Council tax is set to soar by 14.5 per cent in April and cuts totalling £6 million are being prepared.

But Brighton and Hove City Council is still spending money on foreign travel as if there was no tomorrow.

No one is saying an authority which receives visitors to its conventions from all over the world never needs to send an officer or councillor abroad.

But the £27,624 spent in eight months on 29 foreign trips seems excessive and Coun Mark Barnard is right to ask searching questions about them.

It could well have been justified to send an officer to a conference and travel show in Geneva, Switzerland, but the cost of more than £3,000 is enormous.

Easyjet runs flights to Geneva for as little as £50 return, including taxes, but the council was not looking for economy with this trip.

Was it really necessary for another officer to attend a convention get-together in the United States? And what was the justification for spending a four-figure sum on sending two councillors to the World Mayors for Peace conference in Japan?

All foreign trips used to have to be approved by councillors in public. It should happen again.

This is the same council we reveal today employed a woman at the time as prosecuting her for conspiring to defraud the public.

People paying more for less from next April won't be pleased to hear they are helping to fund waste and incompetence.