YORK’S council chiefs have come under renewed fire for spending thousand of pounds of taxpayers’ money on flights for the city’s Lord Mayor.

As reported in The Press on Wednesday, City of York Council spent £5,700 on business class flights from China to Manchester for Coun John Galvin and an aide, after he was affected by the recent volcanic ash cloud chaos.

Matthew Elliott, chief executive of the TaxPayers’ Alliance, said yesterday: “It’s strange that City of York Council decided to fork out £6,000 to fly the Lord Mayor back from Beijing, as his role is a purely ceremonial one.

Putting him up in a reasonably-priced hotel and waiting for the next available flight home might have saved taxpayers some money.”