Wining and dining ‘is good way’ to curry favour with foreign powers

Foreign Office defends forking out for expensive lunches to improve international relations

WINING and dining overseas chiefs is key to diplomacy, the Foreign Office has said, as it defended spending £4,500 of taxpayer cash on lunches.

One of its ministers praised “the appropriate use” of public funds and pointed to significant trade and security benefits amid scrutiny of the sums from Labour.

Emily Thornberry, the shadow attorney general, wrote to James Cleverly, the Foreign Secretary, last month asking why his department allocated the money to three events last year.

Ms Thornberry also asked whether any of the bills – run up on Mar 21, Jun 28 and Jul 26 – included “expenditure on alcoholic beverages”.

David Rutley, a junior minister at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development

Office (FCDO), said in response: “Hospitality has long been an important part of building relations and diplomacy.

“Expenditure was subject to normal FCDO controls and an appropriate use of public money.”

Mr Rutley revealed that the £1,800 spent during the March event at the Corinthia – a five-star hotel in Whitehall once used as Ministry of Defence offices – went towards a lunch to mark the first meeting of a committee overseeing a free trade deal between the UK and Vietnam. “It was an opportunity to build relationships with key ministers and senior officials from the Vietnamese ministry of industry and trade,” he said.

The June lunch at Stanley’s, a contemporary restaurant in Chelsea, that describes itself as “inspired by the English countryside”, cost £2,138 as ‘Hospitality is an important part of building diplomacy and is an appropriate use of public money’ part of the first “Mozambique in the UK Week”.

Around £1billion worth of progress was made on investments and exports in mining, renewables and energy, the Government said.

Trade with the East African country totalled £253million last year.

The third event, at the Waterfront Brasserie in Vauxhall, involved a high-level delegation from the Vietnamese public security ministry meeting their counterparts at the National Crime Agency.

Britain has spent the past year trying to forge closer economic and diplomatic ties with the South-east Asian nation, with whom it sees scope to address various issues including regional security.

Mr Rutley declined to answer the specific question about whether alcohol was consumed at any of the events.

Hospitality spending on high-level visitors is not uncommon and details of Foreign Office ministers’ meetings, gifts, hospitality and overseas travel are published four times a year.

Labour and the Foreign Office were contacted for comment.