You’d think politicians would have learned from the Travel Rorts scandal of 1999. Careers destroyed on both sides of the political aisle, even attempted suicides. All that was, after all, well within the living memory of most MPs, even Anika Wells, who was 21 at the time.
Or did they just think that 25 years was long ago enough that no one would notice them going face-deep in the trough again.
Revelations that Wells billed $34,000 on a return flight to New York for just herself, and thousands of dollars a day in meals, were bad enough. That she had also splurged on Business Class flights for her husband to fly to three consecutive AFL Grand Finals, as well as taking her husband to F1 Grand Prix races and cricket matches and flying her whole family to Thredbo for a skiing holiday only further infuriated the taxpayers who funded it all.
It’s just got worse.
Sport Minister Anika Wells charged taxpayers almost $1000 to have a government-funded Comcar wait seven hours for her while she attended the Australian Open tennis final in January 2023, in the latest example of the embattled cabinet minister’s use of travel entitlements.
What the taxpayer wasn’t paying for, Wells was scarfing up for free, like an American fighting for a discounted TV at a Black Friday sale. Wells hurriedly updated her register of interests this week, and what a list it is: free tickets to 11 events this year, including the Logies, AFL, NRL and NRLW grand finals and an Oasis concert last month. Nine of the declarations were made outside the 28-day deadline for disclosing gifts.
Wells also bilked the taxpayer $1600 to fly to Melbourne to attend a birthday party for Labor MP Peta Murphy, who died weeks later from cancer, which is all well and good, but why didn’t she pay her own way, like three of her Labor colleagues did?
Wells isn’t the only Labor piggy rolling in the slops.
Tourism Minister Don Farrell has logged more than 200 publicly funded family reunion flights, including trips to two AFL deciders, three Australian Opens, and a sunset dinner at Uluru […]
Senator Farrell – the 71-year-old minister and Labor powerbroker – on Monday evening defended more than $123,000 in family travel claims over almost four years, arguing the system he regularly uses allows single parents, young mothers and carers to more easily serve in parliament.
Because, on a minimum $200,000 salary, these parliamentary paupers can’t afford babysitters or nannies.
But is even a minister allowed to claim 266 flights for their family?
Family reunion entitlements permit federal MPs and senators to claim as many as three return business class flights per year for members of their family, on the proviso that the travel is between the MP’s electorate or home state and a destination other than Canberra. Travel to and from Canberra is capped at a value of nine business class fares for spouses and three economy flights per dependent child.
So, how does that possibly justify the following claims:
Senator Farrell is among parliament’s biggest spenders on family travel entitlements, charging taxpayers $123,543.41 to ferry his relatives across the country since 2022.
Among the travel the South Australian factional powerbroker has claimed are airfares for family members to fly from Adelaide to Melbourne for the Australian Open in 2023, 2024 and 2025, and the 2023 and 2024 AFL grand finals.
Senator Farrell also flew a family member from Sydney to Uluru to enjoy a Wintjiri Wiru Sunset dinner, courtesy of Voyages, an Indigenous tourism operator. Billed as a “cultural experience like no other,” premium cocktails, Penfolds wine and “gourmet dinner hamper served picnic-style in a luxurious degustation hamper” are included in the package, according to Voyages’ website.
Farrell tries to defend the indefensible by standing on unconvincing moralising.
“Our parliament would be a lesser place if it weren’t for the mechanisms that allow young mothers, single parents, those with families, and those with caring responsibilities to serve as elected members.”
Farrell is married with adult children.
Just as happened in 1999, the scandal is likely to spread across both sides of the aisle.
LNP parliamentarian Andrew Wilcox, who represents the division of Dawson in northern Queensland, was the only MP to top Senator Farrell’s spending, claiming $123,769.48 in family travel entitlements since 2022.
Wilcox doesn’t even have the excuse of, say Bob Katter, of having an enormous outback electorate to service. Dawson is a coastal electorate, relatively small by Queensland standards.
As all-too-often happens with political scandals, the finger-pointers may find the finger pointed back at them.
Ms Wells’ use of ministerial entitlements drew criticism from opposition communications spokeswoman Melissa McIntosh, who on Monday accused her counterpart of spending taxpayer funds “like its confetti” […]
But in an interview hours later it was reported that Ms McIntosh had on three separate occasions also used family reunion entitlements, including claiming airfares for one of her sons to fly from Sydney to the Gold Coast at a cost of $590.73 where he competed in a judo competition.
The only question, then, is just how far this Travel Rorts 2.0 scandal will spread and how ugly it will get.
