Cabinet Ministers – like the Minister for Foreign Affairs, or the Minister for Trade or the Minister for the Environment – have to travel overseas as part of their job. They have a credit card to pay for expenses such as hotels, taxis and food. They are not allowed to pay for personal things using this credit card.
However, we learnt on Thursday that many Ministers used their credit cards for things like flowers for a partner’s birthday, a massage, expensive champagne, a large amount of alcohol or for watching movies in the hotel. Sometimes Ministers paid back the money for personal spending immediately but sometimes they waited until an official told them to pay it back
Seven large boxes, with about 700 credit card statements in them, were given to the Parliamentary reporters on Thursday. The papers showed what Ministers for the last few years had spent money on, using the official credit cards. Many of these people were Labour Party Ministers before the 2008 elections. Reporters were very happy to tell us about some the wrong things that were paid with taxpayer money.
It was very embarrassing for many Ministers and ex-Ministers. Sometimes, it was unfair to attack them. A hotel bill lists all expenses including movies, mini-bar, spa, hair dressing and anything else. If, for example, the Minister has a guest to take out to the car, a member of his or her staff pays the total hotel bill with the official credit card.
In the future Ministers will be very careful about how they use the official credit card because they know that reporters can check.
Questions
1. If a Minister uses any of these items from the mini-bar, is it a personal item or should the tax-payer pay for it: chocolate, beer, champagne, a bottle of water?
2. If a Minister has travelled for many hours across different time zones and cannot get to sleep at night, should the tax payer pay for a movie? What about a massage to relax or a hair-do to look good for a meeting?
3. Many business people have expense accounts, for travelling and for entertaining clients. Can they expect the company to pay for personal alcohol use? Is it easy to separate personal use from business use when entertaining clients?
4. What are the advantages of having credit card spending by Ministers open to inspection by reporters?