Taxpayers pick up £26k bill for coffee at Stoke-on-Trent City Council

“Oh my days, the Sentinel strike with another red hot story to rile the masses with about 20% of the whole story.

Fact is, anyone in the council looking at a coffee bill would make this cut, but any cursory check would show it's probably spread across god knows how many council owned offices,venues and meeting rooms. It will be accounted for under a code which also covers tea urns and kettles and other miscellaneous bits and bobs and is then added up for the whole council and presented in a summary of spend that the Sentinel get's their grubby little hands on looking for things they can spin out as political injustices.

I don't work for the council, I'm not opposed to criticising the council when it's due, but your paper is a disgrace at feeding negativity in this City and is a major part of the problem, not solution.

shame”

“You honestly couldnt make it up could you.

That money could have been spent maybe keeping shelton pool open for the disabled.

The more I read about this corrupt lot of pen pushers the angrier I get.”

“I've just looked at the post comments on the Which and the Wardrobe story.Which as in,belonging to him and in the way to solve it,do we legalize it ? It sounded like a powder keg was about to go off,excuse the pun.I was being convinced by one of the pro/legalize brigade that it would be a good thing to do, to make it legal.Then another one came on and started ranting on about red arrows,i did not know wether someone had shot him or he was talking about the aeroplanes.in any event they made right display of themselves.QUOTE-End the red arrows,i'm sick of morons telling me I'm wrong,without actually telling me i'm wrong.redsomething his name, and to be honest can't be bothered to look.Same old we are not a threat to society, well if you don't mind being robbed mugged and violently threatened that go hand in hand with these activities,so be it.There are no words to describe these people,which in turn begs the question,why would anyone want dialog with them. they thrive on your comments ,which in turn bring out the worst in human character. They will never get the zombie state they are after.Once an addict always an addict and an exaddict, just one step away.So i have taken my brown powder and smelled the coffee, just as i was being convinced. I would like to withdraw my proposals from my previous post DEAL OR NO STEAL. Sorry Mr Conway ,but i knew you were the only person i could rely on to tell them '' ;;;;;;;;;; OFF”

“they spend this obscene amount on beverages for themselves yet they cant even cut the grass at local cemetaries,keep much needed centers open close libaries and cut funding to the needy..this lot should hang their heads in shame...”

“Yip, dump the coffee.and the rest of it. Save yourselves loads of money.By the popular opinion of the legalize cannabis campaign we suggest,not to a vote, we are telling you,start taking cans of bis and cut the grass to get some weed, it's all self financing. Recycle your cans,sell your grass and weed, should you still need a drink , coke will do it.Come on councillors stop being dopes and do something white for once in your life.You will save money in your social services budget by us robbing and frightening to death the vulnerable and elderly. You will save money by not having to build more prisons for all the crime we are committing when we need our next fix. I see this as a win win situation and to top it all you will save money on the OAP bus fare they will be to scared go through the door just in case we see them.The big earner is to charge people £5 for using your toilet , it may sound a bit hit, but when you are powdering your nose ? So come on Mr Conway say what you think.Good idea or what. I cant hear you.If you need any more persuading, we love taking away from charities.”

“How on earth did they manage to spend so much on drinks ? Providing for more than a couple of people should prove cheaper, as they could use wholesale sizes.

Everyone else has to pay for workplace refreshments, so why should we provide freebies for these parasites ?

Another freebie (still current ?) was the paying of all a councillor's phone bill; not just for council business calls.”

“PotteriesEYE investigated and broke the story of £26,000 being spent on free coffee and tea for senior councillors and senior officers at Stoke-on-Trent City Council.
The Sentinel reports it today, as an aside, thanks Sentinel for giving credit to us community volunteers so that you can make money out of the news we researched and broke. So much for journalistic ethics eh?
Our original story: null
Back to the coffee.
In the grand scheme of things this may seem at first glance a drop in the ocean, especially when you consider the £24m they need to find again this year for cuts, as well as the £59m they want to borrow for the new council HGQ, oh and don't forget the £4m overspend from last years cuts.
Indeed, I agree it is small in terms of cash. However, if you look beyond the cash itself and look deeper, the issue drives right to the very heart of the problems councillors and the public face in democratic terms.
I have absolutely no doubt at all that until we broke this story, no councillor, from any political party had any idea of this £26,000 bill for officer refreshments.
The problem with council spending, and in particular budget cuts is that councillors only receive a list of what officers want them to cut, not a list of all spending.
I have written about this before – 15 years ago at budget time all councillors got a budget book. It was a very thick line by line detailed account of all spending in the council. It was a hard slog to read it but at least when an officer said they wanted to cut something, councillors could say no I want to cut this or that.
Not anymore.
All they get is a list of the proposed cuts and the broad headline amounts for each departmental spend. What happens then? Well some bright spark will challenge any councillor to find alternative cuts if they oppose any that the officers have put forward. How on earth can you find alternatives without being given a list of what those alternatives are?
This refreshment issue is a good example. Would councillors have chosen this as a cut rather than something else if they had been given the choice? Of course they would, but they weren't given the choice by officers.
It beggars the question of how much can you trust officers. If officers are prepared to cuts bus passes for the blind and elderly whilst hiding their own free coffee perks – just for a free coffee! – what else are they prepared to protect in their own interests?
It is time to wake up councillors. It's time for all councillors to demand a full budget book of spend so that those democratically elected to represent the people can make decisions in the budget based on all the information and not just that which has been filter by greedy and self interested officers.
Councillors, you deserve better, but its up to you – and the public certainly deserve their money being spent on the services they need, not on the petty perks of highly paid officers.”

“£25,000 would have cut a several acres of grass!”

“And yet you'll notice that council-run Family Support Centres exchanged their "I'll make you a cuppa Duck" system for a pay-as-you-drink machine.The good old Labour double-standard,again.”

“"I sat in a licensing meeting which went on for more than two hours not long ago and I had a glass of water."

Perhaps Councillor Conway's mother slept with a camel!”