Queensland 2020 election: Tax-payer funded advertising doesn’t pass the pub test

A swath of MPs are making the most of a $30,000 taxpayer-funded pot of gold that’s helping them increase their public profiles ahead of the election. It’s not against the rules, but it doesn’t pass the pub test, writes Jessica Marszalek.

I nearly threw my neck out when I was driving down the M1 recently and saw Employment and Small Business Minister Shannon Fentiman beaming at me over the traffic.

A few days later, there she was again at a different location down the road.

How electorate and communication allowances are being used to pay for billboards

This time she had a friend with her – Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk.

Sure it’s not unheard of to see political billboards ahead of an election, but they’re usually adorned with political brands and paid for by the parties.

Shannon Fentiman’s billboard on the M1 in Logan. Picture: Annette Dew

These ones are being paid for by you.

Bizarrely, it’s thanks to a coronavirus quirk that’s delivered sitting MPs a $30,000 taxpayer-funded fighting fund this year to hang onto their seats with.

Back in April, the Queensland Independent Remuneration Tribunal had a look at the Electorate and Communication Allowance parliamentarians use to do their electorate work and found they were massively underspending it because everyone was stuck in lockdown.

While usually only be able to hang onto 10 per cent of unspent funds at the end of a financial year, the body decided this time they’d be allowed to keep 40 per cent because they hadn’t been able to hold the community functions and activities they’d normally hold. “In recognition of these limitations, the Clerk has suggested Members be allowed to retain a higher proportion of their total ECA for the 2019-2020 financial year that is unexpended at 30 June 2020, for carry-over and use prior to the 2020 State Election,” it said.

Now while this money can‘t explicitly be used for electioneering and campaigning purposes, it can be used to increase the public profiles of MPs.

And that, presumably, is how a who’s who of the Palaszczuk Government and a couple of LNP members came to be overseeing intersections across the southeast.

A Yvette D'Ath, Steven Miles and Chris Whiting billboard at the Rothwell Roundabout at Redcliffe. Picture: supplied

From Labor, there’s the Premier, Deputy Premier Steven Miles, Attorney-General Yvette D’Ath, Ms Fentiman and a couple of backbenchers.

Then there’s LNP frontbencher David Janetzki and Trevor Watts, who was a frontbencher until he got busted breaching COVID rules at a neighbourhood shindig a few months ago. Theirs is even in the blue and yellow LNP brand colours.

Of course, this is all totally within the rules. But is it fair that sitting MPs get to blow a bunch of cash at the end of their term to get their mugs out there in the hope some of those voters will remember them come polling day?

Is it fair they get taxpayer help over other candidates running in their seat who don’t get a bunch of taxpayer cash to throw up billboards of their own?

Sometimes there are rules that just don’t pass the pub test. Rules like the infamous Commonwealth Gold Pass, which funded 25,000 free flights for retired federal MPs over a decade, many of them so they could go on a part taxpayer-funded holiday, before the gravy plane was grounded earlier this decade. And who can forget former federal speaker Bronwyn Bishop’s extravagant helicopter ride to a Liberal fundraiser in Victoria, which had Australians asking a united ‘WTF?’ across the country. The panoramic views ultimately weren’t worth it. The $5000 ride cost the speaker her job, and saw a shake-up of MP entitlement rules.

Bronwyn Bishop. Picture: AAP Photo/Alan Porritt

More recently, the Brisbane City Council was forced to change its superannuation rules after outrage they were pocketing twice as much as the average council worker.

The Sunday Mail revealed last year councillors were receiving ratepayer-funded superannuation benefits of 20 per cent under a set-and-forget scheme introduced in 1995. Under pressure, Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner asked the independent Councillor Remuneration Tribunal to consider the matter and it ultimately recommended councillor superannuation be cut to 12 per cent, saving ratepayers more than $380,000 a year.

Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner posing with Budget paper at Brisbane City Hall. Picture: News Corp/Attila Csaszar

The contribution should have “closer regard to ratepayer expectations, represent more effective use of council funds … and take account of the circumstances of elected public office”, the tribunal found. We’re officially in recession, people have lost their jobs, the public service has had their pay frozen and Treasurer Cameron Dick is counting his pennies by closing social media accounts and vowing to print annual reports in black and white.

It’s dire times. Taxpayers don’t want their cash splashed on political billboards.

If the rules no longer meet public expectations, maybe it’s time to have another look at the rules.

Originally published as Queensland 2020 election: Tax-payer funded advertising doesn’t pass the pub test