04-10-2018, 02:44 PM
Pollywaffle ATP trough gorging continues - 
Via the Oz:
Rent-a-plane MPs keep expenses bill flying
![[Image: 36c1316a2b8ab47b2c7e03618525102f?width=650]](https://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/36c1316a2b8ab47b2c7e03618525102f?width=650)
Eden-Monaro MP Mike Kelly. Picture: Gary Ramage
The Australian12:00AM April 10, 2018
MARK SCHLIEBS
ReporterBrisbane
@mark_schliebs
The revamped parliamentary expenses regime has failed to cut the total cost to taxpayers since the controversies over Sussan Ley’s interstate travel and Bronwyn Bishop’s “Choppergate”, with some MPs still racking up huge claims for charter flights over small distances.
Among the shorter charter flights claimed were three taken during the current financial year by Queanbeyan-based Labor MP Mike Kelly to fly the 80km between Canberra and Tumut.
Each of those charters cost taxpayers between $2000 and $3000. The trip between Canberra and Tumut is less than 2½ hours by car.
Liberal senator Eric Abetz also claimed a $4090.91 charter between Hobart and Burnie last July, and Labor senator Anthony Chisholm chartered a $4202 flight between Hervey Bay and Brisbane on the same day he campaigned with Annastacia Palaszczuk during the Queensland election campaign in November. All three defended the claims, stating they were in accordance with the rules.
The new expenses regime was announced by Malcolm Turnbull in January last year, on the day Ms Ley resigned as health minister following controversy over her travel to the Gold Coast, where she had purchased an investment property.
![[Image: edcf64c0ef531c6ea41290a1ca2547f0?width=650]](https://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/edcf64c0ef531c6ea41290a1ca2547f0?width=650)
At the time, the Prime Minister said the new Independent Parliamentary Expenses Authority would focus on compliance, reporting and transparency — but he did not mention any expected reduction in the amount of expenses claimed.
It is understood the government did not expect any dramatic changes to the amounts claimed by MPs and senators when it established the IPEA.
The total amount claimed by serving politicians in the last half of 2017 totalled $77.5 million, including costs incurred by their employees — which was counted as a separate category of expenses only from last year.
Without staff costs, the total amount claimed was $55.1m — less than 1 per cent below the $55.7m reported in the second half of 2015.
A similar amount — $52.8m — was reported in 2014, although expenses fell to $50.6m in the corresponding period in 2016.
Last week, five Labor parliamentarians — Mr Kelly, Michael Danby, Tim Hammond, Peter Khalil and senator Kimberley Kitching — were named as using taxpayer-funded allowances to pay $909 to $2000 each for a magazine from an ALP think tank that is available online for free.
![[Image: a23f962a3c634e8ea5abec442ebf58e3?width=650]](https://cdn.newsapi.com.au/image/v1/a23f962a3c634e8ea5abec442ebf58e3?width=650)
But the expense claims of Mr Kelly, whose electorate of Eden-Monaro takes in Tumut, also show him chartering a “small prop plane” to the town last August, September and December.
The first, which cost $3072.73, occurred on the same day he and Labor health spokeswoman Catherine King held a community meeting with his constituents.
Three weeks later, he again flew to Tumut, for $2195.45, and held a “mobile office” session at an RSL in nearby Batlow.
According to posts on his social media profiles, he attended a primary school end-of-year ceremony in Tumut on the day he claimed a third charter flight, at a cost of $2310.
Mr Kelly said he believed the expenses passed the so-called “sniff test” and the passengers were “MPs and their staff”.
“A return trip from Queanbeyan to Tumut is a five-hour round trip by car,” Mr Kelly said. “Regional electorates like mine are entitled to use a small number of charter flights per year because they cover such a large distance. Eden-Monaro is larger than 66 nations in the world.”
On the day Senator Chisholm claimed his $4200 charter flight, he and Bill Shorten were on the campaign trail with the Premier in Queensland.
“Senator Chisholm had a flight from Brisbane to Canberra that evening and commercial flight times meant it wouldn’t have been possible to make the connecting flight,” a spokesman said.
A spokesman for Senator Abetz said there were “community and parliamentary commitments” in both Burnie and Hobart on the same day he chartered the flight across Tasmania.
