A menu is circulating on social media allegedly from the restaurant where deputies of the Assembly of the Republic have lunch. The low value is questioned and the nation’s deputies are accused of “chulisse”. Is the indignation justified? SIC Verifies.
The image shows a “restaurant menu” with prices that do not seem to correspond to today’s reality. From seafood rice for two people at just over 17 euros, a “Maitre D’Hotel” entrecôte at 8.15 euros, or even a cod cooked with everything worth 6.60 euros. Anyone who passes by the image is indignant: “Surreal”.
But there are also those who doubt the veracity of the image. There are those who claim that until “the source is presented”, you will have to “assume it is a lie” and whoever points out that, “of the two one”, ou “the photo is manipulatedSo even in AR they are incompetent”pointing to VAT being 13% and not 23%, as stated in the supposed menu.
The image is viral on social mediacirculating on Twitter, Facebook and even Instagram. However, It’s not the first time you’ve walked through feeds of social networks, accusing deputies of paying little, with taxpayers being harmed by these prices that they would have – it is claimed online – to bear. In 2023, it circulated the same “menu”, exactly the same, with the same menu and price list. However, nThis is not the current menu of the Assembly of the Republic.
Let’s see how to eat in Parliament
In the deputies’ restaurant, “the lunch offer consists of à la carte menu and meal of the day“and the price list”is proposed by the service provider” e “previously authorized by the Assembly of the Republic”, being subject to change.
In addition to these, there is also a restaurant in the New Building where there is also buffet two days a week
There are, from the outset, signs that may indicate that this menu is not real or at least not current. The 23% VAT rate where it currently applies the intermediate rate (13%) in restaurantsand, just below the image of the Legislative Assembly, the following indication: “Directorate of Administrative and Financial Services”.
To SIC, a Parliament official pointed out that the menu did not correspond to the one I had consulted, so it would, in principle, be false.
Contacted by SIC Verifica, the Parliament’s office confirmed the suspicions: the menu that has been circulating on social media It is not current and is, in fact, more than a decade old.
“A menu is not current, it corresponds to one of the annexes of the specifications of Public Tender nº 25/DAPAT/2015, and the prices mentioned correspond to base prices from 11 years ago.
If these are not the current prices, what are they?
The menu of “Letter from Restaurante Deputados” demonstrates what you eat and how much you pay in this restaurant. This “has an ‘à la carte menu'” with menus whose base prices were defined in specifications.
So, if we go to the dishes of the day that are on the restaurant’s menu, the minimum price – excluding the salad of the day, it is 8.30 euros for a vegetarian dish. The rest, meat, fish, diet or ‘Steak à Casa’ they cost 9.50 euros.
If we look at the dishes mentioned at the beginning of this text, by way of comparison, we have the cooked cod with all at 10.25 euros, o steak “Maitre D’Hotel” for 12.70 euros and the seafood rice (for two) at 19.40 euros.
Os minimum prices for fish dishes (other than dish of the day) they start at 10.25 euros. The most expensive is the monkfish rice with prawns, also to share as the seafood rice, which costs 25.70 euros. Meat ones start at 8.90 euros, this being the cheapest, and reaching 26.70 euros for the ‘Chateaubriand’ for two people, this being the most expensive meat dish.
In any of these cases, the prices are higher – and aligned (or close) to those currently practiced – than those on the menu that has been circulating on social media.
SIC verifies that it is…
A restaurant menu from the Assembly of the Republic with very low prices went viral on social mediagenerating outrage. However, the menu is not current, corresponding to one of the annexes of the specifications of Public Tender nº 25/DAPAT/2015. Os base prices are those of 11 years ago. Current prices at Parliament restaurants are higher.
