‘A slap in the face for South Australians’: Opposition slams Stephen Mullighan’s $75k trip to the US

The eye-watering amount charged to taxpayers for Treasurer Stephen Mullighan and two others to take a 8-night trip to the US has been revealed.

Treasurer Stephen Mullighan flew business class and stayed at luxury hotels during an eight-night trip to the United States estimated to have cost taxpayers upwards of $75,000.

Mr Mullighan, along with Department of Treasury and Finance chief executive Rick Persse and senior ministerial adviser Matthew Leyson, visited New York, Los Angeles and Washington between January 19-27.

While there, they met with various banks, and businesses, as well as Ambassador to the United States Arthur Sinodinos and Consul-General Nick Greiner.

In evidence to a parliamentary committee on Monday, Mr Persse said the cost of each individual’s travel was about $19,000, which included business class fights and a train trip to Washington.

The Marmara Park Avenue, New York. Picture: Supplied

With accommodation added in, the cost came to about $26,000 per person — an amount he acknowledged was “a substantial amount of money”.

Included in that figure was six nights at the five-star luxury Marmara Park Avenue hotel in New York.

Based on those figures, the state opposition said the final cost to taxpayers would be more than $78,000 when other expenses were taken into account.

The final cost is still being calculated — and will be proactively disclosed in line with established guidelines — but the government expected it would come in at around $75,000.

Mr Persse told the committee the trip also included a night at an ice hockey game in New York, which was not charged to taxpayers.

Opposition treasury spokesman Matt Cowdrey described the trip as “a slap in the face for South Australians during a cost-of-living crisis”.

“We have South Australians living on the streets and in tents, while so many people are struggling to put food on the table, but that clearly didn’t factor in Stephen Mullighan’s mind,” he said.

“Stephen Mullighan’s business class trip appears to be unnecessary, especially when nine consecutive rate hikes from the RBA has impacted the average home loan by an extra $1000 per month.”

But Mr Mullighan said overseas travel was particularly important in his portfolio.

We crunched the numbers to see if we could find a better deal on Mullighan's trip

He said, each year, the government needed to raise billions of dollars in funding for the day-to-day operations of government, to refinance debt and to take on added debt for infrastructure works.

“We’re doing that in a competitive market, not just against other states and territories around the country, but other sovereign countries around the world,” he said.

“And we need to be making it clear to those people who are buying these bonds, that they should be looking to places like South Australia first.”

He said he also met with the government’s major insurer, Aon, to discuss how the state can best secure affordable reinsurance arrangements.