In these tough economic times, this is truly terrible:
Money is tight for most British Columbians these days. But you wouldn’t know it from the way some politicians are burning through your cash over at the B.C. legislature.
Double dipping on housing allowances, using public money to film faux-documentaries, and big pay packages for superfluous new special advisors are just a few of the most recent examples of your tax dollars getting flushed down the proverbial toilet.
MLAs from all parties quietly voted this week to let themselves rent out rooms in their taxpayer-funded Victoria condos—to each other. The move clears the way to double dip on housing allowances to the tune of almost $52,000 annually.
The policy changes, made at the Legislative Assembly Management Committee, will permit an MLA who owns a residence in Victoria and is already receiving up to $25,983 per year in an allowed “capital city living allowance” to cover their mortgage, to also rent a room in their unit to another MLA, and then draw up to $25,983 in rental allowances from that same colleague.
The double-dip scenario means the MLA would walk away with up to $51,966, depending on the rental agreement and what is determined to be “fair market rent” at the moment.
It warms my heart knowing that our politicians are looking after themselves financially. Perhaps this will rub off.
It does appear they’ve written themselves a raise, perhaps this is taxed, but that’s not the point. The appearance is… it’s taxpayer’s money, made into dirty money.
Showing once again that winning an election isn’t much different than winning a lottery.
The writer doesn’t like the documentary – boo fcking hoo, asshole – so he bitches about it within the same context of the double dipping. If it was a pro-genocide, We Indians Been Harmed propaganda piece I’d bet it wouldn’t have been mentioned. Fckoff.
“Everything government says is a lie and everything it has it has stolen” – Friedrich Nietzsche
Hang the f*ckers.
I’m missing something from this.
How is renting a room to an MLA double dipping? Wouldn’t it just be “the MLA pays rent to the landlord, who happens to be an MLA?” How is it different than him paying Larry the accountant next door to rent a place? Or from renting to Janice the taxidermist?
Surely, the issue should be that an MLA is permitted to rent out part of a property for which they receive an allowance, not who they rent it to.
To be clear, I’m not defending MLA spending. I’m simply not convinced BIV (an MSM outlet) is giving us the unvarnished truth. It feels a little like outrage baiting for views
The MLA’s have their own home. They rent a condo near the B.C. Legislature for convenience and that cost is recoverable (paid by the taxpayer) to a maximum ~$26,000 per year. They then get to rent that condo to another MLA who also qualifies for the $26,000 and that amount goes to the first MLA. That one MLA receives $4,330 per month from the tax-payer for a condo that doesn’t cost that much to lease so the MLA is potentially making a profit from such an allowance. They don’t mention whether it’s a taxable benefit or not but why not just increase their salary and eliminate such benefits?
So the issue isn’t whether the tenant is allowed to sub-let. The issue is whether one condo qualifies for 2 subsidies.
Why do elected officials get so many perks & privileges?
Put them in low-income housing blocks.
Get Carney’s Brookfield to build them to guarantee their Soviet-style oppressiveness.
Ok.
I think it’s debatable whether or not the people should pay for MLAs to live in Victoria. I can see the argument, but $2300/month seems rich.
But I’m not convinced, if “we” decide to pay MLAs a housing allowance, that it shouldn’t follow the MLA rather than the residence. If we wanted that, then I say we build barracks ( they can bee nice) for them to use when in Victoria. There’s merit in that, when I think of it.
Just including it with the salaries has merit, too.
Leftist politicians are abusing their power to steal money? Say it ain’t so!
Remember to vote for socialist politicians and maybe just maybe they’ll cut you in on the graft.
It seems to me that One BC is using the money wisely. The limpwristed author gets its panties in a knot over a documentary exposing the BS and Extortion grift.
When I hear of people in the construction industry who evade federal tax, this is the sort of thing I think of as they’re rolling it around trying to make it sound like something it’s not.
Half ways down in the article…
“Meanwhile over at OneBC—the splinter group nobody actually voted for—tax dollars are now financing a feature film.”
Has Rob Shaw, who has covered this for 17 years, never looked at an election ballot to note that the “x” is beside the name of the person for whom they vote for, and nobody actually “votes for a party” ?
Yes, I know most folks say for example, “I’m voting for “this party” … but they’re not, they’re actually voting for a candidate. It’s right there on the ballot.
When I “googled” the title of this documentary for more info, the AI now placed at the top of Google’s search findings appears word for word what Rob Shaw has published.
But the article doesn’t say where’s the film is “featured” at the top of any movie theatre bill, even though Rob Shaw uses the term without reference. It’s the sort of term lazy journalists use to describe other topics they rally against like “big oil” or “big tobacco” and now in Canada we’ve got.. “big Indian”.
How long for denialism to be written into the criminal code?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtC16LgEnVE
Canada is just a suburb of Minneapolis.
With all of the mortgage fraud allegations now making the news in America and now this, it is waayyy past time to cure this tax loophole once and for all. The solution is taxpayer run government housing for all sitting members of legislative bodies in the respective capitals. A government build apartment block of single bedroom apartments for the accommodation of elected representatives while they are in office run by a rotating management team selected randomly for each government term. The simplicity is breathtaking and it can be applied across the board for both federal and provincial capital cities.