Over the past four years, taxpapyers have helped underwrite the cost of George Brandis’ wide ranging tastes in newspapers, periodicals and books to the tune of over $12, 000, with several thousands of dollars potentially spent on subjects previously questioned by the Australian National Audit Office as ”at risk of being outside the scope of the entitlement”.
Included in the impressive survey of fine reading are lives of the Popes, Stalin, Trotsky and Christopher Hitchens; biographies of historians ranging from Manning Clark to Hugh Trevor Roper; histories of Byzantium, Berlin and the Spanish Civil War; biographies of FDR, Eisenhower, JFK, LBJ and Obama; essays and writings by Orwell and Nietzsche; a collection of Isaiah Berlin’s letters; and a survey of the life and works of a Scottish colourist. A select list is provided at the end.
Members of Parliament are entitled to an allowance for the “costs of purchasing publications (including electronic publications) of their choice for purposes related to Parliamentary, electorate or official business, but not commercial business.”
(While it is called a publications allowance, the Finance guidelines appear to anticipate that the allowance will be spent on newspapers and periodicals (dealing as they do with subscriptions and arrangements with suppliers such as newsagents)).
In late 2008, the ANAO advised the Finance Department that it had concerns about the use of the publications allowance by Members in that …
Read the rest on Bill’s blog here
• And when you have finished that, read Politically Homeless, here
• Herald-Sun: Hewson warns Coalition on wedding claims COALITION MPs are endangering their reputations as economic managers by charging taxpayers for personal indulgences such as travel to weddings, former Liberal leader John Hewson has warned. The warning follows a string of questionable claims involving senior members of the Coalition, including Prime Minister Tony Abbott, billing taxpayers to attend weddings. … But former Howard government minister Peter Reith has described the wedding expenses scandals as “petty” and argued that politicians should be entitled to unlimited travel. “I think it’s ridiculous putting limits on where ministers can go,” he’s told Fairfax. It’s been revealed that three Coalition MPs – Julie Bishop, Barnaby Joyce and Teresa Gambaro – claimed more than $12,000 in travel expenses to return from a lavish wedding in India where they were guests of billionaire Gina Rinehart. In their reports they said they were engaged in “overseas study” tours. etc
ABC: Tony Abbott has history of claiming sporting events as travel entitlements
• Jack Waterford, Editor-at-Large, The Canberra Times: Abbott owns rort problems Prevarication, self-indulgence and lack of leadership mean he will cop blame for everyone’s dodgy claims … The great parliamentary expenses massacre has very little, as such, to do with weddings, ironman races or skiing breaks. Or to early advent of the silly season. Its capture of the popular imagination comes not from partisan politics but its confirmation that more politicians than one might think are entirely out of touch with popular opinion. The smarties are keeping their heads down, muttering to themselves that they ”cannot win” this debate. A good many of these are, however, just as much out of touch. Attempts to explain political expenses ”at the margin” should not persuade members of the public, and would rarely persuade Australian Tax Office staff were they submitted as legitimate business expenses. This is not because the public is stupid but because politicians are stupid in thinking that the public wants them to charge such matters to expenses. They should cover them, when they do, from their own ample salaries.
• Meanwhile ABC1 LATELINE 25 September 2013 – Interview with Australian Greens Christine Milne
TONY JONES: Would you agree on the question of strategy that something does look terribly wrong with the Greens’ strategy for a party to have lost one third of its vote from one election to the next?
CHRISTINE MILNE: I think there are a number of reasons for that. I said at the beginning of the election that my task was to hold the number of seats against a tide of conservatism coming in and I’m very pleased to say that we’ve done that plus Janet Rice in Victoria and we’re on track for holding all of our seats across the country and now’s our time to rebuild. I think clearly we need to talk to people who didn’t vote for us this time who have in the past and that’s clearly something we will be doing. But equally, I think you have to look at the fact that this election, a lot of people wanted to get rid of the Labor government and the Murdoch press encouraged that and the Greens were seen as being associated with that period of government, and so the protest vote, if you like, that sometimes comes to the Greens went to a plethora of other parties instead. In fact in the Senate, Labor lost five per cent of its vote, we lost 4.5 per cent, but the Liberals only picked up less than one per cent. And all of that – essentially one senator in each state went to that plethora of other parties. So it was a big pox-on-all-your-houses vote that I think we have to explore.
http://www.abc.net.au/lateline/content/2013/s3856536.htm
• And, Clive made an appearance …
• And, The Hag has been told Examiner Chief Reporter Alison Andrews has jumped ship to take over meedja duties for new Lyons MP Eric Hutchinson. Hag thinks that is in keeping with Examiner editorial policy …
