Senator BARTLETT (6:18 PM) —I move:

This report deals with former parliamentarians’ travel paid over the six month period to the end of last year. I take note of this document mainly to reinforce the point that the Democrats have campaigned on for a long period of time. These sorts of documents that detail the individual expenditure of, in this case, former parliamentarians are always fodder for some easy media headlines. You go through it, find out who has spent the most and you point the finger at them and say, ‘Look how much money they are wasting.’ I do not intend to do that. I do not draw attention to this to try and seek to criticise individuals or reflect on individuals.

Nonetheless, it has been a longstanding view of the Democrats that the life gold pass is not justified. I do not suggest taking it off the people who have got it but I do not think it is something that is justified to continue into the future, for new parliamentarians, at a minimum. I believe that, for the vast majority of people who have been out of parliament for a significant number of years, it is very hard to justify them continuing to have the sorts of entitlements to free domestic air travel around Australia for basically any reason other than a commercial or business reason. I do not think that the Australian public believes this can be justified any longer.

I might say that in most respects I make this point from the point of view of principle and the public perception about politicians. I know it is just the nature of the world that politicians will never be favoured by the public, and that any expenditure by politicians will always be snarled at and scoffed at and generally seen to be ‘snouts in the trough’ and all those sorts of easy, cheap shots that are used. In that sense we are never going to get rid of that perception. That is just the way of the world. Nonetheless, it can be at least kept in a reasonable degree of containment by removing those entitlements that are clearly no longer justified, if they ever were. The total expenditure on the life gold pass in those six months was $417,000, so we are not talking about a king’s ransom—under $1 million a year perhaps—and I might say that even the mechanism of tabling these reports has, I think, led to some—

Senator Robert Ray interjecting—

Senator BARTLETT —I will bow once again to Senator Ray’s wisdom and experience in this: it has led to a significant reduction. It has probably led to a few unfair headlines now and then—because that is what they do, as I said—but there is no doubt that putting the spotlight on these things does make people pull their heads in a bit—or a lot—and that is probably very justified in most cases. As I say, I do not believe the life gold pass is justified at all, but the fact that this mechanism, even by its transparency, has significantly reduced the amount of taxpayers’ dollars involved is a positive thing. I should emphasise that that does not apply to former Prime Ministers. We do believe that they are a special case.

Senator Robert Ray —We have fed and watered them for so long.

Senator BARTLETT —But with other life gold pass holders we do not believe that it is justified. We will continue to push for that, if for no other reason than to not provide one extra unnecessary excuse for an opportunity to attack the integrity of the political process, including the often unjustified but still easily made attacks on politicians about having their snouts in the trough. Removing some of the more obvious targets for attack, the ones that I think are quite difficult to justify, would be beneficial to all of us in the broader task that we have. So I am using this opportunity to signal to the Senate that this is a view and a campaign that the Democrats will continue to push. We had success, of course, with the eventual modification of the unjustified parliamentarians’ superannuation system. I think this is something that should be next in line and I would urge the public to continue to push for the removal of the gold pass entitlement, which I do not believe is justified into the future.

Question agreed to.