UK, each of these transactions would require individual investigation by referring to the cardholder, to determine whether they are related to foreign accommodation or not.
“This information would then have to be collated and summarised.”
Opposition Labour councillor Paul Dimoldenberg said he was perplexed to learn hundreds of hotel trips were made by council officers during the past year.
He said: “What on earth were they doing?
“It’s very strange that Westminster council officers have stayed in hotels outside Westminster 400 times in the past year.
“It doesn’t matter where they were staying, whether it’s somewhere in Britain or not, or elsewhere.
“Why would they be travelling across the country when there’s a pandemic on?”
It comes as Westminster council also refused to provide a full breakdown of costs for the infamous £6 million Marble Arch Mound that attracted global ridicule.
Freedom of Information requests made by the Local Democracy Reporting Service also found Kensington and Chelsea and Hammersmith and Fulham councils spent nothing on hotel stays abroad for officers in the same period.
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