1. Report snapshot
Members’ entitlements refer to the payments that Members of Parliament (members) are eligible to claim under the Parliamentary Remuneration Tribunal’s Annual Determination (the Determination) and the administrative guidelines of the Department of Parliamentary Services (the guidelines). These entitlements are designed to support members in performing their parliamentary duties and can include travel, communication and skills development.
This report reviews compliance in the 2024–25 financial year.
Key findings
There were 35,151 payments made to members for entitlements – totalling $26.4 million.
Of these, 33,450 claims for payment – totalling $13.8 million – were in the scope of this compliance review. The remaining payments of $12.6 million (annual basic salaries, and electoral and committee allowances) were not within scope of this review.
From a sample of 59 claims for the 2024–25 period, there were 29 departures from the requirements of the Determination and the administrative guidelines.
Loyalty and incentive scheme declarations (such as frequent flyer points) must be submitted at the end of financial year (ie 30 June) or within 30 days of ceasing to be a member. This review looked at 141 loyalty and incentive scheme declarations and found that three were submitted late.
Recommendations
The Department of Parliamentary Services should:
- evaluate the effectiveness of its training for members and consider other measures to improve the timelines of claim submissions
- consider conducting its annual internal audit process earlier in the year to identify audit findings sooner to better support members in meeting the requirements of the Determination and the guidelines.
Fast facts
2. Introduction
The Parliamentary Remuneration Tribunal makes an Annual Determination outlining the annual salaries and additional entitlements allowed to Members of the Parliament of New South Wales under the Parliamentary Remuneration Act 1989.
The Determination requires members’ claims for additional entitlements comply with the Department of Parliamentary Services’ administrative guidelines. The Department administers payments of additional entitlements.
This report reviews the compliance of members’ claims for additional entitlements payable under the Determination.
During the 2024–25 financial year 35,151 payments were made to Members of Parliament for entitlements under the Determination totalling $26.4 million. Of these, 33,450 claims for payment of additional entitlements totalling $13.8 million were within the scope of the compliance review by the Audit Office of New South Wales. The remaining payments of $12.6 million made during the 2024–25 financial year were not reviewed as there are certain salaries and allowances within the Determination that are excluded from compliance review requirements. These payments include:
- annual basic salaries, additional salaries and additional expense allowances
- additional entitlements comprising electoral allowances and committee allowances.
Payments within the scope of this compliance review are set out below.
* This total comprises payments for additional entitlements of electoral and committee allowances only. Payments for annual basic salaries, additional salaries and additional expense allowances are audited as part of the general purpose financial statements of The Legislature.
3. Review results
There were more departures from the requirements of the Annual Determination (the Determination) and the administrative guidelines of the Department of Parliamentary Services (the Department) in 2024–25 than in previous years. These departures were similar in nature to those consistently identified in the Audit Office’s previous compliance reviews, indicating a need for improved training and education for members.
From a sample of 59 claims and 141 annual loyalty and incentive scheme declarations submitted by members, the Audit Office identified 32 departures from Determination requirements and the administrative guidelines of the Department. These included:
- 26 claims for payment that were not submitted within 60 days of receipt of invoice or incurring the expense (2023–24: 21 claims)
- 3 claims under the communications allowance relating to publications that did not include the required authorisations and attributions (2023–24: one claim)
- 3 members who submitted their annual loyalty/incentive scheme declarations after the date specified in the Department’s administrative requirements (2023–24: five members).
The following table summarises the instances of non-compliance with the Determination and Department guidelines identified through Audit Office compliance reviews over the past three years.
2024–25 | 2022–23 | 2021–22 | |
| Late submission of claims for payment | 26 | 21 | 22 |
| Late submission of Sydney allowance reconciliations | ‒ | ‒ | 4 |
| Ineligible claims for communications allowance | 3 | 1 | 2 |
| Communications allowance claims made during blackout period# | ‒ | ‒ | 1 |
| Annual loyalty and incentive scheme declarations not submitted | ‒ | ‒ | 4 |
| Late submission of annual loyalty and incentive scheme declarations | 3 | 5 | 7 |
| Total number of departures from the Determination | 32 | 27 | 40 |
# Blackout periods are applicable only to election years.
4. Overview of claims for additional entitlements for the past two years
This compliance review considers 33,450 claims totalling $13.8 million made by Members of Parliament in 2024–25. The following summary outlines the additional entitlements within the scope of this review.
