Former MPs receive pay bonus

Nearly 30 ex-MPs are to enjoy a belated bonus of several thousand dollars courtesy of taxpayers.

In mid-December the Remuneration Authority awarded MPs salary increases of between 4 and 9.6 per cent, backdated to July 1.

Parliamentary Service confirmed last week that MPs who quit or were turfed out at the election would also be paid the increase - not just for the period from July to the September polling day, but all the way through to mid-December.

Depending on the positions they held before the election, they will each receive between $2300 and $2560 when their bonuses are paid later this month.

The unexpected bonus has outraged union organiser and former Alliance leader Matt McCarten.

Mr McCarten, who now works as a strategist for the Maori Party and runs the Unite union - whose Super Size My Pay campaign distributes a 'Minimum wage for politicians' badge - said a minimum-wage worker would have to work an extra hour every weekday for a year to earn the same amount.

"Talk about rip off - even when the MPs leave the job the working poor get to keep paying them," he said.

Under the Civil List Act 1979, ex-MPs continue to be paid a backbencher's salary for three months following an election - meaning in this case their payrise will be calculated for the six months from July to December.

The list of former MPs includes such leading political lights as Richard Prebble of Act and Roger Sowry of National, as well as more obscure figures, such as NZ First's Edwin Perry and United Future's Murray Smith.

Former select committee chairs Mark Peck and Matt Robson, from Labour and the Progressives respectively, and former Act party whip Ken Shirley will receive the largest payouts.

Mr Peck said he had no objection to receiving the bonus but acknowledged it put former MPs in an embarrassing predicament.

"No matter what you get by way of remuneration when you're in public life, it's always too much," he said. "That's the perception and that will always be the case."

Former United Future MP Marc Alexander, who did not know he was due a bonus, said some ex-politicians continued performing public duties for some time after losing their seats and it was fair for them to be recompensed.

"The work doesn't actually stop once you've been voted out," he said.

Parliamentary Service personnel and payroll manager Mike Wilson said it was the first time in at least five elections that such a situation had arisen, as the pay increase had been announced unusually late in the year.

This meant it had to be backdated to before polling day.

Twenty MPs were voted out at the election and a further eight stepped down.

Mr McCarten said he would be writing to each of the MPs to ask them to donate their bonus to the minimum wage campaign.

- HERALD ON SUNDAY