British Columbia has been slowly prying open the doors of accountability, but they clearly didn’t open wide enough or soon enough.
The report by legislature Speaker Darryl Plecas into the activities of two of his senior staff shows that there has been too little accountability in the way public money is spent at the legislature.
Taxpayers now have access to expense claims of MLAs, so they can ask questions and get answers. But the same public access didn’t apply to the expenses of legislature clerk Craig James and sergeant-at-arms Gary Lenz. Fortunately, acting clerk Kate Ryan-Lloyd has changed the policy since the scandal erupted.
Regardless of the outcome of the legislature’s investigation and the RCMP probe, it’s clear that greater scrutiny should have been exercised for years.
Clothes, luggage, gifts and other dubious purchases on foreign trips were approved as expenses with no apparent questioning. The trips themselves seem to offer little benefit to British Columbians.
Complaints about a “culture of entitlement” dog public officials, both elected and non-elected, and this case suggests the complaints are more than just the whining of perpetual critics.
It is depressing to see that the major overhaul of the legislature’s procedures didn’t go far enough, because safeguards that the public expected to be in place either weren’t there or weren’t honoured. The whole scandal will corrode public trust in the government.
When the doors of government are closed, it’s too easy to forget the people outside — the ones who pay the bills.
