When you compare your own salary expectations with what you believe are those of an MLA, some people get hot under the collar. It’s not so much the base pay that a member receives ($52,000) that grates, but the tax-free expense allowance of $26,000 that gets added on.
It’s not inexpensive to be a member of the legislature. There’s a lot of travel, plus you have to maintain offices and sometimes residences both at home and in Edmonton. People who do similar work that involves a lot of travel and being presentable at all times would expect a generous allowance as well.
This is not to take a run at Alberta politicians. Rather, it is instructive to see how other provinces solve the problem of paying their legislative members, recognizing that the job comes with certain costs.
Nova Scotia recently experienced a public uproar over MLA expense allowances, after their auditor general pointed to a few egregious abuses of expense accounts.
Nobody needs custom-made office furniture costing $13,455 — at least nobody whose office is outfitted at taxpayer expense. Neither does an MLA need taxpayers to cover a $7,995 generator for a private residence.
One MLA tried to expense $6,234 for website design for his constituency office. Not good.
Taxpayers even groused when they discovered Premier Darrell Dexter got a $5,500 laptop at their expense, and a digital camera costing just over $2,000.
Of the total list of inappropriate expenses the auditor general highlighted, about 77 per cent has been repaid — including the laptop and office furniture.
None of this is going to make a big difference to the bottom line of a government, but taxpayers can recognize when certain principles have been breached.
That is, if they know they are being breached. So, to their credit, Dexter and his government decided to make all MLA expenses public.
There is no tax-free allowance for Nova Scotia MLAs, such as we have for Alberta. They get a flat base pay of $86,600. But they do get $12,600 a year for standard expenses, without requiring receipts, plus $18,194 for postage and travel and a living allowance of $20,400.
Or rather, they did. The basic allowance has been cancelled outright and their per diem travel rate has been dropped to $39 (it was $84), making it the same as for the civil servants who travel with them.
The government also cancelled its technology allowance for computers and cameras. Oh, and you can’t keep your office furniture when you leave office anymore.
For a government, this is more symbolic than anything. Like the other provinces (except Saskatchewan), Nova Scotia is in deficit. Its next budget must be a balance of service cuts and tax increases, and a symbolic cut, like the expense allowances, though small in the big picture, looms large to voters.
When Ralph Klein first began to tackle Alberta’s debt, he cut all provincial salaries — including his own — by five per cent, plus he eliminated the generous MLA pension plan.
Today, Alberta provincial salaries are back at the top of the nation and a transition allowance has replaced the pension — with a similar gold-plating.
But at the time, the symbolic gesture helped Albertans swallow a whole lot of cutbacks in the hard years.
Albertans may not need a similar gesture now. We are not facing the debt mountain of 15 years ago.
But the example shows that taxpayers are not altogether ignorant of the cost of doing an MLA’s business. We’re watching and we expect results for what we pay.
It shows we still know how to pass judgment.
Greg Neiman is an Advocate editor.