Assistant Treasurer Josh Frydenberg was the first government minister to appear on the ABC’s Q&A panel since Prime Minister Tony Abbott placed a blanket ban on all Coalition MPs from the show in June – but not a word was spoken about it during the program.

This came after a controversial episode aired in June where the ABC allowed convicted criminal Zaky Mallah into the studio audience, where he questioned Liberal MP Steve Ciobo on citizenship laws.

Last Thursday, ABC Managing Director Mark Scott confirmed Q&A would be managed by the news and current affairs division, moving away from the television department, which paved the way for the government to end its boycott of the program.

• ABC will move Q&A to news division
• Tony Abbott: ‘Heads should roll’ at the ABC
• ABC boss to PM: we’re Australian with a capital ‘A’

During the dispute, Mr Abbott had said that “heads should roll” at the ABC, while Mr Scott had said the ABC’s role of being an independent public broadcaster was “a vital one, central to our culture and our democracy”, but it should never become a “state” broadcaster.

Yet after months of see-sawing, Monday night’s program went on without a word spoken about the row.

But everyone seemed to forget about the stoush as soon as panelist and former Commander of the International Space Station Chris Hadfield started speaking.

Mr Hadfield wowed the audience with his epic stories of spacewalks and galaxy songs.

An audience member quoted Mr Hadfield as once saying ‘to fly a spaceship successfully you have to fundamentally change who you are’, and they wanted to know how he did that.

He created a YouTube clip with his son, seen by hundreds of millions of people across the world, of him on the ISS playing guitar and singing David Bowie’s Space Odyssey.

He said it helped communicate what was happening in space to Earth.

“(We wondered) how do we share (what we are doing)?” Mr Hadfield said.

“You can talk about the graphs and the charts, but we are running 200 experiments on the station and we set records for science utilisation and we were busy people.

“But at the same time it is a magnificent human experience, and I just tried to use every means I could think of to try to share that experience with other people.”

No space program for Aus as “we only have 23m pop”. Canada only has 35m but they manage! More #LackofVision from a useless govt! #qanda

— PollyanaSledgehammer (@HeerKittee) August 10, 2015

Mr Hadfield had the audience captivated as he described the moment of stepping out on a spacewalk.

“Launch was risky. The chance of death was one in 38,” he said.

“That the moment comes, you turn the hatch … and you pull yourself out into the universe, and suddenly you’re not on mother Earth.

“All those things that scare you have a richness that make them worth doing.”

• First space-grown vegetables on the menu for astronauts
• Astronauts find ‘another Earth’, possibly alive
• Star Wars-loving astronauts head to ISS

He also suggested that hit movie Gravity, starring George Clooney, wasn’t completely accurate, and that Donald Trump “was a drop kick”. Watch the Space Odyssey video below.

Former Speaker Bronwyn Bishop’s expense claim scandal was front and centre for much of the opening parts of the program.

News Ltd columnist and co-host of Studio 10 Joe Hildebrand said if you entered politics recently, you wouldn’t get the “ridiculous” entitlements that Mrs Bishop will be going out on.

“It’s hard to make these things – retrospective legislation is always a problem, even when dealing with something that the common person would see is an obvious rort, but the rules are the rules and in the case of travel entitlements, it would appear there are no rules,” Mr Hildebrand said.

Let’s get back to talking about space!! #qanda — Tom Cernev (@tomcernev) August 10, 2015

“But, you know, if that’s going to happen, maybe we should grandfather it, but certainly for new people coming in, I think.”

Host Tony Jones asked Mr Hadfield if he got a travel allowance while orbiting the Earth and whether it was on compound interest.

“I wish. I’ve been around the world 2937 times and gone above 60 million miles, I wish, but no,” Mr Hadfield said.

But Mr Frydenberg said some people will never be satisfied with what entitlements politicians get and cautioned against wholesale changes to the system.

“It is really important that we have a sense of balance here … when this committee meets and they make the recommendations to the Government,” Mr Frydenberg said.

“Because clearly some of the entitlements have been within the rules, but outside public expectations.

“But I don’t think we should seek to change the whole system to the point that it becomes unworkable or unreasonable.”

#qanda is this astronaut related to george clooney? #charisma

— john smith (@da20951997) August 10, 2015

The Assistant Treasurer said the entitlements debate had been a “pox on both houses” over recent weeks.

“At the end of the day we need to remember that it is the taxpayers’ money and we as politicians need to use that wisely,” he said.

“That’s why the PM has undertaken a root-and-branch review of the entitlement system. It has got bipartisan representation.

“I think it’s also important for the public to understand, politicians do spend a lot of time away from home, they are required not just to serve their constituency but to travel constantly, to appear before committee hearings and the like and that does cost money, and I just it is really important that we have a sense of balance here.”

Josh is right. Politicians spend a lot of time away from home. It’s unlike any other job that has ever existed, in that regard. #QandA — Not Tony Abbott (@notTAbbott) August 10, 2015

Will Tony now make a joke about Anne Summers being around since federation? #qanda #theirABC #nomanners #nopretence — Chris Kenny (@chriskkenny) August 10, 2015

Author and journalist Anne Summers said she understood the need for politicians’ travel entitlements, but they shouldn’t be taken advantage of.

“These provisions weren’t meant to take your family to Cairns or to Perth or to Uluru for a holiday with the kids flying business class. I don’t think any of us can see any value in that,” Ms Summers said.

“To be fair, though, it is very cruel to make children go to Canberra.”

The audience erupted into laughter.

“Unless they go via business class,” Mr Jones said.

“That’s right. Business class, you want wouldn’t to get off the plane,” Ms Summers responded.

Politicians’ pay should be doubled, and their entitlement should be tested the way tax deductions are #QandA — Julian Burnside (@JulianBurnside) August 10, 2015