Taito Phillip Field to keep super benefits

Jailed former MP Taito Phillip Field has been stripped of travel perks he would have received but could still reap a healthy taxpayer boosted superannuation package.

If he personally contributed the maximum into his super he could receive more than $300,000 of taxpayer money in employer contributions.

The 57-year-old former Labour MP for Mangere was yesterday jailed for six years for bribery and corruption and perverting the course of justice.

Last month, following Field's conviction in August, Parliament's Speaker Lockwood Smith changed the rules so that MPs convicted of serious criminal offences would no longer receive travel privileges.

Travel privileges for spouses or partners of MPs would also be revoked.

However, Field may still receive money through his superannuation portfolio.

MPs who entered Parliament after 1992 - Field was elected in 1993 - could put up to 8 per cent of the backbench salary into their super scheme.

Field's backbencher salary when he left in 2008 was about $130,000.

Taxpayers' contributions were $2 for every $1 from the MP until 2003 when they increased to $2.50.

The taxpayer contribution could not exceed 20 per cent of the MP's salary.

Last year's register of pecuniary interests for MPs showed Field was with the Global Retirement Scheme.

A spokesman for Parliamentary Service said it had no control over private super schemes.

- NZPA