Senator Paterson's secret abode. And Penny Wong's tardy disclosures.

We scratched our head when Shadow Defence Minister James Paterson declared to the Senate interests register the other week a new mortgage with Macquarie Bank but no corresponding property. Was this an innovative new financial product from the Millionaires' Factory, we wondered?

Then the penny dropped: Paterson's mortgage was probably over his wife's property, which under the Senate's opaque rules is not publicly disclosable. (MPs by contrast are required to disclose the interests of their partners and children.)

Sure enough, Victorian land title records show the senator’s wife Lydia, who works for Victorian Opposition Leader Jess Wilson, recently purchased a house in Hawthorn. A Macquarie Bank mortgage is on the title.

Rather appropriately, the house was the setting for not-so-secret Liberal leadership talks in February on the sidelines of former Liberal MP Katie Allen’s funeral.

Senator Paterson told Open Politics the Hawthorn property was his family home and that his wife’s sole ownership had been fully declared to the confidential, family section of the Senate register known as Form B.

Open Politics does not suggest Paterson has done anything wrong here - he's just following Senate rules. What's wrong is a system that prevents the public from being able to assess whether senators' family interests pose conflicts with their public duties.

The Committee of Senators’ Interests has the power to table a senator's family interests if the committee "considers that a conflict of interest arises", but the power has never been used in the 32 years that the Senate register has operated. So not reassuring.

Penny Wong fails to disclose freebies from foreign governments on time

Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong has breached interest disclosure rules, and consequently the ministerial code of conduct, by not declaring hospitality and transport she received last year from foreign governments within the required time. 

Wong accepted complimentary accommodation from the Indonesian government and ground transport from the Malaysian and Korean governments in the second half of 2025, but she didn’t declare the freebies until 31 March this year, well past the Senate register’s 35 day deadline for notifying interest changes.

Wong has in turn breached the ministerial code of conduct, which requires that ministers comply with their parliamentary interest disclosure obligations.

Open Politics does not suggest Wong's breach was deliberate, but we reckon the months-long delays in declaring the freebies warrants a contempt investigation by the Privileges Committee. However there is little to no chance of that happening because the committee has only ever investigated one senator for not declaring their interests since the register was established in 1994. (And the senator was found not guilty of contempt because the committee couldn't prove they had knowingly not declared their interests.)

This still leaves Wong's breach of the ministerial code of conduct. The code states that a minister “may be required to resign if the Prime Minister is satisfied that they have breached or failed to comply with this Code in a substantive and material manner."

In our view, what Wong has done is not a sackable offence but it's still a substantive breach deserving of public reprimand from the code's enforcer, Anthony Albanese. But that won't happen because since the 2022 election at least seven other cabinet ministers have failed to declare their interests on time and not been rebuked by the PM: Richard Marles, Jim Chalmers, Don Farrell, Tony Burke, Anika Wells, and Murray Watt. The repeated poor behaviour is utterly normalised.

Mr Pauline Hanson, formerly known as Barnaby Joyce, has declared a free flight from Brisbane to Sydney courtesy of Gina Rinehart's private company Hancock Prospecting Pty Ltd. He tried to make a virtue of this by adding "No cost to taxpayer", but of course freebies always come with a price.

The Labor Member for Melbourne Sarah Witty is proving to be a very different representative to the seat's previous occupant, Adam Bandt. That is, when it comes to investing and wealth accumulation.

While the former Greens leader owned only one house and no shares, Witty and her husband Paul have four properties - three of which are rental properties - and jointly own shares in eighteen companies. The Wittys recently added to their share portfolio with investments in AGL, Santos, Qantas, NAB, Medibank Private, and Computershare. Most of these companies are destroying the planet or ripping off their customers, but sin stocks tend to be good earners.

Labor MP Tracey Roberts recently declared her husband Pete has sold his Toyota and bought a second Mercedes. Because one is never enough.

So this is how the mining lobby gets its hooks into new politicians. First term WA Labor Senator Ellie Whiteaker has declared she went on a 'Pilbara Familiarisation Tour' last month courtesy of the Chamber of Minerals and Energy WA, which provided free flights, accommodation, and meals. No doubt the chamber also provided Whiteaker with a serving of propaganda on why the federal government shouldn't tinker with mining taxes.