No Right Turn and The Standard both have blogs today on John Key’s announcement of the “reform” of Ministerial accommodation expenses.
So I decided to crunch some numbers – based on the 1 January – 30 June 2009 Ministerial Expenses return, but adjusting for Sir Double Dipton’s agreement to pay back at least part of the money he was rorting for living in his own Wellington home.
The annual expenses for the affected Ministers’ accommodation:
Yes, Key’s “reform” will end up costing the taxpayer an additional $55488 a year – and that money will not even be spent on accommodation expenses. It will end up in Ministers’ pockets, and tax free to boot.
8 September, 2009 at 4:50 pm
Will this change of rules effect the Green Party super fund in a negative way?
8 September, 2009 at 5:22 pm
burt, this relates to Ministerial accommodation. Unfortunately, the Green Party don’t have any Ministers.
Even if it did relate to it, it would have no effect on the Green super fund which, among other investments, owns a couple of Wellington properties that Green MPs rent and get a Parliamentary Service accommodation allowance for.
Those properties are in desirable locations for central Wellington renters and would be tenanted whether or not it happens to be MPs who rent them, and the MPs who live in them would get the allowance wherever they stay in Wellington. The rents are set at market value.
So stop being mischievous burt. The Greens are trying to get transparency and accountability brought into this. Do you really think they would be doing that if their MPs or their super fund had something to hide.
8 September, 2009 at 5:42 pm
toad
The details of the Green Party Super Fund are not well understood by the general public and as this change of rules relates to parliamentary services payments being made to ministers rather than ‘landlords’ I think it is natural to question the implications.
(I acknowledge that there are not any current Green Party Ministers and therefore implications may not be immediate)
I also appreciate that the Green Party have done much to encourage disclosure of parliamentary spending, but that’s not making me automatically convinced that all is pure and clean re: accommodation allowances.
Cheers for the response.
9 September, 2009 at 8:26 am
Burt: this change of rules relates to parliamentary services payments being made to ministers rather than ‘landlords’
I suggest you learn the difference between Parliamentary Services and Ministerial Services. Otherwise, you just come off as clueless.
9 September, 2009 at 3:18 pm
Under the new rules, anyone who doesn’t live in Wellington is essentially entitled to free money. And even some who do live in Wellington but claim it as a technicality.
Even if you accepted the super fund as problematic, you’d have to admit that the “reform” for minister’s accomodation is a lot worse, and perpetuates the idea that politicians are entitled to handouts just because they’re not paid as obscenely as the private sector.
9 September, 2009 at 3:21 pm
Err, “anyone” should probably read “any government minister” for clarity. Hah.