Liberal-appointed tribunal members’ pay claims ‘fishy’, says Labor senator

Part-time administrative appeals tribunal members appointed by the Coalition are being overpaid by claiming “pretty questionable” hours for their work, a Labor senator has claimed.

During a Senate estimates hearing on Wednesday, Murray Watt used data on the payment to four part-time members to grill the AAT about the plausibility of their work claims, which he described as “fishy”.

Watt raised the pay of part-time members Vanessa Plain and Jason Harkess – who have both acted pro bono in Liberal party-supported court proceedings against Victoria’s lockdowns – as well as Tony Barry, a long-time Liberal staffer, and Louise Bygrave, a former senior adviser to Liberal MP Tim Wilson when he was the human rights commissioner.

Labor obtained the total pay for the members over various time periods and divided it by their hourly rate to calculate the number of standard working days they would have had to have worked to receive such remuneration. Watt said the results suggested they had over-claimed and been overpaid.

Liberal senator Sarah Henderson said Watt had mischaracterised the way that members were paid. The AAT’s registrar, Sian Leathan, told the Senate hearing that members were paid according to the number of cases they finalised, not by any timesheet system.

Watt said Plain, as a part-time member, had been paid $128,132 between July and November last year, or about $111,000 excluding super. He said that equated to about 117 standard seven-hour days of work and there were only 123 days in that time period and Plain had other jobs as well as her AAT role.

Harkess was paid $292,053 in 2019-20, or $253,079 after super and allowances, meaning he would have had to have worked “almost every weekend, public holidays, [and that he] didn’t take a single day off during that financial year”, Watt said.

His pay suggests he worked 267 standard seven-hour days, but there were only 252 weekdays in the year, Senate estimates heard, and Harkess also had four other jobs.

Barry would have had to have worked five days a week in his part-time role with the AAT in 2019-20 to earn his $251,119, or $211,380 excluding super, Watt said, while also holding down two other jobs, including one as a lobbyist.

Bygrave, he said, earned $250,236 in 2018-19, the equivalent of 269 standard work days from a possible 250 weekdays during that financial year.

Watt asked Amanda Stoker, the assistant minister to the attorney general, if she would investigate whether overpayment had occurred.

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“Can you guarantee to us and to the Australian public that no Liberal party appointees to the AAT have been over-claiming their remuneration and rorting public funds?” he asked.

Stoker said she saw no evidence of wrongdoing but would ask the AAT president about the matter.

“I can tell you that if any AAT member were rorting their entitlements or their ability to get paid, it would be dealt with very harshly, but that is not the conclusion that can be drawn from the questions you have asked this morning,” she said. “On the face of what you have raised, I think it is really quite plausible that there is nothing of concern, but I am happy to make some inquiries with the president.”

Leathan also rejected the premise of Watt’s questions. She said the payment system relied on members completing the requisite work – by finishing cases – before they could be paid.

“The whole reason why we set up the sessional remuneration arrangements is to ensure that we are not reliant on people simply putting in time, that they are actually generating outcomes and finalising matters, which demonstrates that the official business has been undertaken,” she said.

Stoker said the payment system actually incentivised hard-working AAT members.

“It is worth noting that the payment structure is such that it is designed to incentivise those who choose to work harder and get through more of the AAT’s work. That’s a good thing,” she said.

Watt replied: “Yes but is it a good thing for members to be paid for more days than actually exist in a calendar?”

Comment was being sought from the four part-time tribunal members in question.