Balloons, cakes, clown charged to MPs’ expenses

BALLOONS, CAKES, EVEN A CLOWN CHARGED TO MPS’ EXPENSES

Balloons, cupcakes, magicians, clowns: It might sound like a shopping list for a children’s birthday party, but they are among the things that members of the Canadian parliament have expensed as part of their House of Commons hospitality budgets.

The National Post has crunched the numbers — based on expenditure reports for the 2015-16 financial year published by speaker Geoff Regan’s office — and explores some examples of how elected representatives spent taxpayer money last year. Today, in the first of a three-part series, we focus on entertainment and gifts.

The hospitality tab for all MPs came to $775,084, but some individual items raised eyebrows.

The biggest cupcake purchase, at $700, came from Conservative MP Mark Warawa, who can be seen introducing a giant Canadian flag made out of cupcakes — “very special cupcakes,” he says — in a YouTube video of a Langley event on Canada Day 2015.

As for the single biggest frosted item, NDP MP Charlie Angus takes the cake.

More than 300 youth activists from an indigenous rights campaign were invited to Parliament Hill Feb. 10 to celebrate a Canadian Human Rights Tribunal ruling that found the Canadian government had been discriminating against indigenous children.

“Some of these children had been involved in the campaign from their earliest days in grade school,” Angus explained. “It was worth celebrating in a big way.”

The cake from Artistic Cake Design, which cost $594, would have had about 400 pieces, based on an estimate from a representative of the bakery.

Other fun bulk food items offered at events included $769 worth of ice cream in St. Albert, paid for by ex-independent MP Brent Rathgeber — who famously quit the Conservative caucus — on Canada Day of 2015, and $1,340 worth of products from a Quebec ice cream shop bought by ex-NDP MP Raymond Côté the day after that.

“We clearly have provisions for hospitality, right? I think that the idea of them, for example, hiring clowns or buying cakes in and of itself is not a problem,” said Aaron Wudrick, president of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. “When it starts to look like the number does not mesh with what’s being purchased — like, you know, a cake should not cost $500 — these numbers get unreasonable.

“Part of the reason that we have this disclosure is it should pass the sniff test. If the average person looks at that bill and says, ‘I’m not sure that’s something my tax dollars should go towards,’ they probably shouldn’t do it,” Wudrick said. “We certainly hope (the transparency) leads to greater prudence in terms of how MPs spend their office budgets.”

According to House policies, hospitality expenses may include food, beverages, catering, equipment rentals, live entertainment and other costs associated with “meetings, non-partisan events and other functions.”

That gives MPs’ offices quite a bit of leeway.

Ex- Conservative MP Diane Ablonczy expensed $982 at Balloons Canada for a July 4, 2015, event in Calgary, while the Stampede was on. A thousand people are listed as having attended.

According to a salesperson from that company, this amount would have bought approximately 375 to 400 helium-filled balloons, or the labour to fill approximately 750 to 800 regular air balloons at the site of the event.

Another ex-Conservative MP, Tim Uppal, spent about $350 on helium gas for a May constituency event in Edmonton.

Entertainers are often invited to MPs’ events. Arnold Chan spent $300 on a “tropical steel band” as part of a Jan. 3 event, while fellow Liberal MP Shaun Chen spent $689 at the Phoenix Academy of the Arts in February, which covered a twohour performance by young people — including transportation costs, costume rentals and a sound system rental.

That program included classical Indian dance, a children’s drum group, a Mozart opera piece performed in German, a song performed in Chinese, Russian ballet, a Korean pop dance number and a martial arts demo, Chen said.

Some of the youngsters, including some who had disabilities, “would not normally get the opportunity to perform for a large public audience,” he said.

Ex- Conservative MP Chungsen Leung, meanwhile, spent $700 to have a Royal Canadian Legion pipes and drum band play at a Canada Day celebration. And ex-NDP MP Peggy Nash paid jazz vocalist Beverly Taft and magician Scott Dietrich $300 each to perform.

And another ex-Conservative MP, Brad Butt, spent $200 on a Canada Day performance by Twinkles the Clown.

One of the biggest single hospitality expenses came from Conservative MP James Bezan, who claimed an almost $3,000 bill from a company called Wilson Dunn, which makes promotional items. His office did not respond by press time to requests for more information on what the bill was for.

Promotional trinkets are likely to end up falling into the “gifts” category instead. For example, Conservative MP Marilyn Gladu, who spent the most on gifts out of new MPs at $3,793, said her office spent the money on flags and other such items as pens, pads of paper and shopping bags that include phone numbers and addresses for her constituency office.

Among those re-elected, Conservative MP Harold Albrecht spent the most on gifts, at $4,591. A staffer at his Hill office said his riding contains many maple farms, and Albrecht likes to offer small samples of maple products to those with whom he meets.

MPs spent a total of $151,496 on gifts.