Tory runs up £4,000 taxi bill in nine months

The deputy chairman of the London Assembly has been heavily criticised after running up a taxi bill of more than £4,000 in nine months.

Brian Coleman claimed back an account of £4,157.85 despite also having a travelcard costing £1,720. The total amount the Conservative councillor claimed was £6,278.40, nearly as much as the Mayor. It also accounted for a large proportion of the total taxi bill of just over £8,000.

The criticisms were made at a meeting of the GLA's audit panel. Chairman of the committee Peter Hulme Cross, who claimed back only £36.25 from April to December last year, said: "It doesn't stand up. I wonder how you clock up that sum in London. His bill is nearly that of the Mayor."

No one from London Conservatives was prepared to comment and Mr Coleman said: "I'm not going to get into all that nonsense." Deputy Mayor Nicky Gavron narrowly escaped a grilling from the panel after she submitted her foreign travel expenses of £2,422 only hours before the meeting yesterday afternoon.

She is no stranger to embarrassment over expenses after she was referred to the Standards Board in November for failing to declare free dinners.