Deputy Prime Minister David Seymour argues MPs should have a travel spending limit

Deputy Prime Minister David Seymour says MPs should be given a set budget for travel, saying the status quo is "pretty crazy".

It came off the back of Seymour describing Air New Zealand as, "get woke, go broke" following its after-tax loss of $40 million for the first half of its current financial year.

Questioned on the flights that MPs take - with $1.3 million spent on MP domestic travel, which includes air and land travel, and $303,000 spent on Ministerial domestic air travel for the last quarter of 2025 - Seymour said it would be useful if MPs were bulk funded "and they had an incentive to make savings".

Top domestic air travel Ministerial spenders were South Islanders, - NZ First's Mark Patterson at $15,000, National's Matt Doocey at $13,400 and James Meager at $13,100, while Seymour was the second highest Minister at $14,100, and ACT Minister Karen Chhour was at $13,400.

For non-Ministerial MPs, those with $20,000 or above land travel costs for the last quarter included ACT's Parmjeet Parmar, Labour's Barbara Edmonds and Damien O'Connor, plus the Green Party's Hūhana Lyndon.

"MPs should be given a set budget," Seymour said. "It's pretty crazy, every household and business in this country you have a travel budget, and that actually limits your emissions."

"Parliament must be the only workplace in New Zealand where you have an unlimited travel budget, and as a result, you don't... face any penalty for additional flights. I've said there should be a cap budget for years."

He said it would be simpler than making MPs fly on the cheapest available flight.

"Because if you have a rule saying that you have to always take the cheaper flight and then they take one at 7.30 that costs more, when there's a cheaper one at seven, we're going to end up having these crazy arguments about whether you should have gone half an hour earlier."

Seymour said he looks over his MPs' travel budgets.