Teas at council meetingscost £7,500 in a year

THE cost of providing teas at council meetings in Leeds last year was 7,500.

Throughout 2009 Leeds City Council spent the cash on providing sandwiches, cakes and tea for councillors, senior council staff, members of the public and any invited guests.

The meetings, held in the Council Chamber at Leeds Civic Hall, usually start at about 1.30pm and tea is served at about 5pm.

A total of 7,508 was spent on teas for the meeting. Usually about 130 people are catered for at each meeting. The costs for last year are almost double the amount in 2008 and 2007. But last night a spokesman for Leeds City Council said comparing the figures was misleading as the accounts had been prepared differently.

He said the catering had previously been provided in-house but was now done by an outside catering firm. Because of this overheads including staff wages and other costs had now been included in the 2009 figures, accounting for the apparent rise.

In previous years, when the authority was providing its own catering, these costs such as staff wages and other costs were not included in the figures.

The spokesman added: “There’s no more cost to the taxpayer now than there was 12 months ago. The seemingly extra cost is the council factoring in the cost of staff, use of the building and other costs that previous accounts did not include.”