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Boris Johnson's anger at aide's City Hall credit card spree
Andrew Gilligan and Katharine Barney17.06.09
Boris Johnson was furious today as it was revealed that one of his deputies used a City Hall credit card to upgrade flights and pay for meals and groceries.
Ian Clement bought business class travel for himself and a colleague on a British Airways flight to the Beijing Olympics weeks after the Mayor said he was going to fly economy to the Games.
Mr Clement also used the card to pay for lunches and dinners with fellow Conservatives and a £700 meal in New York.
The deputy mayor for “government and external relations”, had the card confiscated earlier this month.
He broke City Hall rules by using it for “private expenditure” totalling £2,300, including more than £200 on groceries at Tesco and a £535.49 audio system for his Jaguar, which he then repaid. He told City Hall officials it was the only card he had at the time.
The £127,000-a-year deputy mayor was summoned to crisis talks with Mr Johnson today as a senior City Hall source said his position was “very shaky”.
Mr Johnson, questioned on the spending at his monthly Question Time, told the London Assembly he was not firing Mr Clement, but would not be drawn on whether he should quit.
“I felt a deep sense of fury when we discovered what had happened,” he said.
“I think it is wholly appropriate that he should make himself available in what form you [the assembly] should choose and submit himself to your interrogation.
“I had to make a very difficult decision and see if there was any evidence of real dishonesty, and I don't think there is.
“It is a very big thing to fire someone for behaviour which is inappropriate and crass.”
Mr Clement faces pressure to resign after full details of his spending were revealed. He is set to be summoned by the Greater London Authority's audit committee to explain himself.
The Mayor was particularly angry at Mr Clement buying upgrades for the Beijing trip last July for himself and Dominic Hurley.
Mr Johnson had ordered big cuts in spending on the Olympics trip from the amount his predecessor Ken Livingstone had been planning to spend and flew economy himself.
Mr Clement refused to comment directly on the matter but a spokeswoman said: “Ian is very sorry and feels hugely embarrassed about the trouble caused for the Mayor.”
He was the only member of the mayoral team to be issued with a corporate credit card.
Details of his spending published today show he put more than £2,300 in personal spending on his GLA card between October last year and this May.
In that time he used it for 26 personal transactions including 13 restaurant meals, a £130 hotel stay and a £58.50 bar bill.
At one point last month, Mr Clement was using the card for personal expenditure every few days, including eating out at Pont de la Tour twice, spending £105 and £125 at Butler's Wharf Chop House and Acorn House, as well as a £60 meal at Curry Mahal in Sidcup, near his home, and £45.20 at his local Pizza Express.
Mr Clement repaid the spending as soon as the card statements were received. He made no personal gain from the transactions.
However, his actions broke City Hall rules which state that corporate cards “should only be used in exceptional circumstances” and “must only be used for GLA expenditure” with “no private use”.
His business spending also reveals a series of meals with Tory colleagues.
The most expensive meal was a £704.44 “formal dinner” at the Gotham Bar and Grill in Manhattan's East Village.
At the Michelin-starred restaurant he hosted Robert Lieber, New York's deputy mayor for economic development.
Among the guests was Merrick Cockell, who is leader of
Kensington and Chelsea and the chairman of London Boroughs.
They drank an Oregon pinot noir wine at $105 a bottle and a $75 bottle of French white.
The meal was during a four-day trip to New York which saw Mr Clement stay in the Bryant Park Hotel in midtown Manhattan, which advertises itself as “a nexus for young Hollywood, fashion culturati and cosmopolitans”.
He spent £1,540.84, which included a series of claims for breakfast, one of which cost £41.12.
It was one of five claims he submitted for entertaining Mr Cockell, a prominent Conservative.
Mr Clement was leader of Bexley Council until he became deputy mayor. His expenses show he entertained the director of regeneration at the council with a lunch costing £61, and took five Bexley Tory councillors for lunch over the past year.
