Greens MPs own millions in shares and properties despite policies targeting wealthy investors

More than half of the Greens federal MPs have either property portfolios or shares, despite the party’s policies cracking down on such investments.

All 16 Greens MPs and senators in the federal parliament have been given gifts of membership of the exclusive Qantas chairman’s lounge. 

Nine of them have also declared investment property or share holdings in the compulsory register of interests for politicians. 

Top of the pile is Nick McKim, a millionaire senator for Tasmania, who owns four properties, one of which he said is a ‘shack’.

He is closely followed by Greens deputy leader Mehreen Faruqi and Queensland MP Elizabeth Watson-Brown, who own three properties each. 

As well as his own home, Mr McKim owns investment properties in Nubeena and New Norfolk and another property in Nubeena that he describes as a ‘shack’. 

Further down in the declaration form, Mr McKim said he holds a mortgage on a holiday home. Daily Mail Australia has contacted him to ask if this is the ‘shack’. 

As well as his extensive property interests, Mr McKim has share in Mystate Bank Limited.

Fellow millionaire Elizabeth Watson-Brown, the Greens MP for the seat of Ryan in Brisbane, owns three properties, including a holiday home on the NSW north coast.

She also has an interest in an apartment building and sold a fifth property in January last year for $925,000. 

It may be that she had taken notice of the Greens policy lambasting ‘investors buying their fifth home’ while other families cannot get a first.

Ms Watson-Brown also has shares in Wesfarmers, Coles, and two banks – NAB and Commonwealth.

‘It’s vital that we get rid of tax concessions for wealthy investors so that it’s no longer easier to buy your fifth home than your first, and so that everyone is able to have a secure home,’ she said previously.

Ms Faruqi, a NSW senator and Greens deputy leader, co-owns investment properties with her husband in a Sydney suburb and the beachside town of Port Macquarie.

Originally from Pakistan, she also owns a 500 square metre parcel of land there in Lahore, of which she is the sole owner.

Greens MO for Ryan Elizabeth Watson-Brown is pictured making her first speech in the House of Representatives at Parliament House in Canberra, Thursday, July 28, 2022. Ms Watson-Brown owns three properties and has a share in an apartment building

Senator Penny Allman-Payne owns and investment property in Cleveland in her home state of Queensland, while Brisbane MP Stephen Bates entered parliament with shares Apple, one of the biggest companies in the world, before selling them in July.

The Greens website refers to Apple as a ‘tax dodger’.

Mr Bates said he got his Apple shares while working for the company in a retail position, earning $55,000 a year.

‘Companies like Apple provide share units in lieu of fair wage increases, on the condition that the employee remains with the company for three years,’ he told the Courier-Mail.

‘It’s my experience as an underpaid worker that makes me so passionate about pushing for multinationals to pay their fair share of taxes.’

Deputy Greens leader Mehreen Faruqi (pictured) co-owns three properties and also owns a 500 square metres parcel of land in Pakistan

NSW senator David Shoebridge has declared a BT Panorama Investment Account valued at ‘more than $7,500’, the minimum level at which such investments have to be declared.

Mr Shoebridge put down ‘Nil’ for real estate in his declaration, but then later in the form declares three mortgages on ‘investment properties held by spouse’.

Victorian senator Janet Rice declared shares in the Earthworker Co-operative and Pride of our Footscray and a holiday home at Sisters Beach, Tasmania, as well as her main residence. 

WA senator Dorinda Cox owns shares in the Bank of Queensland, and her SA colleague Barbara Pocock declared she owns a ‘block of land’ in Chiton.

Max Chandler-Mather, the new Greens MP for Griffith in Brisbane, recently joked on social media that his 2007 Toyota Yaris, which he calls ‘Bonesy’, did not meet the minimum value to be a declarable asset.