Rare win for taxpayers

In a rare win for New Zealand taxpayers under this Government, Chris Hipkins has shot down the Report of the Seventh Triennial Appropriations Review Committee.

"This report was a power and money grab. There was no clear rationale for boosting the staff of Ministers, the pay of list MPs, and guaranteeing a minimum level of funding for parliamentary parties", says ACT Leader David Seymour.

"Some recommendations were completely unacceptable. For example, funding to retrain MPs when they leave Parliament to help them back into the job market.

"It already costs the taxpayer $23,000 an hour to run Parliament – more than half a million dollars a day.

"It’s rare that ACT agrees with Mr Hipkins or the Government, but MPs have been dining out at the taxpayer’s expense for too long.

"Perhaps now we can persuade the Government to support ACT’s Smaller Government Bill which would cut the number of MPs to 100 and the number of Ministers to 20."

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