Nationals senator Bridget McKenzie billed taxpayers to attend her son’s wedding in Tasmania, a new report has revealed.

Parliamentary expenses records show McKenzie charged taxpayers nearly $1,000 for the four-day trip in February 2023, including flights and accommodation.

After appearing at a Senate estimates hearing in Canberra on February 16, McKenzie flew back to Melbourne and then immediately boarded a flight to Launceston, billing taxpayers $328.99, the Sydney Morning Herald reports.

She then charged taxpayers $317 for one night’s accommodation in Launceston.

McKenzie’s son was married at a vineyard in Sidmouth on February 18, about 35km north-west of Launceston, the closest major airport.

The following Monday, McKenzie charged taxpayers $207.53 for a flight back to Melbourne, but that expense did not appear on her public expenditure record until more than a year after the wedding.

The party’s Senate leader used a total of $853.52 in public money for travel to Tasmania.

In wedding photos posted on social media, she could be seen socialising and dancing with a man presumed to be her son.

A spokesperson for McKenzie told the Herald the senator’s bookings were ‘undertaken in accordance with parliamentary rules as part of a multi-state campaign to expose Labor’s budget cuts to infrastructure.’

The spokesperson also said McKenzie undertook ‘legitimate activity as shadow infrastructure minister’ to expose cuts to Tasmanian road funding that had been disclosed during Senate estimates the previous week.

Her office also claimed the senator had repaid the Devonport-to-Melbourne return trip following the wedding on February 20.

In 2024, McKenzie also apologised for failing to declare 16 undisclosed flight upgrades with Qantas, including on five personal flights to or from New Zealand between 2016 and 2018.

She also billed taxpayers nearly $30,000 for accommodation, flights and chauffeur services to attend 21 sporting events, despite losing the sports portfolio in 2019.

According to Remuneration Tribunal records, federal MPs had a base salary of $217,060 in February 2023, with a 25 per cent bonus for a shadow minister taking McKenzie’s pre-tax salary to $264,062 a year.

It comes just months after McKenzie called for Communications Minister Anika Wells to step down, slamming her as ‘very arrogant’ amid a furore over her travel expenses, which saw Wells’ team rack up around $90,000 on a trip to the United Nations.

‘What you’ve got with this minister is that that was an incredibly lavish spend, to spend six and a half minutes on stage for the United Nations in the middle of the Triple Zero crisis happening here at home,’ she told Sky News in December.

‘I think there is an issue around character when it comes to making the call to travel in that moment, and there is also an issue that is under investigation around the quantity of spending for that trip, for her and her staff now the broader travel issue is being investigated by IPEA.’

Earlier this month, Wells apologised for four four trips she took on the taxpayers’ coin that were against the rules for federal politicians.

The Independent Parliamentary Expenses Authority found the trips were outside the rules, with the minister forced to repay $10,116, including a 25 per cent penalty loading. 

The Daily Mail has contacted McKenzie for comment.