Labor shows ‘some Australians more equal than others’

It is becoming all too obvious that many of our federal MPs have been on the take for quite some time in relation to family travel arrangements. It is absolutely laughable that Don Farrell has been escorting his adult family members around Australia at the expense of the ordinary Australian taxpayer. For goodness sake, they are mature independent adults who surely can afford to pay their own way to be in the company of their father. They do not need the taxpayer to foot their family reunion bill. Here I was thinking that of all the Labor MPs, Farrell was one of the good guys, who had his finger on the pulse of the nation. No more, I’m afraid to say.

Peter Surkitt, Sandringham, Vic

In George Orwell’s Animal Farm, the increasingly corrupt and totalitarian pigs secretly made changes to the rules to favour their excesses, until there was only one rule: “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.” And so it is that Australians now have the revelation that just weeks before calling the May federal election, the Albanese government quietly made changes to travel expense rules by expanding the definition of “party political duties”. Changes that will no doubt exonerate the exorbitant extravagance of Labor’s high-flying big spenders. Clearly, some Australians are more equal than others.

Deborah Morrison, Malvern, Vic

In a private business when I travel to update my skills I have to earn the money to pay the cost of the trip. If I add a ski holiday then that is not tax-deductible. My wife’s expenses when she accompanies me are not a tax deduction. Politicians do not pay for their trips, their accompanying family members or the ski holiday. We taxpayers fund this without any tax deductibility. It is not surprising that these people, few of whom (if any) have ever had any experience in private business, use this largesse up to and beyond the limit. Accountability is a concept that is foreign to them.

Brian McGregor, Mount Claremont, WA

Attorney-General Michelle Rowland blatantly rorted her travel entitlements to the tune of $16,000 but has been absolved by Treasurer Jim Chalmers. I’m not too sure what this tells us about politicians and their use of parliamentary entitlements.

Ed Turner, Sinnamon Park, Qld

I’m sure our FIFO workers would appreciate the family travel perks afforded to government ministers et al, given they are regularly away from their families often for long periods. Unfortunately they live in the real world.

Margy Knudsen, Taringa, Qld

When then treasurer Paul Keating introduced fringe benefits tax in 1986, with the associated increased costs to businesses of record keeping and compliance, many employers changed remuneration packages to pay employees with fringe benefits the value of those benefits. Why can’t politicians and public employees be treated the same?

It would be a simple one-off actuarial exercise to determine relevant costs for each electorate and family situation. Taxpayers would certainly need to continue to fund essential travel for government business, as do we in the private sector.

Alan Slade, Dover Heights, NSW

Gemma Tognini explains that the Labor government came to office promising transparency, fiscal restraint and government done differently (“ ‘Had a gutful’: Wells’ words come back to haunt the political class”, 13-14/12).

Tognini has gone to the heart of the Albanese government’s spending scandal with her report of the indignant MP for Lilley, Anika Wells, proclaiming, on Brisbane talkback radio in December 2021, she’d had a gutful of the Morrison government’s spending ways “treating the taxpayer money as their own piggy bank”. Yet it has been Wells who started the Albanese spending scandal with her offensively extravagant trip to New York as Sport Minister. As Tognini points out, the scandal is not just the sin of excessive spending, it is the disdainful response by politicians, particularly Wells, being caught with their hands in the cookie jar.

Ian Dunlop, Tea Gardens, NSW

Many wives of senior public servants in Canberra had husbands who spent a lot of time away. I can’t recall the government giving us family reunion holidays.

Sheila Duke, Bulimba, Qld