The Home Office spent £340,000 during the London Olympics on hotel rooms that were never used, it can be revealed today.

Chris Leslie, shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, demanded an explanation as to why 3,455 rooms costing up to £139 a night were block booked for the 2012 Games but then left empty.

He discovered, through a Freedom of Information request, that 862 rooms at the Holiday Inn Express at Gatwick were reserved but not used, at a cost of £68,960.

Reported by the Evening Standard. You can read the full story here. 

Matthew Burgess
http://www.mattburgess.co
I am a journalist and author. I am a journalist at the UK edition of WIRED magazine. In 2015, my first book Freedom of Information: A Practical Guide for UK Journalists, was published. My second book Reed Hastings: Building Netflix, was published in March 2020. I created FOI Directory in 2012 and have maintained it in my spare time ever since.