He also entertained Ed Lister, who was the head of a scrutiny panel set up to investigate excessive spending at the London Development Agency.
Reader views (54)
Val Daniels is treading a very foolish and disingenuous path in trying to pin the label of sleaze on Conservatives. Would she like a list of all those Labour politicians, both local and national, who have been guilty of sleaze, or much worse, since, for example, 1964? She should grow up and recognise there are people in all parties who have failed to uphold the standards to which we would expect them to adhere.
Ian Clement was a complete idiot and deserved the fate that has now befallen him but the torrent of invective Val Daniels has unleashed on all Conservatives says far more about her than Ian Clement.
- Philip Read, Erith, Kent
#Jo, Bell Green
Firstly, Boris has actually said he was on the same flight as Mr Clement. Are you seriously suggesting Boris was in Economy and Mr Clement passed him on his way to Business Class. Secondly, we pay taxes in the UK on our retirement income and on the property we own. We also pay taxes in Spain on the property we own here. Don't let that green-eyed monster destroy you, will you. The drivel you write about Ken Livingston is risible. Despite all the innuendo and smears about him and about Mr Jarvis, despite a thorough Police investigation, no charges were ever brought and it was all found to be smoke and mirrors dreamed up by the opposition. I was born in Paddington Hospital and raised in London during the second world war, until I was old enough to be evacuated; my father had a business in Edgware Road. I also remember the 18 miserable years under the Conservatives until 1997 when a Labour government was returned, and won three consecutive terms because the Tories weren't fit to govern, despite changing their leader 5 times. They are still not fit to govern; nothing has changed in the Conservative party. They will not win the election in 2010, you heard it here first.
- Val Daniels, Mijas Costa, Spain
Boris didn't get an upgrade when he flew to Beijing - he booked an economy ticket with the assumption that they'd give him a free upgrade because of who he is, but they didn't.
- Helen, West London
For Val, you need to look at both sides the same way. You see the moral mask of Brown, Balls and their like was ripped off when McBride was exposed. Now many ministers have resigned, as they refuse to work with Brown and his cronies. They were seen as immoral, aiming lies and smears to destroy opponent and their families. Ken got his first step into London power by stabbing his leader after they were elected. In his last years in power he was deeply implicated funding people and companies that did not exist. Boris got a 'free' upgrade, and of course you find that upsetting, as he really was on an economy ticket. It shows up Ken and Labour with their phantom mortgages. Boris is putting this freeloader Clement up for accountability, so of course you are upset, as Labour are never accountable. Always share the blame, and cling to power. Why not live here, or would that mean some UK tax?
- Jo, bell green uk
The Mayor was particularly angry at Mr Clement buying upgrades for the Beijing trip last July for himself and Dominic Hurley.
Note the above , buying , not a free upgrade !!!
- Alan Baker, essex .uk
Exactly - empty promises. Analyse all his poromises. How many replacement buses are in the pipeline? Remember that promise about conductors on buses? How many have we seen? Zero. If it costs nothing and he gets a bit of publicity, we get it. Soon motorbikes will be allowed to ride in buslanes. What will he say when accidents increase?
Incidentally, Ian Clement's claims are trivial. Just consider the scale of Brian Coleman, Deputy Mayor and chair of Fire Service. He has a free travel card and his taxi fare runs in to £1000, known to be £500 a day - how can you have time for £500 taxi travel per day?
- Ray, London
#Claire
That is exactly my point. He could afford the empty gesture of saying he was doing things differently, and saving London taxpayers money, by travelling economy. It was an empty gesture because he knew he would get an upgrade. I know upgrades are free, I have been offered, and accepted, several myself. OK?
- Val Daniels, Mijas Costa, Spain
The real problem with Mayor Johnson is that he was elected on a raft of empty promises. 'I will preserve open space'. But what was almost the first thing he did? He and Mr Mister Upgrade gave their blessing to the sale of the Holland Park School playing fields. Why? So that their Kensington Tory friends could have their trophy project. Now Mister Upgrade spends tax payers' money in entertaining the Leader of the Kensington and Chelsea Council. Time for a change, a real change.
