Nile is doing well as a reward for backing O'Farrell -
since the O'Farrell government took power and the votes of the Shooters, along with the Christian Democrats' Paul Green and the Reverend Fred Nile, became vital to the government passing controversial laws such as the privatisation of electricity generators and the winding back of workers' compensation.
The windfall is due to a decision by the Premier to pay the chairs of general purpose standing committees for the first time. They are now paid $8722 on top of a new MPs' base salary of $143,00, plus an additional $8722 ''expense allowance''.
The decision has drawn the ire of the Labor opposition, who say general purpose committees often meet for little more than three hours during one fortnight a year for budget estimates hearings.
Under Labor, there was no remuneration for chairing the five general purpose committees because aside from a short meeting every three months, the job is largely to conduct budget estimates hearings, which takes up one fortnight a year.
Mr O'Farrell broke with tradition by appointing government MPs to chair most of the general purpose committees, rewarding factional heavyweights such as the right's Marie Ficarra and the Christian right's Matthew Mason-Cox.
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