P2 - I guess I shouldn't have a problem with MPs chartering aircraft, after all they are by default supporting an ailing GA industry. However the overwhelming evidence is that the unelected bureaucrats, QANGOs & GBEs are running the country so why not cut our losses and get rid of the trough feeding pollywaffles all together, as they are superfluous in Australia's Bureaucratocracy?
MTF...P2
Via the Oz:
Rent-a-plane MPs keep expenses bill flying
Eden-Monaro MP Mike Kelly. Picture: Gary Ramage
The Australian12:00AM April 10, 2018
MARK SCHLIEBS
ReporterBrisbane
@mark_schliebs
The revamped parliamentary expenses regime has failed to cut the total cost to taxpayers since the controversies over Sussan Ley’s interstate travel and Bronwyn Bishop’s “Choppergate”, with some MPs still racking up huge claims for charter flights over small distances.
Among the shorter charter flights claimed were three taken during the current financial year by Queanbeyan-based Labor MP Mike Kelly to fly the 80km between Canberra and Tumut.
Each of those charters cost taxpayers between $2000 and $3000. The trip between Canberra and Tumut is less than 2½ hours by car.
Liberal senator Eric Abetz also claimed a $4090.91 charter between Hobart and Burnie last July, and Labor senator Anthony Chisholm chartered a $4202 flight between Hervey Bay and Brisbane on the same day he campaigned with Annastacia Palaszczuk during the Queensland election campaign in November. All three defended the claims, stating they were in accordance with the rules.
The new expenses regime was announced by Malcolm Turnbull in January last year, on the day Ms Ley resigned as health minister following controversy over her travel to the Gold Coast, where she had purchased an investment property.
At the time, the Prime Minister said the new Independent Parliamentary Expenses Authority would focus on compliance, reporting and transparency — but he did not mention any expected reduction in the amount of expenses claimed.
It is understood the government did not expect any dramatic changes to the amounts claimed by MPs and senators when it established the IPEA.
The total amount claimed by serving politicians in the last half of 2017 totalled $77.5 million, including costs incurred by their employees — which was counted as a separate category of expenses only from last year.
Without staff costs, the total amount claimed was $55.1m — less than 1 per cent below the $55.7m reported in the second half of 2015.
A similar amount — $52.8m — was reported in 2014, although expenses fell to $50.6m in the corresponding period in 2016.
Last week, five Labor parliamentarians — Mr Kelly, Michael Danby, Tim Hammond, Peter Khalil and senator Kimberley Kitching — were named as using taxpayer-funded allowances to pay $909 to $2000 each for a magazine from an ALP think tank that is available online for free.
But the expense claims of Mr Kelly, whose electorate of Eden-Monaro takes in Tumut, also show him chartering a “small prop plane” to the town last August, September and December.
The first, which cost $3072.73, occurred on the same day he and Labor health spokeswoman Catherine King held a community meeting with his constituents.
Three weeks later, he again flew to Tumut, for $2195.45, and held a “mobile office” session at an RSL in nearby Batlow.
According to posts on his social media profiles, he attended a primary school end-of-year ceremony in Tumut on the day he claimed a third charter flight, at a cost of $2310.
Mr Kelly said he believed the expenses passed the so-called “sniff test” and the passengers were “MPs and their staff”.
“A return trip from Queanbeyan to Tumut is a five-hour round trip by car,” Mr Kelly said. “Regional electorates like mine are entitled to use a small number of charter flights per year because they cover such a large distance. Eden-Monaro is larger than 66 nations in the world.”
On the day Senator Chisholm claimed his $4200 charter flight, he and Bill Shorten were on the campaign trail with the Premier in Queensland.
“Senator Chisholm had a flight from Brisbane to Canberra that evening and commercial flight times meant it wouldn’t have been possible to make the connecting flight,” a spokesman said.
A spokesman for Senator Abetz said there were “community and parliamentary commitments” in both Burnie and Hobart on the same day he chartered the flight across Tasmania.
P2 - I guess I shouldn't have a problem with MPs chartering aircraft, after all they are by default supporting an ailing GA industry. However the overwhelming evidence is that the unelected bureaucrats, QANGOs & GBEs are running the country so why not cut our losses and get rid of the trough feeding pollywaffles all together, as they are superfluous in Australia's Bureaucratocracy?
MTF...P2