Councillor spends £9,835 on taxis!

[breeksy]

I'm shocked!! £10k for taxis!! can you tell??

Does anybody else get to claim for their bus/petrol expenses from their employer? I wouldn't have thought so.

 

Yes, as far as I know most people that are required to go out and about for work in their own car gets to claim mileage from their employer. Thats how it has always worked where I have worked, and within businesses I have done books for.

 

It all depends on where is classed as your base - and councillors bases are their own homes - they don't get offices in Lerwick to work from - and so they are able to claim costs from their base to meetings etc.

 

But if I was a councillor, I would like to think I would be a little more careful with my constituents cash than to spend it on taxi fares...

[BigMouth]

If a company car is taxable I wonder if a taxi fare also goes on the tax return? P11 perhaps?

 

I ask this because I worked for a company where we got 29p a mile whilst the MD paid himself £1 a mile for mileage. He was earing so much from mileage that I think thathe was beginning to make the tax man squeak a bit.

[breeksy]

a taxi fare would have to go on a p11, but unlike mileage which has tax applied to anything above a certain rate (40p per mile IIRC), refunded expenses would not be subject to tax.

[Luke Skywalker]

Assuming that she has been spending £10,000 a year on taxi fares for the 25 years she has been a councillor she will, by my calculations, have spent over a quarter of a million pouns on taxi fares over the last quarter century. It's seems incredible that she's never bothered to learn to drive or that anyone at the council took her to one side and suggested she try.

[humptygrumpty]

£10 000 on taxis !!!!! Not a good enough bus service ???? Well there are lots of people from west ower that hae jobs in lerwick who manage quite well with the bus service , but then again these are WORKING people who DO work between 8 or 9 and 5 and dont just drittle in when they feel like it.

 

As for not having the time , thats stoness , everyone else manages.

 

She shouldnt be in the job at all unless she has her own transport like all the rest of us , or pays for it herself. Its an absolute disgrace that we have to fork out for this.

[Fjool]

In her defence, she never shirked having to come out to residents association meetings at times which the bus wasn't running. Turning up to these things at 7, 8 and even 9 o'clock at night must be a chore, but she was always fine and cheerful about it. Very interested in what the folks needed, etc.

[Styles]

In her defence, she never shirked having to come out to residents association meetings at times which the bus wasn't running. Turning up to these things at 7, 8 and even 9 o'clock at night must be a chore, but she was always fine and cheerful about it. Very interested in what the folks needed, etc.

 

But is that not what a counciller is ment to do? Plus if she didnt she may not have been elected again and lost her taxi.

[humptygrumpty]

I seriously doubt whether the number of meetings she attended after bus hours would have racked up 10 grand in taxi fares. She could have been using public transport the rest of the time.

 

But then again our illustrious councillors , being the "great and the good" that they surmise they are couldnt be seen to be mixing with the ordinary plebes.

 

Council saving money ? Dont mak me laugh.

[sheepshagger]

6+ taxis a week for 52 weeks a year.....mmmmm

 

cooncil meets 5 days a week 2 taxi's a day (wan in wan oot) = 10 taxi's a week = £150

52 weeks a year (nae time aff for dis wife) = £7800

this means wir florry is workin above and beyond the call of duty

surely she would be happy to let an independant auditor check her figures and stop all this moaning about someone who is obviously a very hard working woman

[humptygrumpty]

Hard working or not her reasoning behind not learning to drive because of a lack of time is just plain witless and anyhow she should have a licence and be able to transport herself , end off.

[Luke Skywalker]

The other interesting point is that Grains's house at Hoove is only a few minutes walk from a bus stop with regular buses to Lerwick. I doubt whether she has ever used the service.

[humptygrumpty]

Exactly Luke , But then she woulda looked like an ordinary plebe then , which as we all know our councilors THINK they are quite a few rungs further up the ladder than the rest of us.

 

Anyway she shouldnt be getting us to pay for her taxis and should just get the mileage allowance , and if she's too "busy" to pass her test then tough turd she'd just have to make up the shortfall herself.

[BigMouth]

Due to the cheapness of bus travel it is likely to be profitable to claim mileage and take the bus!

 

Councillors should travel by the most environmentally friendly method and set an example to the rest of us.

[Rasmie]

Perhaps councillors in future should be given a car user allowance - a sum allocated to cover their normal travelling expenses-the any additional expenses would have to signed off by the chief exec! or convener.otherwise all council emplyees should get free taxis to work, to keep things on an equal footing - now councillors have taken the queen's shilling....................

[Caeser]

I am sure that any taxi expenses claim will be signed off by someone, and I am sure the claims are valid or there would have been questions raised many moons ago.

 

What is the issue is that is taxi's a suitable form of transportation for councillors.

 

I would have thought that in the days of the green world we all live in, all councillors should be forced to use the bus to keep cars off the road. public transport should be the assumed method of transport if the times fitted in with the meetings etc.

 

I suspect however, that many of the meetings attended by councillors are at 'odd' times and that for someone who does not drive it will be difficult to jump on the bus.