UCP MLA apologizes for flipping bird to health minister staffer at legislature
FORT MCMURRAY UCP MLA for Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo Tany Yao is apologizing after the province’s health minister accused him of giving one of her staffers the finger in a hallway at the legislature.
In a Wednesday evening post on Twitter, Minister Sarah Hoffman made the accusation.
She asked UCP Leader Jason Kenney why the incident took place “if decorum is so important to you?”
She added, “Apparently he was supposed to pass it on to me.”
Yao said the action “was done in jest” and “was clearly inappropriate and not consistent with the tone our leader has set.”
“I apologize wholeheartedly and without reservation for this,” he wrote.
On Thursday, Hoffman told reporters at the legislature that Yao should have brought any disagreements he had to herself directly and not to her staff. “All this talk about how we’ve been so classy, we don’t bang on our desks, feel free to bang on your desks, just don’t flip off my staff,” she said. “I think that there’s a new barrier that’s been crossed when you do it to someone’s staff.”
Since the 2015 election, this is the second time an MLA has apologized for flipping someone off at the legislature.
In 2016, NDP MLA Michael Connolly apologized for making the gesture towards opposition MLAs during debates.
At first, Connolly denied he raised his middle finger but said he “tried to throw my hand up in the air as a signal of frustration.”
Eventually, Connolly apologized and told reporters he did not “intentionally mislead the house,” but did not realize the seriousness of his actions at the time.
“It was just the heat of the moment,” he said.