Editorial: MPs enjoy winter of our discount rent

When New Zealand's first Parliament met in Auckland in 1854, one of the MPs' opening acts was to vote themselves an honorarium of between 10 shillings and £1 a sitting day.

Though it was little more than what a carpenter or wheelwright would earn, it was immediately contentious. One MP warned it would nurture the growth of parasitic politicians hanging on the skirts of ministers, "ever ready to snatch the crumbs which fell from the rich man's table".

Others quite rightly pointed out that the alternative was less palatable still: "giving over the government of the country into the hands of the monied classes". Government would always be the domain of the independently wealthy - unless smart and talented working men were adequately remunerated to allow them to leave their farms and blacksmith's foundries to represent their peers in a parliament.

In Britain, the progress towards one man, one vote, and payment of members, was tortuous, riotous and bloody. The House of Commons did not finally agree to pay MPs salaries until 1911.

In New Zealand, MPs were paid from day one of that 1854 colonial parliament. And almost from day one, it was alleged, MPs rorted the payment system. Some were said to stay in their seats only as long as it took for the messenger to tick off their presence - then head off to the billiards room for the rest of the day.

If the history of payments to MPs is as long as our democratic tradition, the history of transparency has barely begun to be written.

It was only after the Herald on Sunday persuaded two of the Mt Albert byelection candidates to disclose their expenses in the heat of the campaign, and the rest of the Green and Act parties' MPs to follow suit, that sufficient pressure could be brought on the rest of Parliament to open the books.

The two established parties, National and Labour, had maintained a conspiracy of silence ever since they first awarded their members full-time salaries and £250 tax-free expenses allowances in 1944.

It was with a great deal of resentful wheezing and complaints of intrusion that they last month agreed to disclose the total accommodation and travel expenses incurred by each MP. Unlike those scoundrels in Britain, they said, New Zealand MPs were beyond reproach. The great "reveal", they sniffed, would prove a salacious distraction from the worthy public works of the Honourable Members.

How right they were on that last count.

We learned that Sir Roger Douglas, the prophet of public spending restraint, had claimed thousands on a trip to London to visit the grandkids. Jeremiah was clad not in sackcloth and ashes, but in Savile Row suits.

We discovered that Finance Minister Bill English was claiming more than $900 a week towards his $1.2 million home.

And Housing Minister Phil Heatley was housing another National MP in the apartment he owned, pocketing the subsidised rent, then housing his own family in a ministerial home - also subsidised.

MPs' protestations continued. Trust us, they beseeched. This is Godzone - we're honest as the day is long.

Did none stop to think of the irony of falling back on this statement of blind faith in the same week that, for the first time, an MP was convicted of bribery and corruption? This is a cold winter in New Zealand democratic history; the days are short and dark.

Let us be clear: MPs are mostly decent people, working hard for the public good. But let us also state unequivocally: they united to fight these disclosures every inch of the way.

Now, they must stop fighting. It is time for Parliament to accept full disclosure of its members' expenses. Where do MPs fly on their international trips? What subsidised investment properties are they purchasing? And what do they do with their $14,000 unreceipted expenses allowances?

Those first MPs in 1854 were right: our representatives should be compensated for the vitally important work they do. They should not be left out of pocket. But they must be transparent. It is no longer good enough to say "trust us", before retiring to the billiards room.