otb,

A minor correction for you:

The Remuneration Tribunal, an independent statutory body
is the body that determines pay raises for MPs.
The Remuneration for Members of Parliament is set entirely
independently of government and of Members of Parliament.
It is appropriate that this is a non-political process.
Blaming former Prime Minsters is simply wrong.
Parliament does not have the power to knock back or approve
pay raises. The pay raises are automatic.

The Tribunal has said it - "considers it important that
remuneration in its jurisdiction is maintained at appropriate
levels over the longer term to attract and retain people of the
calibre required for these important high level offices."

That seems fair enough - when you consider that company
CEOs and others in top paying positions earn in the millions.
What we do need to question are the mis-used entitlements and perks
that come on top of their salaries and the entitlements of our
former PMs, GGs, and other retired politicians. These do need
closer scrutiny and questioning as the recent incident with
Madam Speaker shows.

Fox,

Did Julia Gillard ever vote to receive that increase?

Now, what about addressing what I said, instead of deciding the question uou want to answer and ignoring everything else?

Here, copied for you,

<Leaving all of that to one side, I don't particularly care who it is, private sector CEO or politician, they can all fall prey to the syndrome where they believe in their own importance and may even regard the organisation's or government's assets as their own. Not implying any of that in respect of the Speaker, where the result of the Labor inspired AFP investigation must be awaited.

Also, most taxpayers, shareholders too, don't really mind if their leaders gain some status benefits to make up for their exhausting, demanding roles that leave little room for a personal life.

They (taxpayers and shareholders) want to see some productivity and quality in return and the politicians who would criticise the Speaker haven't exactly been so helpful in maintaining order, productivity and efficiency in the House either.

Taking Shorten and Labor as the example, they have shown no interest whatsoever in the problems of Struggle-town (ABC), but they are long on same sex marriage and playing the fool in the Parliament. That represents no return whatsoever for the $250,000+pa each gets paid, let alone their other personal overheads (that they aren't talking about).>
[onthebeach, Sunday, 19 July 2015 9:55:52 AM]

As with senior managers and particularly CEOs in private enterprise, their equivalents in the public sector and politicians must exercise discretion in the use of their powers and their use of benefits and assets.

It should come as no surprise that travel is very often problematical.

Public disclosure, transparency and reporting should be supplemented by regular independent audits.

Labor sought and obtained AFP investigation. In that case I assume that all here would be happy and apologising if the Speaker has done nothing illegal.

My concern though is that each and every one of those well remunerated politicians should be producing quality decisions to the value of their Executive level (APS, SES) remuneration and conditions.

"FORMER Prime Minister Kevin ‘747’ Rudd lived up to his nickname in his final weeks in office, splurging $500,000 on taxpayer-funded VIP plane flights in just five weeks. New documents tabled in Parliament reveal after Mr Rudd was reinstalled by the ALP caucus in June, 2013, his VIP travel bill was running at $100,000 a week. That was the average weekly cost of his VIP flights until he called the federal election on August 4."

"AUSTRALIAN Federal Police have widened an investigation into alleged rorting in the parliamentary office of new labor Speaker Peter Slipper, as scrutiny of his taxpayer-funded entitlements shows he claimed nearly $1100 a day on travel and other expenses during the first half of the year."

Labor leads the way on taxpayer funded expenditure.

SM,

It's useless to get involved in a slanging match about pollies expenses if you're set on defending the Coalition.

Actually, I'm a little surprised #choppergate has taken off like it has. These things are usually toughed out - and eventually they blow over.

Not this time methinks....

Bronnies got a lot of righties calling for her to resign.

http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/party-games-precedent-gives-pm-tony-abbott-no-cause-to-complain-about-bronwyn-bishops-helicopter-ride-being-referred-to-police/story-fnihsr9v-1227446371591

Dennis Atkins

"TONY Abbott is the last person who should complain about Labor referring to the Federal Police the rorted helicopter ride undertaken by his Speaker Bronwyn Bishop.

In his time in Opposition and as Prime Minister, Abbott has done more than any other Australian politician to criminalise politics in this country.

Along with George Brandis, now Attorney-General, Abbott was always keen to refer to the police any suggested wrongdoing by any Labor MP.

After winning power, Abbott set up two royal commissions with the express aim of litigating behaviour of existing and previous Labor politicians, in particular the former prime ministers Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard.

The royal commission into trade union activities has more recently turned into political pursuit of Labor leader Bill Shorten.

Now Abbott’s hand-picked Speaker has been caught out billing $5000 to the taxpayer for a luxury helicopter ride from Melbourne to Geelong, a journey that might take an hour and a bit by cab for a few hundred dollars.

To make this absence of decorum worse, Bishop fleeced the public purse to attend a Liberal Party fundraising lunch which cannot in any way be labelled official business related to her role as a presiding officer of the Parliament."

"Abbott and his party have been hit by the inevitable payback from Labor and they have no one to blame but themselves."

otb,

Neither Julia Gillard nor Tony Abbott nor any other
MP have the power to knock back or approve pay raises.
The pay raises are automatic and as stated earlier -
The Remuneration Tribunal - an independent statutory body is
the body that determines pay raises for MPs. The remuneration for
members of parliament is set entirely independently of government
and of members of parliament. It is appropriate that we
don't have a political process. We have a non-political process.
Stop trying to make it political.

Now back to the topic.

Mrs Bishop has not set a good record in her role as Speaker.
And considering the Coalition's attempted pursuits of Labor's
"wrong-doings" in the past and currently of Mr Shorten, it is mot
surprising that Labor is now pursuing Mrs Bishop's mis-use
of MPs entitlements to the full letter of the law.

Pointing out the facts that "this side or that side did it
much worse" - only muddies the waters as David F., and
Conservative-Hippie pointed out earlier. It does not change the
fact that it should not have happened - and for someone who is
supposed to set an example for others - the role of the Speaker
must be above reproach. Mrs Bishop in punishing others for their
behaviour in parliament should now resign for her own bad behaviour.
She has lost the confidence of many of her parliamentary members.
Her position in untenable.

The coalition defenders seem to live in the past or is that me seeing things that are not there.
They should come up to present day and argue their point out allowed.

The payrise dispute goes through parliament because it is an expense on taxpayers. A formality which is never questioned.