Wells repays $10,000 of travel expenses after husband’s AFL grand final trip

Communications Minister Anika Wells has been ordered to pay more than $10,000 back to taxpayers after the parliamentary expenses watchdog found she broke travel rules four times, including a trip her husband took to the 2025 AFL grand final.

Wells was made to pay $10,116 back to the public purse – $8093 of inappropriate travel expenses and a $2023 penalty, according to audit documents published by the Independent Parliamentary Expenses Authority (IPEA) on Friday.

But the expenses watchdog ruled the minister did not break the rules when she charged taxpayers thousands for a family reunion at the Thredbo ski resort and $1000 for making a Comcar limousine wait for her for seven hours outside the Australian Open.

A trip to Adelaide for a Saturday afternoon meeting with South Australian Health Minister Chris Picton, who is married to Wells’ friend Connie Blefari, and which coincided with Blefari’s birthday party, was also judged to be within the rules.

The minister referred herself to the expenses authority after an ongoing scandal stemming from revelations that she, a staffer and a public servant paid almost $100,000 for flights to New York to spruik the government’s social media ban. Wells, who is also the federal sports minister, came under further pressure over her husband travelling to three AFL grand finals at a cost of $9000 to the taxpayer.

Wells said in a statement released on Friday: “These were four cases where I chose what I thought was the more sensible, cheaper option, but those choices were not allowed according to the rules, which I accept and respect.

“I accept [the Independent Parliamentary Expenses Authority] assessment and I am sorry for making these honest mistakes. I have repaid the money with a penalty loading.”

On February 16, 2022, Wells’ husband Finn McCarthy travelled between Brisbane and Canberra to collect their children, as the minister had contracted COVID. The expense was charged as family reunion travel, however as McCarthy was unable to physically meet Wells she was ordered to repay the $1209 for her husband’s trip.

On May 10 last year, Wells’ family travelled to Canberra to visit her; however, she was not conducting parliamentary business at the time, and was ordered to refund taxpayers $5513 for the trip.

Wells had travelled to Canberra on May 9 to attend a Labor caucus meeting, while McCarthy and their children flew to Canberra from Brisbane the following day to attend her swearing-in ceremony at Government House on May 13. The family stayed with friends, so did not claim accommodation allowances.

On September 27, 2025, McCarthy travelled to meet Wells in Melbourne for the AFL grand final. This trip was deemed appropriate. However, McCarthy’s return flight to Brisbane was deemed to have broken the rules because Wells took an earlier return flight to Brisbane, meaning her parliamentary business in Melbourne had concluded. Wells was made to pay $726 for McCarthy’s return flight.

The two other AFL grand finals McCarthy attended were not deemed to have broken expenses rules.

On October 3, 2025, Wells hired a car which she used for a mix of parliamentary and personal business. She paid back a section of the cost, which totalled $644.

Wells charged taxpayers $1389 for her husband and two of their children to join her in Thredbo in June 2025. The minister met members of the Australian Paralympic Snow Sports team on the trip, and the expenses authority found that the dominant purpose of that trip was parliamentary business and was within the rules.

Taxpayers were billed $3600 for her trip to Adelaide to meet Picton. Picton’s wife Blefari is a former staffer to Julia Gillard, and the trio all worked as staffers during the Rudd-Gillard government.

In the IPEA report, Wells stated that her meeting with Picton “did not take place as scheduled in the afternoon due to the prior meeting running over. We instead held a sideline meeting during a function later that evening. I therefore estimate that my parliamentary business concluded at 7.45pm on 7 June”. That function was Blefari’s birthday party.

The watchdog cleared Wells of misusing her expenses on the basis that the dominant purpose of the travel was parliamentary business.

Revelations of Wells’ expenses last year started an imbroglio that caught MPs from across the political divide.

Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young was investigated and cleared of any wrongdoing for a $50,000 bill she racked up flying her lobbyist husband, Ben Oquist, to Canberra. She has since stated she will not use the allowance for that purpose again.

Coalition MPs Ted O’Brien, Michaelia Cash and Dan Tehan claimed a combined $9563 for travel, accommodation and Comcar transportation when they travelled interstate to Sydney, where they attended an event hosted by the Liberal Party’s fundraising organisation, the Australian Business Network.

Spokespeople for all MPs said they were conducting parliamentary business at the time.

Trade minister and Labor powerbroker Don Farrell charged the taxpayer $2200 to travel to Canberra on the same weekend he attended the wedding of a press gallery journalist, which he claimed was to conduct official duties, while Attorney-General Michelle Rowland repaid part of a $22,000 trip to Perth.

Opposition communications spokeswoman Sarah Henderson said Wells’ response to the saga was “tone-deaf” and that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had a responsibility to punish the minister. “He can enforce his own ministerial standards, or he can admit they are not worth the paper on which they are written,” Henderson said.

Albanese on Friday rejected assertions that Wells should resign.

“She’s paid back the money. We have IPEA … she referred herself to it, which was appropriate, and it was appropriate that she pay back the money. That has been done,” Albanese said.

The trip to New York, which began the scandal, was deemed appropriate by the expenses authority as the minister had “very limited flight options available to her through the contracted travel services provider”. The authority said Wells had taken “due regard to her obligation to ensure value for money”.

Read more on Wells’ expenses

• Rob Harris analysis: The optics on Wells’ $94,000 flights to New York are terrible
• Thredbo ski trip: Nearly $3000 of taxpayer money to bring husband and two children to resort
• Birthday party: Wells attended friend’s soiree during $3600 taxpayer trip

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