Next thing you know we'll be hearing Johnny has spent $3000 of taxpayers' money on one of these... perhaps using $110000 worth of champagne and fine wines to flush!
The most galling thing about this flagrant misuse of public money is the fact that John Howard needed to spend almost $20 000 of taxpayers' money for a 'design expert' to 'advise' on the style of chairs being selected.
John Howard and his ministers are the proud new occupants of a $200,000 set of executive chairs for the cabinet room. Ordered long before the Coalition took a dive in the polls, that amounts to almost $3000 a chair.But last night the Prime Minister pulled the pin on a $500,000-plus renovation of the private dining room in his Parliament House offices, revealing the Government's sensitivity to election-year accusations of extravagance.
The about-face came despite Senate estimates being told yesterday that design work costing $65,000 was well advanced on the plan to knock down a wall so Mr Howard's dining room could be enlarged for more guests.
[...]
Senate estimates was told the Government had already bought the 36 executive leather chairs for the cabinet room at $2885 apiece. It had bought another 28 slightly cheaper chairs - $2707 each - for the adjoining cabinet committee room. They had a lower back.
The $179,656 purchase cost comes on top of just over $18,000 spent on engaging design experts to advise on the type of chairs.
Heck, you'd think for $20 000 you could get someone to make you the chairs too. Can't blame the 'design expert' though- I'd happily accept $20000 to tell someone what would look good in their dining room without my having to lift a finger and do any work. Sounds like a great job!
Yet it seems we're always hearing about people rorting Centrelink benefits. Why doesn't the government 'employ' dole recipients to tell it their thoughts on the 'style' of chairs they think would look best in the PM's dining room? I'm sure they'd do it for, oh hell, let's say the bargain price of $10000. That's more than a person's annual income on the dole anyway!
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As an aside, I recently heard the phrase 'executive size' used as a euphemism for small penis. It was in relation to rich wankers and their flamboyant 'mid life crisis' cars, but I think 'executive size' might also apply just as well to rich megalomaniacs who waste public money on flamboyant $3000 chairs...
2 comments:
He also paid something like 50,000 for a wine consultant to choose wine for the cellar a couple of years back.
Also, in relation to this, how funny was Ikea's rejoinder?
The average welfare fraud conviction is about 4 Howard-worthy chairs.
That's quite a lot of money.
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