Civil servants in Scotland used bank cards to make tens of thousands of purchases, including spending nearly £10,000 on VIP airport services.

For a fee, former first minister Nicola Sturgeon, and her staff were given fast-track security and access to lounges at UK and European airports.

Other purchases on procurement cards included yoga classes and nail polish.

The Scottish Government issues its senior staff with credit-card style electronic purchasing cards for buying goods and services up to a value of £5,000 per transaction.

A summary of purchases over £500 is officially published, but Scottish Labour obtained a full breakdown detailing all values between September 2019 and August last year.

The BBC has seen the data which included a payment of £4,182 on September 8, 2019, for hospitality and hotel accommodation at the five-star Gleneagles Hotel in Perthshire.

Hospitality

This is listed as being for Scottish Women and Girls in Sport and came prior to the Solheim Cup women's golf tournament. A £856 payment for "hospitality with UK Sports Minister" at Gleneagles during the Solheim Cup also appeared.

The 58,000 transactions on the taxpayer-funded cards also showed purchases of Edinburgh Festival tickets.

A breakdown of the airport services paid for by the Scottish government for Ms Sturgeon and her staff highlighted transactions typically around the £500 mark.

However, one entry for February 2020 showed the government spent £1,271 at Schipol Airport in Amsterdam on VIP services which included private security and passport checks, as well as lounge access.

A total of £9,898 was spent on airport services for the former first minister, both in the UK and across Europe, between September 2019 and June last year.

More than £14million was spent on the Scottish Government procurement cards over the near three-year period.

Heel stoppers

One of the items was a set of heel stoppers - costing £24.99 - for Ms Sturgeon when she was giving a speech in Berlin in 2019 as there was concern her footwear would damage the venue's historic floor.

Scottish Labour finance spokesperson Michael Marra said: "These are the spending habits of an arrogant and entitled government with no regard for taxpayers.

"The SNP government is frittering away public money on frivolous purchases and VIP treatment while services are stretched to breaking point.

"The SNP must end the financial mismanagement that has plagued their government and start delivering for Scotland."

A Scottish Government spokesperson said it was "committed to delivering the best value for money for taxpayers".

They added: "Spending through electronic purchasing cards is used to support government officials during their usual course of work such as on training, catering, room hire and one-off supplies.

Regular auditing

"The cards are not for personal expenditure and there are robust authorisation and regular auditing arrangements are in place to monitor their use.

"For security reasons, we cannot comment on the first minister's travel arrangements."

More like this…

View all