Linda Reynolds repays nearly $9,000 after partner billed taxpayers to visit son in Melbourne

Key points

• Liberal senator Linda Reynolds has paid back nearly $8,800 in parliamentary expenses after her partner claimed family reunion allowances to visit his son in Melbourne while en route to meet her in Canberra.
• Reynolds accepted the ruling of the Independent Parliamentary Expenses Authority (IPEA) but initially disputed their ruling, saying her partner’s visits to his son – her stepson – were necessary after “high profile (and false) 2021 workplace allegations made against me”, seemingly a reference to her long-running court dispute with former staffer Brittany Higgins.
• The IPEA, which administers the use of political spending and travel, last week published a number of recent reviews into parliamentarians’ expenses.
• Labor MP Louise Miller-Frost repaid more than $4,100 after travelling to Perth with her husband several days before a committee hearing, while Liberal senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price repaid $387 after blaming an “oversight” for claiming an extra day of travel allowance.