The ACT's MPs are relatively cheap for taxpayers compared with some of their colleagues.
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Finance Department figures for the costs of parliamentarians for the period April 2011 to December last year show the big spenders are ministers.
The department is also clamping down on MPs incurring additional costs, such as changing the location of their electorate office.
Newly elected Liberal senator Zed Seselja is taking over the office of his predecessor Gary Humphries and would like to move out of Civic when the lease expires.
Labor MP Andrew Leigh says, however, his similar proposal was blocked. When he was elected in 2010, he wanted to move the office from Braddon closer to the centre of the electorate of Fraser, which covers the northern half of the ACT.
Former Eden-Monaro MP Mike Kelly said in July he had no say over the fit-out of his electorate office, which cost $500,000.
He said the costs were partly due to extra security and communications issues related to his position as Minister for Defence Materiel.
The costs were triggered by the relocation of his Queanbeyan electorate office because the owners of the original site were redeveloping.
Canberra-based MPs say they would probably be at the bottom of the spending list if office accommodation costs were not so high in the capital.
Federal parliamentarians are permitted to have up to 30 domestic overnight stays a year and are entitled to a travel allowance of between $250 and $400.
The Remuneration Tribunal says an ACT senator who lives within a 30-kilometre radius of Parliament House will be paid $84 for each day he or she attends sittings of Parliament.
Gai Brodtmann, the member for Canberra covering the southern half of the ACT, travels to Norfolk Island, which is part of her electorate. An ACT senator is allowed an extra 11 nights' travel allowance each year to Norfolk Island.
As Sports Minister, Senator Kate Lundy travelled extensively around Australia and represented the nation at the London Olympics.