- Richard, London
Jonnie Of Brixton will you be my solicitor if I commit benefit fraud? I'm sure the judge would accept your sharp minded legal arguement of "it's an error"
Maybe knoxy needs your help too!
- Derek, Temple
Unusually for me, I don't actually have a problem that Boris was able to blag a free upgrade from BA.
I'm even bored with his grand but empty promises and his pretend "anger" attacks.
My gripe is that Boris is a useless waste of space and is a disaster for London.
- Fresh, London
Never, ever, trust a Tory.
- Roger Westons, Fulham, London
Note to VAL... this is your comment:
"Sure Boris paid for Economy flights, but it is common knowledge BA gave him an upgrade" yes BA GAVE HIM AN UPGRADE - ergo it was FREE!
- Claire, London
milking the systen is a pandemic and as contagious;
from police, through politicians to the poorest.
if one can get something for nothing through fancy footwork one will go for it.
- M.O'Brien, london.uk
Repeat after me...'it's an error'..
- Jonnie Of Brixton, brixton,london,england
Why is there never any mention of the mortgage claims that Boris made in his last year as an MP. He's as dirty as the rest of them.
- Paul Rutland, Rochford/Essex
These people do things which the rest of us would be sacked for, don't worry chum your off the hook,just don't get caught next time.
- David., Chertsey.UK.
Errrrm...this from a guy who as the MP for Henley claimed the maximum expenses???
Is this guy for real or just bumbling through everything?
I suppose he feels he has to say he protests because he knew it would cause such a storm.
Now every time I hear some MP who I know has rorted (ie fleeced) the system with the sad feeling that many Tory and Labour MPs are pure hypocrites.
(Thanks of course go to Maggie Thatcher for introducing it of course as a way around giving MPs a pay rise...Now I think I knwo why she bought that house in of all places in Dulwich in 1985, the year after she secretly introduced the 'expenses rip off'!)
- Nick, St James SW1
If he used the card and paid it off on the payment dates at no expense to the public, then whats the problem? Ok a little silly 'only to have one' credit card, but I can understand the thinking. This to me is completely different from MP's expenses. Are we all so filled with angst that its off with everybodies head?
- Bondy, London
How many advisers got? And how come they are such a motley crew? Has no judgement?
- Steve S, London
Mr Clement repaid the small sums at Tesco's, but didn't repay the excessive dining expenses for entertaining fellow Tories or Americans. It sounds a bit like paying back the costs of trimming the wisteria while claiming the mortgage for a Country Mansion.
- B Madeoff, Queens Park England
Boris for Mayor!
- Haskey, London SE1
#St London
Do you know I sometimes wonder if you are a grown up, or a child just home from school. As I am a UK homeowner and am domiciled for tax purposes in the UK, I have every right to comment on what is happening. I have not been disenfranchised, indeed I have just returned from casting my vote in the EU elections. For your further information, my family home was in St Johns Wood, and I was born in St Mary's Hospital Paddington. Funny, but I never read any comments from you about the domicile of Marianne, France. Could that be because, although living in France, she shares your political persuasion. But then, if it's good enough for Lord Ashcroft, it's good enough for everyone else, isn't it? As for Ken Livingston, I was simply saying that what you saw was what you got. You could hardly say that now, could you. As I said, smoke and mirrors.
- Val Daniels, Mijas Costa, Spain
If Ian Clements has paid no attention to the guidelines for use of our corporate credit card, how can Londoners trust him to read details of any documents he may be responsible for in his deputy mayoral role?
After Boris' outrage at his Tory colleagues' expenses as revealed in the Telegraph since early May the consistent reponse must surely be to dismiss Ian Clement - not just take his card away because he can't be trusted!
