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Welsh Secretary Cheryl Gillan and her predecessor Peter Hain are embroiled in an entertaining war of words over how much taxpayers' cash each spent on hotel bills.

Mrs Gillan has defended her use of the St David's Hotel when visiting Cardiff - and used a parliamentary answer to claim that she spent less on hotels (per night) than he did.

Mr Hain hit back, saying it was wrong for the taxpayer to have to foot the bill for Mrs Gillan's hotel bills incurred because, as an English MP, she has no home in Wales.

This is how Mrs Gillan lit the fuse. She told Mr Hain's deputy, Wayne David in response to a written question: "Since my appointment, I have been required to stay overnight in Cardiff on official business on six occasions, at an average cost of around £93 per stay. That compares favourably with the average cost to the public purse of hotel accommodation in Wales for my predecessor."

Ouch. Over to Mr Hain: "The Wales Office would book good value and convenient hotels for me when I made official visits to North Wales that required an overnight stay. The current Secretary of State is not undertaking official visits. She stays in a five star hotel every time she has to work in Cardiff because as an MP for an English constituency she has no home in Wales. The Welsh taxpayer is footing the bill for this and that is wrong."

Then Wayne David chipped in: "In answering my Parliamentary Question, I am very concerned that the Secretary of State appears to have abused her position. It looks as if she has been instructing civil servants to file through historical records in an attempt to dig dirt on one of her political opponents, which is a very serious matter indeed.

"The Secretary of State should have no special access to information held on the accommodation and security arrangements of former Ministers. To obtain such information, she should submit a Freedom of Information request in the normal way like members of the public and journalists have to do.

"I have written to the Director of the Wales Office asking how this information was obtained by Ms Gillan."

I'll bring you the director's reply as soon as I have it.

UPDATE: Here is is - "I have looked into the matter and consulted the Cabinet Office, and we are content with the way in which it was handled. The Secretary of State was granted no special access to information held on the accommodation and security arrangements of former Ministers. The answer simply made a factual comparison between expenditure incurred in this financial year with that in the previous year."

UPDATE 2: And a A spokesman for the Secretary of State for Wales said:

"It is blatantly untrue to suggest Cheryl Gillan has not undertaken any official visits since becoming Secretary of State for Wales, as the numerous organisations she has met will confirm.

"Mr Hain is also quick to forget that as a Welsh MP he served as Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, and stayed in taxpayer-funded accommodation on his visits there."

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