MPs have had a torrid time in recent weeks. First there were
thousands of documents detailing ministerial credit card
spending which landed several in trouble, and last
Thursday a report was released by the independent watchdogs
who check the way Parliament spends taxpayer money.
Among other things, it recommended changes to the way MPs'
allowances and entitlements are handled.
On Friday morning, talkback radio was going berserk.
The report had collapsed into a single issue: MPs were going
to get a 10 percent pay rise.
Outraged callers were beside themselves. It was the
scandalous old "snouts in the trough" behaviour - and they
were doing it while everyone else was being told to tighten
their belts and the Government was saying it was strapped for
cash.
What the report actually said was this:
"We see no good reason to retain the international travel
rebate in its current form. None of the other jurisdictions
we examined provide international travel entitlements for MPs
or their spouses/partners for personal purposes.
"If the remunerative aspects of travel entitlements were
incorporated into MPs' salaries, there would be an
approximate 10 percent increase in MPs salaries (on average)
but no change in MPs' total remuneration (as the subsidies
for private travel would be discontinued)."
That's it. "No change in total remuneration". But the
Parliamentary Appropriations Review Committee had opened an
old can of worms.
Those travel entitlements, rebates of between 25 percent and
90 percent on international travel depending on length of
service, go back to the 1970s.
MPs of that era, considering they should be paid more than
they were getting and that there should be some sort of
increase for those who had been around for several terms,
didn't want to incur public wrath by giving themselves a pay
rise so they thought up the international air travel rebate.
It has been part of the deal ever since. If it is considered
in lieu of salary, then taking it away would cut their pay.
At the time it was introduced there was far less transparency
around MPs' spending. Today it is a noose around their necks,
tightened every time disgruntled voters feel like stringing
them up.
It would be a fairly safe bet to say nothing is going to
happen. If they wanted a 10 percent pay rise instead of the
travel perks they wouldn't take it because they know the
trouble they would land in if they did.
And it isn't likely those talkback radio callers would see it
any differently to the way they did on Friday.
It would also be difficult to work out how to do it and end
up with that "no change in total remuneration" proviso
because MPs don't all use the entitlement to the same extent.
Some make the most of it and others don't use it at all.
And if they did get a 10 percent pay rise, they would pay tax
on it at 38 cents in the dollar which they presumably don't
when they get cheap flights.
A much more realistic recommendation, which was lost amid the
10 percent pay rise fiasco, was this: "MPs should consider
whether it is appropriate for them to continue to be involved
in determining the benefits they receive.
"MPs' entitlements and allowances are determined largely by
the Speaker on the advice and recommendation of the
Parliamentary Service Commission. By way of contract, an
increasing number of Parliaments with whom the New Zealand
Parliament might be compared have moved or are moving to have
the allowances and entitlements of MPs determined by an
independent body."
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