A public spending campaign group has welcomed a reduction in foreign trips by Scottish councillors.
With local authority expenditure under continued pressure, councillors are taking fewer trips overseas funded by the public purse.
A survey of councils in Courier country confirms the trend and reveals that some elected members are even paying their own fares.
The Taxpayers’ Alliance said the figures, provided in response to freedom of information requests by The Courier, confirm the pattern of greater financial prudence.
A spokesman said: “These new figures suggest that, after councils up and down Scotland have spent too much on overseas trips, some are beginning to rein it in.
“Every single taxpayer-funded trip has to be justified to the local residents that are paying for it. If it doesn’t deliver value for taxpayers, it shouldn’t happen.”
A spokesman for the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities said: “Council trips for elected members, whether at home or overseas, are rightly and properly a matter for individual councils to consider and decide on, taking full cognisance of the cost circumstances.
“When considering any trip, councils have always kept an eye on the public purse and only taken part in them when there has been a benefit for the community or, perhaps, a twinning link or a common cause with overseas councils or other bodies, such as remembering those who have fought in wars.”
In Thursday’s Courier: see a full breakdown of what your local council spent on foreign trips.