Asylum seekers run up £2,500 taxi bill... even though the bus fare costs £1.80 - 24th Apr 2011

Asylum seekers are being ferried to and from court hearings by a private taxi company costing the taxpayer thousands of pounds - even though the local bus does the trip for £1.80.

Each five-mile trip from the train station to the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal Centre in Newport, Gwent costs £8.70 in a cab.

Around £2,500 a month is being spent to bring migrants to Columbus House - where applications to become British citizens are heard. It is paid by the Tribunals Service to a private taxi company.

Campaign groups have criticised yet another wasteful Government scheme.

Matthew Sinclair, from The Taxpayers' Alliance, said: 'Across the public sector, costs need to be properly kept under control and the taxpayer's money spent on front line services and not on more convenient journeys for asylum seekers to tribunals.

'If there are more are more affordable options other than taxis, they should be used wherever possible as one more way of minimising the burden on hard-pressed families.'

A spokesman for the Tribunals Service told The Sun: 'The service is provided for appellants as part of the conditions imposed by the local authority when planning permission was granted for the centre.'

She added that they do not pay for train fares. Source