Written question asked by Lord Laird (Crossbench), in the House of Lords. It was answered by Baroness Royall of Blaisdon (Labour) on Friday, 24 April 2009.

Northern Ireland Office: Taxis

Question: To ask Her Majesty's Government further to the Written Answer by the Lord President (Baroness Royall of Blaisdon) on 30 March (WA 198-99) concerning the cost of providing information about taxi expenses for officials of the Northern Ireland Office, in developing its calculation, how long the Northern Ireland Office's Financial Services Division considered it took to examine one claim.

Answer: Calculating expenditure on taxis reimbursed through the travel and subsistence system for the first two weeks of 2007-08 would involve a detailed manual review of every single travel and subsistence claim submitted for a period of up to four months given that staff are permitted to submit claims up to three months after the month in which the costs were incurred. Therefore taxi costs incurred in April could be claimed up until the end of July. There were 4,814 claims during 2007-08 so the period to the end of July represents, on average, over 1,600 claims. It is estimated that the process of retrieving, reviewing, calculating the taxi cost and compiling the relevant information would take, on average, two to three minutes per claim. It is estimated that this process alone would exceed the disproportionate cost threshold of £750. In addition it would also be necessary, in order to review the information for accuracy and completeness, to carry a spot check of, say, 10 per cent of claims and there would be other costs involved in preparing the Answer to the Question.

Secondary information

Type: Written question
Reference: 2767; 709 c421-2WA
Session: 2008-09
Related items: Northern Ireland Office: Taxis
Monday, 30 March 2009
Written questions
House of Lords
Subjects: Costs Expenditure Taxis Written questions Northern Ireland Office
Link: View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk