Late Friday afternoon before a week in which MPs will be back in their riding, the House of Commons Board of Internal Economy — the secretive all-party committee which supervised the House of Commons budget, including members' office budgets and expenses — released a suite of minutes from various pre-Christmas meetings.
There is not a whole lot of detail in the minutes — apparently the board has an issue with an unnamed MPs Ottawa residence expenses and another unnamed MP wants his legal bills covered by taxpayers while s/he is being sued by a constituent.
But we do have this information:
- MPs may not charge Apple iPads against their office equipment budgets. A handful of MPs like James Moore, Stockwell Day, and Gerald Keddy have been showing up in the House of Commons with Apple's popular tablet computer rather than bulky briefing books. Those MPs and any others that want to switch to the iPad will have to find another way to pay for $800 item.
- The BOIE decided that MPs may no longer charge the purchase or rental of pieces of art against their office budget. MPs may purchase and expense decorative items but only if those items cost less than $100 (including the cost of framing).
- The BOIE also decided that Friday, Dec. 24, 2010 was, in fact, a work day on Parliament Hill.
None of this stuff really makes a difference in terms of actual expenses. MP expenses always exceed MOB they make up for it by expending certain items to their riding associations. Making an MP pay for an iPad from MOB just means that the riding association will eat the cost of a flight or two.
That being said, most of our MPs our pretty frugal because they know the public is watching. Democracy works both ways, you know.
Seems very shortsighted. We should be encouraging our elected officials to use technology as much as possible. An iPad could be a much more useful tool than a laptop or desktop computer to someone on the go like MP's typically are.
If I was in charge of things, I'd buy each MP an iPad and offer training on how to use them.
I would be curious to know if MPs have paid for the iPads, or received them other ways. My memory may be wrong, but I believe Heritage Minister James Moore had his iPad before they were available for sale in Canada.
Apple has a horse in the Bill C-32 race, given they are one of the strongest proponents globally of the type of non-owner locks on technology protected under the “technical protection measures” aspect of that bill. It was Heritage Minister Moore, not Industry Minister Clement, who convinced Mr. Harper to back Moore/Apple's position on this critical policy.