Costs are defended

South Lanarkshire Council have paid out more than £14 million in taxi fares in the last three years.

The council have defended the costs, saying the taxi journeys are necessary to provide transport to the area’s most vulnerable people.

However, there are huge differences in the amounts paid out in different parts of the council.

South Lanarkshire has the second highest taxi bill out of all of Scotland’s council areas.

South Lanarkshire Council has spent £ 14.2m on cabs since 2012, second only to Glasgow on £15m.Edinburgh City Council have only spent £ 1.8m on taxis in the past three years.

The council hav e defended their high levels of spending.

A spokesperson said: “The costs incurred are important to help the most vulnerable people the council supports on a daily basis.

“This includes children with additional support needs, those under child protection orders, adults with learning difficulties who attend college or day care, and older people in residential accommodation who have hospital appointments.”

Eben Wilson, of Taxpayer Scotland, has hit out at the figures, saying that councils should have to provide full details of taxi fares paid to the pubilc.

Eben said: “Our councils should be made to put a full analysis, to an agreed format, of these huge amounts of money into the public domain on their websites as a legislative obligation.We pay for these taxis. It is only fair that we should know what these millions of pounds have been spent on. “