Government travel expenditure is poorly controlled, with no central oversight of spending, and departments are failing to actively manage demand or observe agreed policies, according to a report from the National Audit Office (NAO)
The watchdog said it had ‘found little evidence that departments are actively managing demand and the centre of government does not consider this to be part of its role'.
In 2013-14 central government identified £546m of travel expenditure through travel contracts, and some government procurement card expenditure. However, the NAO says this analysis does not routinely capture expenditure claimed by officials as expenses.
The analysis of central government data suggests that travel expenditure has increased by at least 11% in real terms since 2010-11, and the NAO stated that ‘publicly-available travel expenditure data are not complete and prepared on an inconsistent basis’.
The report points out that this rise in expenditure has occurred ‘despite overall headcount reductions and advances in video and teleconferencing technology’.
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