4.1. Analysis of additional entitlements paid to Members of Parliament
Similar to previous years, Audit Office processes for this compliance review did not extend to examining every claim made by members. Instead, we used data analytics to guide the selection of claims for further review. This resulted in testing of a sample of 59 claims relating to 23 of 141 Members of Parliament.
The graph1 below shows how the value of additional entitlement claims by Members of Parliament in 2024–25 compares to 2023–24.
Communications allowances continue to be the largest entitlement claim by value made by Members of Parliament each year. This is further discussed below.
The graph2 below shows how the number of claims made by Members of Parliament for additional entitlements in 2024–25 compares to 2023–24.
While the number of general travel allowance claims exceeds communication claims in 2024–25, the average claim value by members for general travel costs is much lower.
The communications allowance continues to be the largest category of additional entitlements claimed by Members of Parliament
The graph below shows the percentage of total additional entitlements claims made by Members of Parliament for the communications allowance, Sydney allowance and other allowances, for the past three financial years.
The Determination provides a base communications allowance allocation of:
- $5,505 to members of the Legislative Council
- $21,600 to members of the Legislative Assembly and an additional allocation between $84,374 and $101,526 (depending on the number of enrolled voters in the member’s electorate).
In addition to the above, recognised office holders also receive an additional allowance ranging from $825 to $30,240.
Members of Parliament can carry forward unused communications allowances up to the base allocation, but these are forfeited when a member’s parliamentary term ends.
In 2024‒25, Members of Parliament submitted 13,075 claims for communications allowances totalling $9.9 million. The average value of individual communications allowance claims also increased from the previous year.
The compliance review procedures continue to identify departures from the requirements of the Determination and the administrative guidelines for communications allowance claims. These departures are reported in section 4.2.
Eighteen per cent of all claims for additional entitlements in 2024–25 were submitted in June 2025
The graph below shows the claims for additional entitlements made by Members of Parliament each month for 2024–25.
Of the $13.8 million claimed by Members of Parliament for additional entitlements in 2024–25, claims for $2.5 million (18.1%) were submitted in June.
As outlined in section 4.2 below, the compliance reviews have consistently identified late submission of claims for payments over the years. This suggests an ongoing need for the Department to provide Members of Parliament with greater clarity, training and education about the timeliness of claim submissions.
The Department’s administrative guidelines also state that claims may be denied if they are not submitted in a timely manner. In both 2024–25 and 2023–24, no claims were denied for payment due to late submission.
RecommendationAs late submissions of member claims have continued to occur, the Department should evaluate the effectiveness of its current training for members and consider other measures to improve the timeliness of claim submissions. |
1 This graph does not include travelling allowances for recognised office holders claimed by Members of Parliament (2024–25: $1,472; 2023–24: $3,917).
2 This graph does not include travelling allowances for recognised office holders claimed by Members of Parliament (2024–25: 65 claims; 2023–24: 57 claims).
4.2. Detailed findings
The number of late expense claims by Members of Parliament continues to grow
The Determination requires members to submit expense claims to the Department within 60 days of receipt of invoice or incurring the expense. The compliance review identified 26 instances where members submitted claims after the 60-day timeframe (21 in 2024). Each claim was on average 62 days late, with the latest claim being submitted 221 days late (127 days in 2024). Nineteen claims (73.1%) were over a month late (18 in 2024).
Three Members of Parliament were late in submitting their annual loyalty and incentive scheme declarations
Members of Parliament are required to complete declarations to confirm that loyalty or reward benefits accrued using their additional entitlements have not been used for non-parliamentary purposes. The Determination requires these declarations be completed by Members of Parliament at the end of the financial year (i.e. 30 June), or within 30 days of ceasing to be a member.
