Wasteful spending “would not be repeated today” claimed the council after it was revealed to have spent £10,000 on flowers over five years.

Freedom of Information requests made by Channel 4’s Dispatches programme, which aired on Monday evening, showed Barking and Dagenham Council had run up the bill on blooms from 2007 to 2012.

But the local authority was far from the worst offender as the TV show revealed council chiefs across the country had spent a total of roughly £34million on perks and foreign trips.

A Barking and Dagenham Council spokesman said: “This is historic expenditure on hospitality, authorised by officers who left the council quite some time ago — in some cases going back four or five years.

“As a result, it is not possible to identify precisely what it relates to.

“What we can say with certainty is that such expenditure would not be repeated today. For example we now share a Chief Executive with Thurrock Council which has brought about significant savings to both authorities.”