MoD ran up £1bn on credit cards

The Ministry of Defence has defended itself after figures were released revealing it spent nearly £1bn using department credit cards over the past four years, more than any other department. Records from the Cabinet Office show the MoD spent £986,041,110 on the cards over the period, with 14,271 cards held by the department as of last December. The details emerged in a list of the top 20 organisations with the highest spend through the Government Procurement Card (GPC), a branded Visa purchasing card used by the public sector. Other organisations on the list, released on 13 July in response to a freedom of information request, included the Environment Agency, Kent County Council, the Prison Service, the Foreign Office, the Home Office, the City Of Edinburgh, the BBC, L&Q Housing Trust and the Metropolitan police Government procurement cards are held by 140,000 Whitehall officials who ran up a £25m bill last year. An MoD spokesperson said: "The MoD is one of the largest departments in government with military and civilian personnel based all over the world." "This means that we need the speed and flexibility in procurement that the GPC provides. The GPC also cuts overhead costs – the National Audit Office concluded a transaction through GPC is, on average, £28 cheaper than a manual order and payment process – and so provides good value for money for the taxpayer."The Daily Telegraph reported that the MoD had refused to follow other departments in publishing a breakdown of expenditure on the cards and claimed that several officials at the department have been privately disciplined or prosecuted over fraudulent or inappropriate use of the cards. Releasing the list, the Cabinet Office insisted that the GPC was not a credit card. "It is a payment charge card that allows public sector workers to pay for low value items in a controlled, secure and efficient way typically removing 95% of administrative effort," it said in an accompanying statement. It emerged earlier this month that ministers were set to publish all spending on government credit cards in order to expose profligacy and waste as part of new plans to reveal large amounts of government data showing low-performing services. Bills released under the Freedom of Information Act have included spending last year, such as a £370,000 bill for restaurants and takeaways, £3m on foreign travel and £117,000 for leisure activities including theatre tickets, golfing trips and football matches.