THE Federal Government has spent nearly $2 million on April's 2020 Summit and the bills are still coming.

The $1.9 million price tag includes $100,000 to the summit's project director, former Tasmanian public servant Linda Hornsey.

An outlay of $11,000 went to build a time capsule storing the comments of summit participants for future Australians to discover.

In a Senate estimates hearing yesterday, Mike Mrdak, deputy secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, said expenditure to date was $1.9 million. "We still have a number of invoices to come in and settle," Mr Mrdak said.

One of the key contracts was with the University of Melbourne's vice-chancellor's office for $317,000.

Vice-chancellor Glyn Davis was co-chairman of the summit with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.

Mr Mrdak said payment to the university related to summit "program content and development".

A payment of $100,000 went to Ms Hornsey, a former head of the Tasmanian Department of Premier and Cabinet, who was hired after the April 19-20 summit was announced in early February.

Mr Mrdak said Ms Hornsey had put her name forward and was judged the best person for the job because of her prior involvement in the Tasmania Together project. "When the summit was announced, she expressed an interest in being involved," he said.

One of the more unusual bills was for the time capsule.

Mr Mrdak said the time capsule was intended for display in Parliament House. "Each of the participants in the summit were asked to make a personal commitment to the action they will undertake to make Australia better by 2020," he said.

"(It was recorded) and put into the time capsule. The intention was this would go on public display and be opened in 2020."

AAP