In previous years, the Department had determined a due date of 31 July for declarations. In 2024–25, this was revised to 8 August to coincide with the first sitting day of Parliament in the 2025–26 financial year.
The Audit Office reviewed 141 declarations completed by Members of Parliament for 2024–25 and identified three members who submitted declarations after 8 August 2025. Each declaration was two days late on average, with the latest declaration submitted five days late.
In 2023–24, the Audit Office identified that five members submitted declarations after 31 July 2024. Each declaration was seven days late on average, with the latest declaration submitted 15 days late.
Three communications allowance claims did not include the required authorisation and attribution
Publications by Members of Parliament are required to include that the communication is ‘authorised by’ the member and an attribution that it is ‘funded using parliamentary entitlements’.
The compliance review procedures identified three instances where a member had claimed the communications allowance for publications for which the required authorisations and attributions had not been made. These three instances related to the same member.
Last year the compliance review identified one instance where a claim under the communications allowance did not include the required authorisation and attribution.
The Department could improve the timeliness of its internal audit relating to claims from Members of Parliament to improve efficiency and reduce non-compliances
The Departments’ internal audit of members’ additional entitlements for the 2024–25 financial year was in progress at the same time as the Audit Office’s compliance review and is yet to be concluded at the date of this report.
The Determination requires the Department conduct an annual internal audit of members’ additional entitlements but does not specify when this audit must take place. The Department has discretion to determine the timing of the audit.
Undertaking an internal audit earlier in the year may support the Department in earlier identification of common non-compliance themes, allowing it to tailor its training and education and support members’ timely compliance with the Determination and guidelines.
RecommendationThe Department’s annual internal audit process may be more effective if conducted earlier in the year. Doing so would allow the Department to consider audit findings sooner and better support members of parliament in meeting the requirements of the Determination and administrative guidelines. |
5. Status of recommendations from prior years
The 2024 Report to Parliament on members’ additional entitlements made five recommendations.
The table below describes the status of these recommendations.
| Recommendation | Current status | |
| The Department should improve its quality review process when reporting the number and total dollar value of members’ additional entitlement claims to ensure it is accurately reporting the number and value of claims. | The Department applied satisfactory quality review processes over members’ entitlements data prior to submission to the Audit Office. | Fully addressed |
| The Department should ensure internal audits of members’ additional entitlements are adequately scoped, quality reviewed and endorsed prior to their commencement. The scoping should ensure requirements of the Determination are considered and achieved. | Last year the compliance review identified that the Department’s 2023–24 internal audit of members’ additional entitlements did not meet the requirements outlined in the Determination. This was because the scope was limited to communications allowance claims, and excluded the Sydney allowance and all other fixed allocation allowances. This year:
| Fully addressed |
Prior to the Audit Office’s compliance review commencing each year, the Department should ensure:
| This has not progressed. Similar to last year, the internal audit of members’ additional entitlements for 2024–25 was in progress at the same time as the Audit Office’s compliance review and is yet to be concluded at the date of this report. Section 4.2 recommends the Department should conduct its internal audit earlier to allow for earlier identification of member claim non-compliance. | Not addressed |
| Prior to payments being made, the Department should enhance its assessment as to whether members’ expenditure claims comply with the requirements of the Determination and the administrative guidelines of the Department and advise members promptly about whether their claims are ineligible. | The Department has determined that it will not review compliance of members’ claims at the time of payment as it:
| Risk accepted by the Department |
The Tribunal should provide greater clarity on current processes and the implications of departures from the guidelines to members. The Department should work with members to provide them with additional training or education and better help them to comply with the Determination and the administrative guidelines of the Department. | This has not progressed. Additional recommendations relating to the Department are outlined in section 4.1. This includes assessing the effectiveness of its existing training and education to members and considering other measures to enhance timeliness of claim submissions. | Not addressed |
Appendices
Appendix 1 – Response from the Department of Parliamentary Services
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