Green Party Co-leader Rod Donald today welcomed the report of the review group on MPs' salaries and expenses.
"The recommendations follow very closely the Green Party's submission to the review group," noted Rod Donald. "We wanted
to see an improvement in the transparency of our salaries and accountability of our allowances - and the report does
just that.
"In particular, we're pleased the $8000-$20,000 constituency allowance is being removed from electorate MPs' salary
packages and treated as an expense to be recovered on an actual and reasonable basis.
"It's also good that the basic expense allowance will be taxed as part of our salary package," said Rod Donald.
"However, the most important outcome of the report is that it dispels the myth that MPs are on salary packages of
$130,000-plus, by clearly distinguishing between our personal incomes and work-related expenses.
"This is reinforced by the Inland Revenue Department ruling 95 per cent of our air travel and 97 per cent of our phone
calls are direct costs of doing our jobs.
"These so-called 'entitlements' are not perks."
Ends