A couple of weeks ago, the Canadian Taxpayers Foundation held its annual awards for the most egregious examples of wasted tax dollars. The winner in the provincial category was the Alberta legislature’s Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections, Standing Orders and Printing Committee which hasn’t met since 2008 but the 21 MLAs who serve on that committee have been paid $1,000 a month for “working” on that committee nonetheless.
The revelation immediately caused an uproar in Alberta. Progressive Conservative Premier Alison Redford, who must face the voters within weeks, immediately cancelled the pay program for this moribund committee.
The biggest challenge Redford and the PCs face is from the right, from the Danielle Smith-led Wildrose Party. Immediately after the CTF’s ‘award’ went to this Alberta legislative committee, two of the three Wildrose MLAs, Heather Forsyth and Guy Boutiller, said they’d give the money back they received for doing nothing. The third Wildrose MLA, Paul Hinman (who is also Smith’s predecessor as party leader) told reporters late last week that he was, essentially, entitled to his entitlements. As the Calgary Sun‘s Rick Bell notes:
Hinman said his “hat goes off” to his two colleagues but he feels he actually deserves more money after being short-changed on committee assignments where each committee increases an MLA’s annual paycheque by $12,000.
“If you want to look at MLA equity, they owe me tens of thousands if not $100,000 in back pay,” said Hinman.
Well, 24 hours after looking an awful lot like David Dingwall, the Wildrose party issued this terse statement on Hinman’s behalf:
“Alberta taxpayers do not owe me anything. I owe them an apology for poorly articulating my beliefs and those of the Wildrose Party. Wildrose supports a reduction in Cabinet pay by 30%, a reduction in MLA pensions by 65%, and a reduction in MLA salary by 5%. It is in that spirit that I will follow the lead of my colleagues and return all money I received from being a member of the Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections, Standing Orders and Printing.”
In the meantime, the MLAs from Redford’s Tories sure seem to be taking a chance, given that a provincial election must happen before the end of May. Here’s Bell again in Saturday’s Calgary Sun:
… no Tories, not a single solitary one, has offered up a penny and they’ve made up the vast majority of the do-nothing crew.
Instead, they shovel the usual you-know-what.
Just listen to Tory MLA Ray Prins, chairman of a committee that doesn’t meet for 40 months while the members get paid and he slurps up an annual $18,000 in do-nothing coin because he’s the chairman.
Guess the chairman who does nothing heading up a committee doing nothing is worth more money since he’s doing more of nothing.
“I have done nothing wrong. Why would I give the money back?” says Prins.
Good luck going to the voters with that line, Mr. Prins.
I have a feeling that quote will be a rallying cry for a large number of disaffected voters in Alberta. It will be an interesting election, to say the least.
When Hinman was MLA for Cardston-Taber-Warner from 2004 to 2008 and Leader of the Alberta Alliance the PC’s with held caucus research funding and starved his staff hiring budget. I believe that is what he is referring to in the first quote. He went to the members services committee on numerous occasions to have it corrected so he could get the same budget that each other member of the Assembly was ‘entitled’.
If you want to slag him for saying something stupid, that’s fine. But I hope you take the time to blog the rest of the story.
I live in the riding of Calgary Fish Creek, and would like to ask Ms. Forsyth: what is so righteous about giving back money after you have been caught?? It took an outside organisation to bring this issue to light. Why did none of the 21 people taking the money-for-nothing blow the whistle in 2008, or even 2009??
You can tell a lot about a person by their ethics and morals when nobody is watching. None, absolutely none, of these 21 people deserve once single iota of praise. They were ALL quite happy to take the money every month when they thought nobody was watching. Shame on you all.