Govt and Opposition trade blows over ‘spin doctor’ spend
The State Government and Opposition have traded blows over the amount spent on media advisers, with the latest Government Gazette revealing the millions of dollars taxpayers fork out for ministerial staff.
The Government’s multimillion-dollar spend on ministerial media advisers has come under attack from the state’s Opposition, but Labor has hit back, saying that the Liberals have more ‘spin doctors’ than MPs.
According to InDaily’s tallies, the State Government is spending $2,752,543 on ministerial media advisers. When the government’s Social and Digital Director, Senior Digital Content Producer, Senior Graphic Designer and Digital Content Producer were included, the number came up to $3.3 million.
The amount drew criticism from Shadow Treasurer Ben Hood, who said that “this is a Government and a Premier so obsessed with their own image they think nothing of spending millions of dollars each year to convince South Australians a bad government is a good one”.
“Put this into perspective, $3.3 million could employ 34 nurses, 29 teachers or 27 police officers,” he said.
“Instead, there are 21 people employed purely to make the Premier and his ministers look good.”
The latest Government Gazette showed that the government’s Director of Media and Communications, Adam Todd, was earning $201,958 a year, while the Premier’s Chief Media Advisor, Nick Harmsen, was on $195,017, and Pamela Perre, who is the Manager of Media Operations, was on $174,585 a year.
Of the 15 other ministerial media advisers, their salaries ranged from $135,000 for media advisers to $158,401 for senior media advisers, while the Premier’s Chief of Staff, John Bistrovic, was on $238,941 a year.
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In comparison, the Liberal Party was spending $323,500 on its two media advisers, with Chief Media Adviser Ben Avery on $166,750 and Media Director Hayley McDonald on $156,750, while $200,000 was spent on two senior communications advisers and $96,429.90 on two media monitors. The Opposition Leader’s Chief of Staff, Rowan Mumford, earnt $170,370 a year.
Health and Wellbeing Minister Blair Boyer said it was “simply remarkable” that Opposition Leader Ashton Hurn has more “spin doctors” than MPs in the lower house.
The latest Government Gazette listed all ministerial staff salaries, with a total of $16,177,770 spent on 108 State Government advisers and chiefs of staff, according to InDaily‘s calculations, while Opposition Leader Hurn spent $1,120,187 on her 12 office staff.
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