The Time Philip Ruddock Opposed Double Dipping by Retired MPs

Revelations that fomer Minister and Member of Parliament, Philip Ruddock, has continued to receive his full parliamentary retirement benefits whilst in receipt of payment for his role as the Government’s Special Envoy on Human Rights are at odds with a stance he took early in his parliamentary career.

In Senate Estimates for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade yesterday, the Department indicated that Mr Ruddock’s parliamentary pension had not been reduced, as a result of legal advice on the status of his role as a “Special Envoy”. The DFAT officer to which the role reports,  Dr Lachlan Strahan, First Assistant Secretary, Multilateral Policy Division, told the Estimates session that Ruddock had obtained the legal advice on his own initiative.