NEWS: Met Police spent £216k phoning directory enquiries & £35k on speaking clock

It's absolutely shocking but, following a Freedom of Information request, it has been revealed that the Met Police spent £35,000 telephoning the speaking clock in the past two years. Do they not have watches? Or clocks? Or mobile phones? Or computers?

Additionally, in the same time, the Met Police spent £216,000 phoning directory enquiries!

At £216k it would have been cheaper to employ a team of people to internally look up numbers for them - or get them to use online directory services like most sane people do!

I wonder if all police forces around the country have similar extravagant telephone use and what other premium services they have been using.

With this information in mind, there can be no excuses for some drastic cuts being made to police budgets.... and some senior heads must roll.

COMMENT: Waste in the NHS

A couple of weeks ago my eldest was referred by GP for some treatment at Chesterfield Hospital.

The referral was done online at the surgery. We were able to choose from a list of times and were then given a printout confirming the appointment.

I thought this was very efficient.

However...

Today we had a letter confirming the already confirmed appointment!

It may only be a small amount of money (paper, envelope, stamp and, of course, someone's time to write and send it) but I imagine it cost the NHS a few pounds. If they do this for every appointment the waste will add up very quickly.

And what about the environmental impact on such unnecessary letters?

When people say that there should be no cuts in the NHS they are talking nonsense. This is an example of waste that must be cut immediately.