Mathias Cormann had ‘no idea’ travel agent paid for family holiday flights

by Elizabeth Minter | Jul 23, 2020 | Dubious Travel Claims, Liberal Party, QED

Dubious Travel Claims | Liberal Party | QED

Mathias Corman

Mathias Cormann had ‘no idea’ travel agent paid for family holiday flights

January 2018

The flights for the holiday to Singapore were paid for by a travel company controlled by Liberal Party Treasurer Andrew Burnes within weeks of that company winning a $1 billion contract from Cormann’s department, according to The Age.

Helloworld, a listed company of which Mr Burnes is the chief executive, booked the flights for Senator Cormann, his wife and two children on the company’s “staff and family travel” account.

The travel company paid $2780.82 for the Singapore flights, which were booked in July 2017, and taken in early January, 2018.

The minister only paid for the return flights to Singapore from Perth in February 2019 after being contacted by The Age.

Senator Cormann said he had “no idea” that his credit card had not been charged. Mr Burnes said it was “absolutely an internal administrative oversight” that the credit card had not been charged for the trip when it was booked,

What's a rort?

Conflicts of Interest

Redirecting funding to pet hobbies; offering jobs to the boys without a proper tender process; secretly bankrolling candidates in elections; taking up private sector jobs in apparent breach of parliament’s code of ethics, the list goes on.

Deceptive Conduct

Claiming that greenhouse gas emissions have gone down when the facts clearly show otherwise; breaking the law on responding to FoI requests; reneging on promised legislation; claiming credit for legislation that doesn’t exist; accepting donations that breach rules. You get the drift of what behaviour this category captures.

Election Rorts

In the months before the last election, the Government spent hundreds of millions of dollars of Australian taxpayers’ money on grants for sports, community safety, rural development programs and more. Many of these grants were disproportionally awarded to marginal seats, with limited oversight and even less accountability.

Dubious Travel Claims

Ministerial business that just happens to coincide with a grand final or a concert; electorate business that must be conducted in prime tourist locations, or at the same time as party fundraisers. All above board, maybe, but does it really pass the pub test? Or does it just reinforce the fact that politicians take the public for mugs?

Mathias Cormann had ‘no idea’ travel agent paid for family holiday flights

Mathias Cormann had ‘no idea’ travel agent paid for family holiday flights

What's a rort?

Conflicts of Interest

Deceptive Conduct

Election Rorts

Dubious Travel Claims

Thank you!

Thank you!

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