Explanatory note

This note is not part of the determination, but is intended to indicate its general effect.

This determination, which comes into force on 1 November 2009, determines that the travel, accommodation, attendance, and communications services in respect of members of the Executive are those set out in the document entitled “Travel, Accommodation, Attendance, and Communications Services Available to Members of the Executive” and signed by the Minister Responsible for Ministerial Services on 22 October 2009 (the October 2009 document). The document will be published on the Internet at www.parliament.nz.

Those services are in addition to the travel, accommodation, attendance, and communications services available to members of Parliament and their families, determined by the Speaker of the House of Representatives in the Parliamentary Travel, Accommodation, Attendance, and Communications Services Determination 2008.

This determination replaces the Executive Travel, Accommodation, Attendance, and Communications Services Determination 2009, signed on 26 May 2009, which determined that the additional travel, accommodation, attendance, and communications entitlements in respect of members of the Executive are those set out in the document entitled “Travel, Accommodation, Attendance, and Communications Services Available to Members of the Executive” and signed by the Minister Responsible for Ministerial Services on 26 May 2009 (the May 2009 document).

The main differences between the May 2009 document and the October 2009 document, which all relate to the accommodation services available to members of the Executive whose primary place of residence is outside the Wellington commuting area, are that the October 2009 document—

• no longer provides that a Minister whose primary place of residence is outside the Wellington commuting area has an entitlement to be provided with the use of an official residence. However, the Minister Responsible for Ministerial Services has the ability to allocate official residences at his or her discretion:

• sets out that if a Minister is not allocated an official residence but has a primary place of residence outside the Wellington commuting area—

  • the Minister may stay in a hotel when in Wellington, in which case the Department of Internal Affairs will reimburse the actual and reasonable costs of staying in a hotel in the Wellington commuting area, up to a maximum of $37,500 per year but not more than $200 (including GST) for a single night's accommodation; and

  • if the Minister does not stay in a hotel, the Minister will be paid an accommodation payment. The maximum amount of that payment is $30,000 per year, if the Minister stays in the same accommodation that Minister was living in at the time that he or she was appointed as a Minister and had claimed actual and reasonable expenses in respect of that accommodation under the accommodation provisions applying to ordinary members of Parliament. In all other cases the maximum amount of the payment is $37,500 per year, unless more than 1 Minister is living in the same property, in which case the maximum aggregate amount paid in respect of the property will be $37,500 per year:

• provides that the maximum cumulative amount that a Minister may be paid in a year by way of accommodation payments and reimbursement of hotel costs is $37,500.

The Speaker of the House of Representatives is required, by section 20B(3) of the Civil List Act 1979, to ensure that a copy of the October 2009 document—

• is available for inspection free of charge, or for purchase at a reasonable price, at Parliament House in Wellington and at any other place or places that he or she appoints; and

• is published on the Internet.