Fury as Home Office pen-pushers blow £756 of taxpayers’ cash playing board games on team building jaunt

HOME Office pen-pushers blew £756 of taxpayers’ cash playing board games on a team building jaunt.

The jolly — logged as “staff costs for team away day” — emerged when The Sun analysed credit card declarations.

The department’s Digital Data and Technology workers, based in Manchester, made the payment to the city’s Goodtime Games on November 28.

It advertises itself as a vegan/vegetarian-only board games café where customers can “let the good times roll”.

The Home Office has insisted the away day did not actually take place in the café, but that Goodtime Games ran exercises for them.

The payment had to be declared as it topped £500.

Campaigner William Yarwood, of The TaxPayers’ Alliance, said yesterday: “As the Home Office lurches from crisis to crisis, bureaucrats are bunking off.

“Instead of focusing on border control, civil servants took the day off for board games.

“These pen-pushers should focus on beefing up security without milking taxpayers for a jolly.”

A Government spokesperson insisted: “The expenditure was for professional services.”