On Tuesday a response to our Freedom of Information request exposed the £32,500 annual bill to rent a handful of trees in Parliament. The twelve Californian fig trees are in the atrium of Portcullis House, the most modern building in Westminster which acts a hub for much of the politics happening there. Taxpayers don’t own them, they’re rented from a private company and it is believed they have cost over £400,000 since the building opened in 2000.

On Tuesday we revealed new research on the cost of unnecessary staff at local councils. We identified non-frontline workers doing jobs that could be cut without putting frontline services at risk and produced a full list of how many Climate Change Officers, Political Advisors, Diversity Officers and European Officers are working at each council.