Peta Credlin: Gravy train leaves a nasty taste with taxpayers

Taxpayers can’t be blamed for suspecting some public officials are more focused on themselves than their job. What is clear is that the codes of conduct on outside-parliament life need an urgent rewrite, argues Peta Credlin.

People in public life are meant to be working for us, not themselves.

The slightest perception that MPs, staffers or public servants are on the gravy train brings the whole political class into disrepute.

It’s not like Australian ministers, political staffers, or public servants are badly paid.

Ministers earn nearly $400,000 a year. Staffers to a Cabinet minister can earn well over $200,000.

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And the biggest earners of all, department secretaries, have salaries in excess of $850,000, more than 10 times average earnings.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and Treasurer Jackie Trad. Picture: AAP Image/Glenn Hunt

It beggars belief Queensland’s Deputy Premier Jackie Trad didn’t know her husband was buying a house that could increase in value because of a government decision that was on her desk to make.

Just as bad is she has been found to be making calls to the head of Queensland’s Crime and Corruption Commission, forcing him to stand aside from any investigation into Trad’s house purchase.

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But it doesn’t stop there for Queensland Labor. The Premier’s chief of staff has been exposed for investing hundreds of thousands in a company that was also applying for a Queensland government business development grant.

And then there’s the head of the Prime Minister’s Department, Martin Parkinson, a bloke Scott Morrison inherited from Malcolm Turnbull and is smart enough to replace.

Port Martin Parkinson, Secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. Picture: Sean Davey/News Corp

With a salary far greater than his boss the PM, Parkinson will retire on a $450,000-a-year pension for life and is also reported to be on the verge of accepting a directorship with one of the big banks.

A conflict of interest? No, like Julie Bishop and Christopher Pyne (who coincidently, Parkinson inquired into and cleared), board directors are not considered ”lobbyists” because a director is just presenting the business case to former colleagues, not actually “lobbying” them for a decision.

If you can see the difference, you’re better than me! But of course you drive a truck through these rules. And if the government was interested, I would happily redraft them for free.

Is it any wonder families struggling to get by, on a teacher’s salary or running a small business are cynical?

Peta Credlin is a News Corp Australia columnist and Sky News presenter.