- Celia Blair, Wandsworth London
To the numpties who clearly have trouble understanding the words 'Free upgrade' ie Mijas Val and Robert Turner.
Boris did not pay any money for an upgrade it was free. It cost us nothing. Fantastic value for the taxpayer.
Viva Boris!
- Ethan, UK
Val, I can't understand why you are so angry that Boris got a free upgrade? Given that we (not you, I mean we the London-domiciled tax payers) didn't pay for the business class fare, surely we should be happy that our Mayor got to travel in comfort? Surely that would be the position of any rational human being? Or is it that you want him to physically suffer because he beat Livingstone?
- St, London
Mr Clements says in defence of hos creditcatd spree on the hard working people of Londo that is was the "only card he had on him at the time." Well Boris make sure that Mr Clements this will be "his only job for a time" and is forced to Join the queue at Tesco's for a shelf stackers job. Somehow the message is not getting through to these people. Most people get the message the first day they join a commercial. If you want to be a fiddler join an orchestra.
- Albert Hall, hove england
Mr Clements says in defence of hos creditcatd spree on the hard working people of Londo that is was the "only card he had on him at the time." Well Boris make sure that Mr Clements this will be "his only job for a time" and is forced to Join the queue at Tesco's for a shelf stackers job. Somehow the message is not getting through to these people. Most people get the message the first day they join a commercial. If you want to be a fiddler join an orchestra.
- Albert Hall, hove england
Come clean Boris - you got a free upgrade on the Beijing - London flight.
- Robert Turner, Corsham UK
I wrote before the following statement:
Opportunity helps the prepared mind.
How much money was lost before the scandal broke?
- David Nigel Braham, Milan Italy
#E Egbert
Cast your mind back, why don't you. Sure Boris paid for Economy flights, but it is common knowledge BA gave him an upgrade. Much was made of it at the time. He would have known an upgrade from Economy to Business was a given. He made much of the previous administration travelling business class on journies of more than 8 hours, and how he was going to be different. At least Ken Livingston didn't say one thing and then do another. It's all flummery from Boris, and smoke and mirrors. I, too, wonder who paid for the Conservative Council Leaders' flights; if it wasn't City Hall, it must have been the K&C and Wandsworth Council Tax Payers. It wouldn't be so bad if we didn't have this holier than thou rubbish constantly rammed down our throats.
- Val Daniels, Mijas Costa, Spain
Bob from cheam,
why don't you read the article again before decrying fraud?
clearly and inarguably there is no fraud or net loss here at all.
- Scott, London
so he paid the expenses back when the statement came in.
not ideal, but hardly a big thing either.
he used the card, and made the payment - its not exactly cleaning out the moat or buying a duck island is it????
- Scott, London
Why is he still employed!!!
- Shallotman, Basildon
Nowadays it's seems like everybody is helping himself in milking the tax-payers money, who's next?
- Aissa Fodil, LONDON, ENGLAND
Just typical of this naff chappie !
Get rid of him and get someone in from either K& C or Westminster
- Hungry Tory K & C, Chelsea
Boris,Boris,Boris...as the Headmaster would say there is room for Improvement..Weed out these people whom " are on the make" before they take more of the Cake and leave us Taxpayers with nothing but Crumbs...
- Justice, London
I see that Councillor Merrick Cockell was entertained by Mr Upgrade at a modest dinner in New York. Cost only £704.44, what a bargain.
Councillor Cockell seems to enjoy New York. But the intersting question is who paid Mr Cockell's expenses for the trip to New York this time? Was it the council tax payers of Kensington and Chelsea or perhaps even the GLA?
- Richard, London, England
Hang on. He and Boris were on the same flight to Peking and Mr Clements claimed an upgrade. Surely Boris must have noticed this at the time and presumably kept quiet. If Boris were as keen as he pretends to be on respect for Tax-payers money he would have got angry in Peking or on his return and sacked the Tory sleaze bag then. Like David Cameron he only gets angry when misdemeanours are exposed.
