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Opinion: The gravy train must stop at the B.C. legislature

The B.C. legislature is a great place to work, but some of its employees have a problem following certain rules for handling tax dollars.
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The B.C. legislature is a great place to work, but some of its employees have a problem following certain rules for handling tax dollars.

Auditor-General Carol Bellringer’s report on the “expense policies and practices” in three legislature offices – the Speaker, the Clerk, and the Sergeant-At-Arms – documents all kinds of questionable expenditures. It makes for dismaying reading.

Bellringer’s team examined more than 4,700 financial transactions totaling $2.2 million that occurred between April 1, 2016 and Dec. 31, 2018. She raised questions about a lot of them, especially those relating to what appears to be a lot of travel by the occupants of those offices.

Questions abound about the purchase of expensive clothing, clothing accessories, sculptures and other artwork, as well as expensive and unexplained airplane travel.

There is an eye-opening itemized list on page 26. Someone or some folks from those offices spent more than $17,000 to buy seven sets of cufflinks, a tuxedo, two pairs of shoes, 14 shirts, one suit, a “uniform,” a silk robe, a vest and a couple of ties. 

None of this is terribly new, of course.

Her predecessor, John Doyle, raised serious questions about the dollars being spent in those offices in 2011. Current Speaker Darryl Plecas blew the whistle, taking his concerns to the RCMP and leading to an ongoing investigation overseen by two special prosecutors.

Plecas himself has yet to explain how travel expenses associated with his office grew by the greatest amount compared to the other offices on his watch (a 300-per-cent jump in one year).

Speaker Darryl Plecas. Photo Darren Stone/Times Colonist
Speaker Darryl Plecas. Photo Darren Stone/Times Colonist

But Bellringer’s report will likely have the most positive impact of any of the concerns and complaints associated with these abuses in the past.

That is because the legislature assembly and the MLAs have accepted all nine of her recommendations - without the cooperation of MLAs, it is hard to see how this kind of spending can be policed going forward.

MLAs from all parties have been complicit in this controversy over the years. The all-party management committee that is supposed to manage the assembly has rarely met over the years, and it had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the public light. For years, it was a rather secretive group.

The culture of entitlement was allowed to flourish for years as the honourable members essentially looked the other way. Bellringer’s report and recommendations will likely ensure that culture will gradually disappear.

Overall, we are not talking about a small amount of money. The legislature assembly spends more than $72 million a year and that number has been steadily growing.

It is indeed a great place to work, but those in charge of it need to step up their game. The province’s auditor-general has provided a pretty good road map to follow.

Keith Baldrey is chief political reporter for Global BC.