Morning:
9°c
Jowell gets a £14,500 new office
Paul Waugh28.04.09
WHITEHALL has spent more than £14,500 furnishing a new office for Olympics minister Tessa Jowell, MPs have been told.
The former Culture Secretary returned to the Cockspur Street HQ of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport in September last year after a spell at the Cabinet Office.
Upon her return, the Department spent £14,656 on the office which "needed to be fully furnished", Ms Jowell revealed in a Parliamentary answer.
Ms Jowell was replaced by Andy Burnham as Culture Secretary in June 2007 and demoted to the post of Olympics minister with a right to attend Cabinet.
She was moved but the DCMS building has now been adapted to accommodate her as well as Mr Burnham.
Ms Jowell apologised to retiring Labour MP John Austin last week for failing to tell him she was visiting his Erith and Thamesmead seat for a party selection battle. She attended a meeting organised by Georgia Gould, who is seeking to succeed Mr Austin.
Reader views (35)
James Elliott, Eastbourne, doesn't understand irony.
- John, Dorset , UK
Thomas, London wants us to stop being nasty. What exactly is nasty about drawing attention to public money being spent unnecessarily, at a time of financial crisis, just to placate Ms Jowell's taste. Jowell may be having an indifferent time of it in her personal life, but she is complicit in a Government that is causing the rest of us considerable concerns and hardship. Perhaps she is the nasty one.
- James Elliott, Eastbourne UK
I have heard of a frmer calling his pigs, Harmen, Jowell, Mcnulty, Brown and a beautiful Darling. The Pigs trough suites them nicely.
- Ebin Donk, angus scotland
not that popular is she?
- Satnam Singh, corby
Whats your surname Thomas - Jowell perchance... pigs and troughs spring to mind
- David, SOUTHAMPTON
One can but hope, the interior designer did not feel the need to hang a mirror.
- Wills, Soton
Stop being nasty to this woman. She is married to a very rich man who is being invesitgated along with his business partner Berlusconi for corruption so she is having a hard enough time without her being denied a comfortable new office. These people are incredibly intelligent and real self-less gems for our nation and they don't ask for much in return for their services.
- Thomas, London
Mordwinoff has a good point - why isn't she in a portakabin in Stratford? PUT HER IN A PORTAKABIN!
- Sarah Bradshaw, Enfield, Middx
Why bother? She has a good chance to be on the way out!
- Pt, London
she is the most loathsome MP, thank goodness she will be out soon! (not fast enough in my opinion) a Dulwich MP who lives in Islington,tut tut tut, demand her out Dulwich!
- Alanj, London
She better enjoy it while it lasts - she and all the other NuLiebour wasters will be out of jobs come the election
- David, SOUTHAMPTON
What a waste of cash considering she'll be out on her neck next year!
- Scotty, Cambridge UK
Worth every penny. Is she still pretending to have dumped her husband?
- Paul Smith, harpenden
Is that Cockspur Street or Cock-up Street?
Perhaps she's looking ahead... the office can double as a meeting room for all the labour MPs returned at the next election.
- John, Dorset, UK
Trust she has a naughty corner for her convicted husband to sit in tho' she will need another for Smith + one for McNulty + one for Hoon + + +
- P Doff, paris france
Another act of wasting valuable funds by this completely useless Government. If Ms. Jowell cannot keep to budgets for a mere office refurbishment, it is no wonder the Olympics' budget in such a dire mess.
- Maggi Nixon, London
What was wrong with previous office? I suppose we should be grateful that she did not order Lord Irvine style wall paper and its still £230,000 less than the kitchen we all bought Cherie Blair at 10 Downing Street....
- Thrifty, London
Like the Olympic budget it's probably only a matter of time until she confesses that again she forgot to add the VAT onto the costs!
- Ron, London
You really must improve your proof reading. As this is an office for a New Labour Monster err I mean Minister, there must be at least two zeros missing from the number.
- Warren Alexander, London, UK
Unforseen costs were overlooked? What, to the extent of £13,000? That's not careful management: tghat's bad management.
- Janet, London, UK
As if we needed yet another example of "Labour Sleaze" to confirm that this bunch of crooks need to be hounded from Government and utterly destroyed at the General Election.
- Silent Hunter, Stirling, Scotland
Oink oink!
- Nobby Clark, Perth, Scotland
The original budget estimate was £1,400 but unforeseen costs such as carpet, chair, desk etc were overlooked. However, thanks to careful management the project kept to its new budget and was delivered on time.
- David Burns, Beckenham
Surely she should be in a Portakabin on the Olympic Site?
Thank goodness she won't be Olympics minister when this farce takes place. The Olympics should always be held in Greece with the athletes completing in the nude. Save a fortune and would be less boring.
- Mordwinoff, Lisle France.
Hey, it's only tax payers' money and will spend it while I still can. Anyway, it's only a drop in the ocean comparing with the trillions already wasted.
- K Lee, Cheshunt, UK
What's wrong with IKEA?
- Paul, London
She will only be in it for another 14 months!
- Dave Davies, Basingstoke
We don't know, this may be a cheap job. She may have been able to acquire John Thain's famous $1.4K parchment waste-basket at a knock-down price.
- Bloke, London
What an extortionate amount to spend on an office for this useless woman who is guaranteed to be kicked out of it at the next election.
- R.F., Yorks, UK
14500 pounds - a drop in the ocean compared to what Coe`s gravy train will eventually cost the British taxpayer.
At least the building work keeps EU migrants employed, though.
Perhaps a manifesto pledge for a referendum on the matter would be in order, David?
- Darius Midwinter, London UK
Forget the waste of taxpayers money she is a woman and Harriet Hatemen says women should be treated better than men
- Trevn, Abu Dhabi
Is that all? Compared to Derry Irvine she is positively frugal.
- Bj, London
So we can expect another £billion or so added to this fiasco called the Olympics, Its already £billions over budget at we are still years away from the date. How many more £billions will be wasted?
This latest example is typical of Gov. who are still taking as much as they can for themselves and at our long term cost. If these games go-ahead it will take at least 50 years for UK to pay for them and this at a time where we are already £trillions in debt!!
- Mike, London England
"needed to be fully furnished" - The curtains were the wrong colour. And my fellow man hating colleague Harpy Harman will be coming around for tea.
- Frank, Home Counties, England.
It shows a complete disregard for the electorate that minister continue to spend huge amounts of money unnecessarily and then flaunt the fact we can't do anything about it. I'd struggle to spend that much money revamping my entire house!
- Marianne (Uk National And Tax-Payer), SW France
