Parties agree to boost MLA spending on offices, travel during closed-door meetings

The four political parties in New Brunswick's fractured legislature haven't been able to agree on much, but they have struck a deal on one thing: spending more taxpayer dollars on their own offices and travel.

CBC News has learned MLAs will now get more money for constituency work, including for their riding offices and for claiming mileage for some travel within those ridings. House leaders from the four parties will get salary top-ups or increases to existing top-ups.

The leaders of the two smaller parties say the changes, which will cost a total of about $1 million a year, will help them do their jobs better.

"It's not in effect to help the MLA, it's to help the role of the MLA in working for their constituents," said People's Alliance Leader Kris Austin.

More taxpayer dollars to cover MLAs' expenses

6 years ago

Duration 1:21

New Brunswick's four political parties don't usually agree on much. But they all agreed on this: spending more taxpayer dollars on their own offices and travels.

Green Leader David Coon agreed: "You can't be a good representative without necessary resources to run your office and serve your constituents."

But a lobby group that pushes for fiscal restraint said it's difficult to understand why additional funding for MLAs will make the system more accountable.

Paige MacPherson of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation said the increases are "the last thing they should be spending tax dollars on" after slashing the capital budget and cancelling the Francophonie Games to balance the budget and pay down debt.

"Increasing compensation for MLAs in one way or another just seems like the furthest thing the government should be doing as a priority right now," she said.

Members of the Progressive Conservative, Liberal, People's Alliance and Green parties agreed on the changes at three closed-door meetings of the legislative administration committee in November, December and March.

MLA salaries have been frozen at $85,000 since 2008, while the salaries that cabinet ministers receive on top of that are frozen by legislation at $47,443. The Gallant Liberals passed legislation locking in both amounts until 2021.

New and larger house leader salaries

One major change the committee approved at a Nov. 16, 2018, meeting is a standalone salary of $26,307 for the position of government house leader, now held by Saint John East PC MLA Glen Savoie.

No salary existed in the past because the post had always been held by a cabinet minister already getting extra pay.

The standalone pay "was initiated by the government, saying they thought there should be higher compensation for their house leader," said Liberal House Leader Guy Arseneault.

The committee then decided to apply an existing pay formula for party whips to the house leader positions, to "try to balance it off, and that way they'll be no argument as to where it goes or how much it should be," Arseneault said.

Arseneault's house leader top-up leapt from $8,000 to $19,730.25, and his counterparts Megan Mitton of the Green Party and Rick DeSaulniers of the People's Alliance each received an extra $2,500.

Coon and Austin both say their house leaders do a lot of work co-ordinating the legislative agenda with their counterparts. The pay "is very small, but it is enough to at least give them something there for the extra work that they're doing," Austin said.

Whips from smaller parties were already eligible for $2,500. Coon decided his three-member caucus didn't need a whip, a role that involves ensuring members are in their seats for votes and other duties, so no Green MLA is collecting the $2,500 whip's pay.

Miramichi MLA Michelle Conroy was the Alliance whip earning the new top-up.

"There's not a whole lot to that [whip's role]" with a three-party caucus, Austin said. "I'll be the first to admit that.

"But it is important then when you have committees going on, when you have votes that go down in the legislature, that the party whip makes the other member aware: the vote's going down and you have to be in here for the vote."

After this story was published Wednesday morning, an Alliance spokesperson said Conroy only learned from the story that she could refuse the position and the $2,500. She has now given up both, the spokesperson said.

Riding budgets boosted

At a Dec. 18 committee meeting, MLAs awarded themselves higher constituency budgets. They increased the amount they get for riding office, supplies and staff from $40,000 per year to $50,000.

"Forty thousand just wasn't quite enough," Austin said. "Fifty thousand is a bit more reasonable to do what you need to do as an MLA."

The assistants who work in their riding offices will also now qualify for public service pensions and benefits, a cost of $175,000 to the government.

Riding money includes mileage

And at a March 29 meeting, the committee approved allowing MLAs to bill taxpayers for mileage within their ridings if it exceeds 50 kilometres in a day, as long as they log it and justify it as legitimate MLA business. The money comes out of their $50,000 budget.

Coon said in some large rural ridings, MLAs were shouldering an "extraordinary cost" to travel long distances for events.

"They put on a lot of miles in bigger ridings," he said. "That never made any sense to me so we changed that."

Arseneault said it's a legitimate expense given constituents "want to see their MLAs, they want to have him or her at activities, have them attend meetings."

MLA travel claims boosted

At the Dec. 18 meeting, the committee also overhauled MLA travel allowances to offset recent changes by the Canada Revenue Agency that made some of the money taxable.

Travel amounts for sitting days, committee days and 40 additional trips per year have been standardized to leave MLAs with roughly the same net amount to cover expenses. They'll now get $150 per day plus meals and mileage for all three types of travel.

They also get more trips covered to places other than the legislature in Fredericton. In the past, four of the 40 trips outside sitting or committee days could be expensed if they were for caucus meetings.

Now, MLAs can claim up to 10 of the 40 for travel to places other than Fredericton, as long as they can justify it as MLA business. Travel for partisan party events is not eligible.

Party offices at the legislature

At the same Nov. 18, 2018, meeting where house leader salaries were boosted, the committee also created a new formula for funding the party offices at the legislature.

Each of the four parties now starts with a base budget of $250,000 and gets $25,000 per MLA in the caucus.

For the Greens and the People's Alliance, that's new: in the past, funding for so-called third parties was hashed out in an ad hoc way.

Under the new formula, the office for the five PC backbenchers will get additional funding worth 1.5 times the base budget, and the Official Opposition Liberals will get extra funding worth two times the base budget.

No one from the PC caucus responded Tuesday to a request for comment on the changes.