The federal education department has revised its hospitality policy after revelations public servants spent thousands of taxpayer dollars to hold meetings in fine dining restaurants.
A Senate estimates committee hearing heard one of these meals cost $171 a head.
The shadow minister for education, Sarah Henderson, told Senate estimates on Thursday it was “extraordinary” the department’s staff had been allowed to claim expensive meals on expenses, likening the practice to “restaurant rorts”.
“Holding a meeting should be in a meeting room with a cup of tea and a biscuit,” she said.
“These are [departmental] meetings … it’s just appalling.”
Among the expenditures were $1,840 at Ginger Indian Restaurant in Sydney, $509 at Black Fire Restaurant in Brisbane, $3,000 at Mabu Mabu in Melbourne, $1,209 at Courgette Restaurant in Canberra and $1,543 at Mezzalira restaurant, also in the ACT.
Mezzalira’s spend averaged $171 a head, while Mabu Mabu and Courgette averaged about $120 per person.
Secretary of the department, Tony Cook, told Henderson he was in “furious agreement” with her.
“I agree with you entirely,” he said. “It should not have happened – we should not have been utilising taxpayers money in those sort of expenses.
“I think we have let taxpayers down.”
Cook said the education minister, Jason Clare, had personally spoken with him regarding the matter after it was publicised in the media at the end of January.
The expenditures, first revealed in questions on notice from a budget estimates hearing and later publicised by the Daily Telegraph, totalled $172,691 on events and catering in the first half of last year and $118,404 on accommodation and travel costs.
In total, $12,637 was spent on meetings in prestigious restaurants, with an average cost per person of $81.53.
Cook said the department’s hospitality policy had been formally revised since his meeting with Clare, placing a maximum spend of $77 per person for dinners and $55 for lunch, in line with the Australian Tax Office travel allowance rates.
“A majority of those restaurants would be completely out of our policy,” he said.
The new policy reads any decision to spend money on official hospitality or business catering must be “publicly defensible” and approval must only be given where “benefits outweigh the costs or are in the public interest”.
“It is expected that when organising business catering on behalf of the department, efforts will be made to provide hospitality at a lower cost than these limits,” it reads.
Assistant minister for education Senator Anthony Chisholm pointed the finger at the former government, weighing in: “It’s not unusual from time to time for politicians to have spent money.”
He reminded Henderson of a $4000 dinner held by Peter Dutton while the immigration minister was in the US that drew wide public condemnation.
Henderson said while it was legitimate for ministers to claim restaurant expenditures when meeting overseas counterparts, to hold department meetings outside meeting rooms amounted to a “complete rort of taxpayers money”.
