COMMENT: How to live like a queen on other people's cash

I WAS out shopping the other day, while I was meant to be working, and accidentally bought a handbag worth $5000.

I WAS out shopping the other day, while I was meant to be working, and accidentally bought a handbag worth $5000.

It seemed like a really good bargain at the time and was a spur of the moment thing during a trip away for work, paid for by my boss who also generously paid for my partner to come along.

When he found out he was mad at me, but I couldn't understand why?

Now my boss is questioning me on whether I even had to go away for work or if I just convinced him I needed to go so that I could buy that bag.

Any employer reading this is probably outraged; that's exactly how I feel when I read about Federal Health Minister Sussan Ley using a taxpayer-funded trip to buy an $800,000 investment property on a whim.

Oh and taxpayers paid for her partner to go along too. Oh and she's claimed more than $1 million worth of expenses in one year, including more than $105,000 on chartered flights, the ABC reports.

In case you haven't worked it out, there is no bag - I'm a lowly journalist who can't afford a $50 bag.

Perhaps it's time to go into politics; that way I can spend other people's money and live like a queen.

Why not, everyone else is doing it.

Helen Spelitis,

Lowly reporter

Originally published as COMMENT: How to live like a queen on other people's cash