- E Egbert, Hampton Wick England
Three cheers for Boris. This is a side to him that I like and hope he keeps it up. How can a meal cost £700 no matter where it is taken.
T H Leeds
- Thomas Hayes, Leeds UK
Under Ken Livingstone's regime we did not get a chance to see this kind of stuff. Good for Boris for making City Hall more transparent.
- Dan, Hammersmith
I'm sure that Boris promised to put every item of expense spending on the web-site so we could see what he was up to. It sounded good at the time but doesn't seem to have applied to this Good-time Tory at our expense. Can we all get invited to one of his lunch parties?
- E Thrip, Harlesden England
Another rich Tory free loader. No doubt he espouses capital punishment for those claiming unemployment and housing benefit!
- Darren, london
Noticed "Train ticket to Awayday" anyone know which county Awayday is in?
Another month and yet another Boris aide in trouble well what do you expect His a Tory so same old story.
I suppose Boris is still miffed that BA failed to give him free upgrade to Olympics!!
No mention of any meetings with Bob Crowe even though one was at the Labour Conference!
A case of Champers and Cavier rang the till of Mr Clements you owe me £5000 said the restaurant in St Martins.
- Melvyn Windebank, Canvey Island, Essex
I would have thought being in charge of External Relations he would know a thing or two about negative PR.
- Matt, London
Well they did say that Boris running the GLC would give us a taste of what a Cameron Government would be like. So it is no surprise that austerity is for those defined as 'Not one of Us', while we continue with our snouts in the trough. Mind you Dave and Boris both do brilliant simulated Anger.
- Ttaylor, Hammersmith England
Boris is just like David Cameron, surrounded by sleazy Tories who spend Tax-Payers money like water while promising to cut waste. Who could vote this Party in to sort out the Expenses Scandal?
- T Tugger, Andover England
I'm not sure how the GLA will continue to function if Clement is given the boot. The work he does is so important, as his expenses details on the GLA web site today show. All those lunches with Conservative politicians from around London (but never other parties' politicians - 'External Relations' uses quite a narrow definition of 'external'). If he leaves, the whole GLA will collapse. He's well worth every penny of his £120k salary, plus expenses... (etc. until sarcasm wears thin.)
- Paul, London
Clement should not be fired for using his card for personal transactions and then repaying the money. But he should be fired for being completely out of touch with what Boris is trying to achieve at City Hall.
Get rid of him Boris, he is clearly not with you.
- St, London
Goes to show that Boris is, as ever, good at the PR but bad at the detail - if you seek good publicity for banning flight upgrades it's surely a good idea to actually check that they've actually been banned, not wait for the press to catch up with you a year later?
Mr. Clement's actual role is to act as the voice of London's Tory councils with Boris, as can be seen from his choice of lunch partners. Nice to see what kind of person they picked, really. He's also got a past back in Bexley that merits examination.
- Tom, London, UK
I would say that was the only card he needed. WOW !
- A.Txpayer, London
Tut Tut Ian , So the rains pour down on you.
What one could call InClement weatherwould you say?
Like a lot of our represenatives You're a Shower,
- Seguh Syrme, Brisbane Australia
"Mr Clement now faces pressure to resign"
No, Mr Clement should be sacked for gross misconduct and should also be investigated for fraud.
- Bob, Cheam
At my IB, if you use your Corporate Card to pay for anything that is 'private', then it is a serious disclipinary offense which could and does result in one being escorted out of the building.
"That's the only card I had .." is not a valid excuse.
- Sarit, Hong Kong
So, Boris Johnson gets half a million a year from his newspaper column and mayor salary. On top of this Boris managed to claim almost one HUNDRED THOUSAND pounds in expenses from us taxpayers, including trying to claim sixteen pounds for a Remembrance Day wreath. In light of that I can't see how Boris can possibly be angry about anything, his staff are just copying his example!
- Ben Potter, London
