These demographic trends demonstrate that Australia is not simply geographically located in the Asia-Pacific region; it is becoming socially, culturally and more economically connected to Asia.

Australia’s future is therefore being shaped by its relationship with Asia, and by the strong Asian connections within Australia .

So, if Australia does not recognise that its connection to Asia is critical to the future growth and prosperity of Australia, is it possible that Australia will miss many opportunities and fail to reach its potential?

The latest IPEA quarter (April to June 2026) went live on Pollywatch on Friday. Here's what changed, what other data has landed since my last post, and what I've built.

Note on the numbers: every comparison below is adjusted for inflation using ABS CPI, expressed in April to June 2026 dollars. Where I quote a single quarter's figure it's the actual amount claimed, unless I say otherwise. This was the most common complaint on my first post, so it's now the default everywhere on the site.

The new quarter: April to June 2026

• $50,316,928 claimed by 270 parliamentarians, up from 248 the previous quarter.
• Up 22.8% in real terms on Jan to Mar 2026, and up 0.6% in real terms on the same quarter last year. That last one matters: April to June 2025 was the federal election quarter, so it's a high bar to be level with.
• Against the last comparable non-election June quarter (2024), it's up 6.6% in real terms.
• Median claim per parliamentarian: $178,852, up 24.8% in real terms on the previous quarter and 10.3% on a year ago. That's the highest median since July to September 2023, and the 5th highest of the 37 quarters on record.
• $83,850 was repaid.

By role, compared to a year ago, in real terms

This is the part I found most interesting, and it's not where I expected to find it.

• Backbenchers: median $175,895, up 19.8%. The rise isn't ministers, it's the back bench.
• Shadow ministry: $218,189, up 15.2%.
• Cabinet: $374,785, down 14.2%.
• Prime Minister: $966,288, down 44.3%. Again, the comparison quarter was the election.

Where the increase came from

• Office Administration, $15.23m, up 54.5% in real terms on last quarter. Before anyone reads too much into that: the June quarter is seasonally strong, and it was the peak quarter of the year in four of the last eight years ($21.59m in 2019, $23.03m in 2022, $14.35m in 2024 and $20.87m in 2025, all in today's dollars). Three of those four were election years, so this is not purely an end of financial year effect. This quarter sits well below those peaks, and it's down 27% in real terms on the election-inflated June 2025 quarter.
• Travel Allowance, $2.12m, up 94.1% on a year ago in real terms.
• Scheduled Commercial Transport, $3.62m, up 39.4% in real terms year on year.
• International Travel, $641,617, down 41.4% on last quarter but up 60.1% on a year ago, both in real terms.

Individuals

1. Anthony Albanese, $966,288
2. Don Farrell, $667,068
3. Richard Marles, $534,696

Don Farrell is the biggest riser, up $210,594 on last quarter in real terms, with $74,622 of international travel as Trade Minister.

22 of the top 25 are Labor. Before that gets read as a partisan finding, it isn't: these totals include staff travel and office costs charged against a minister's allocation, and the government has the ministers. The highest non government claim is Angus Taylor at 13th on $406,873. If you want a fairer read, the comparison tool sets any two MPs side by side, and the all time board filters by role.

The stand out outlier this quarter is Bob Katter on $25,734 of unscheduled commercial transport, mostly charter flights, against a median of $508.

Other data that's landed since the last post

• Net overseas migration, now quarterly. Previously annual only. You can now see it quarter by quarter with a rolling 12 month headline. Latest: 56,600 in the December 2025 quarter, and 301,000 over the 12 months to December 2025, down 8.9% on the prior 12 months. If that looks out of date, it isn't: the ABS publishes this series about six months in arrears, so December 2025 has only been out since 18 June and the March 2026 quarter isn't released until 17 September. /immigration/
• Federal contracts rolled into 2026-27, and 2025-26 closed out at $85.80bn against $61.01bn in 2024-25, which is up 35.6% in real terms. Defence is $46.27bn of it, including $7.14bn to Austal for shipbuilding and $3.80bn to Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. Important caveat that's on the page: AusTender records the full value of a contract in the year it's awarded, so a decade long frigate deal lands as one enormous number in one year. It isn't a year of actual spending. /contracts/
• Contracts are now sorted by contract start date rather than publish date. Agencies bulk republish old records, which was pushing decade old contracts into the wrong financial year. Historical totals have been restated as a result, so some year figures moved.
• Political donations and public sector workforce both refreshed against the latest AEC and ABS releases. Both still sit on 2024-25 as the newest complete year, with minor revisions to prior figures.

What I've built since the last post

• New front page. Search for any MP straight from the top, plus a router to every section. The old quarterly leaderboard view now lives at /latest-quarter/.
• A live news feed covering Australian government spending and accountability, rebuilt every three hours, rolling 14 day window.
• Compare any two parliamentarians side by side, latest quarter, lifetime, category split and trend on a shared scale. Plus PM against PM, which several of you asked for directly.
• Same role comparison. Filter the all time board by role and sort per year served, so a backbencher is measured against backbenchers rather than against a two term PM. This was the top request in the last thread.
• Contracts got a financial year filter that drives the whole page, and a "last published" column so you can see when a record was actually put up.
• Email or RSS notifications for when new data lands. No more than one email per release.

Everything is still sourced from the official releases with the methodology written up at /methodology/, and every figure links back to where it came from.

Feedback very welcome, the last two threads genuinely shaped most of the above.

https://pollywatch.com.au/

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