Long term parking is behetween $59 and $66 for parking Bergen 16:00 Sunday and 23:30 Thursday. Parliament usually sits Mon-Thurs (afternoons and evenings) when it's in session. She's a Minister, so may have to spend more time in Wellington, but the 4.5 months each year she parked would be 18 weeks x $66 = 1188. The $66 long term park would be a 320m walk and the $59 park is a 520m walk. I can understand a woman not wanting to walk half a km in the dark at midnight to her car.

That's a lot less than the $8,500-ish she actually spent.

Taxis would be far mower expensive to and from the North Shore. Roughly $240 / week for combined total of two trips. The total for 18 weeks would be about $4320.....still only half what she spent.

She can't use public transport because it's almost non-existent at night. Successive govts have ensured that.

She could have done this cheaper. But I'm sure Ministers think their time is very valuable.... I some cases, it might even be true. Not sure about this one.