It鈥檚 a measure of how quietly and comfortably politicians are taken care of that Premier Christy Clark could effectively get fired and not even notice it in her bank account.
When regular people lose their jobs they soon notice a side-effect 鈥� they stop getting paycheques. But sa国际传媒鈥檚 MLAs cooked up a way to ease that syndrome a few years ago in one of their secret sessions. They invented a transition allowance that keeps the cheques coming for 15 months after their departure date.
It鈥檚 such a gracious, seamless arrangement that Clark was apparently blissfully unaware that the legislative assembly was keeping her on the payroll even after she came up short in Vancouver-Point Grey and lost the seat. It wasn鈥檛 until my curious sa国际传媒 colleague Rob Shaw inquired about the financial details when a premier loses a seat that this came to light.
Clark reacted appropriately, stopping the cheques and promising to repay whatever she鈥檚 received to date. Her office said there was never any intention to take advantage of the transition funding. But it shows how loose her team has been on the details that this was allowed to occur in the first place.
She lost May 14, but her party won, so she obviously needed to arrange a byelection and run in it in order to carry on. So the idea that she鈥檇 be entitled to a transition or severance payout is ludicrous.
But no one thought to check with the legislature accountant to ensure no money was paid out.
When it was brought to light by Shaw, the premier鈥檚 office was caught by surprise and quickly scrambled together a response. No more transition money would be taken by Clark, and any received since the election will be paid back.
Part of the mixup may stem from the two-tiered pay system that many MLAs have. They all make a base amount of $102,000. That鈥檚 the salary that Clark forgoes because of her election loss. But she makes an additional $91,673 as premier, to which she is still entitled, even as a premier without a seat.
Regardless, taxpayers can consider the transition allowance a leftover irritant from the bad old days of the legislative management committee, which used to meet in secret and concoct that sort of perk with no explanation of their reasoning or even disclosure of their existence.
A transition allowance is a defensible measure. But it would go over a lot better if it were fully explained and disclosed and didn鈥檛 just kick in automatically with no indication that anyone has stopped to analyze each case to see if it鈥檚 applicable.
Clark set out Wednesday afternoon to make it an academic question, by announcing plans to run in Westside-Kelowna, which Liberal MLA Ben Stewart just won for the second time, the latest one with 58 per cent of the vote.
Stewart will be sworn in next week and will immediately resign to prompt a byelection to give Clark another chance at winning a seat.
The incoming/outgoing MLA is following a parliamentary tradition that is infrequent, but has played out in sa国际传媒 in the past. Both major parties have faced similar circumstances and engineered a way for leaders to get in, or back, to the legislature.
Financial arrangements were made for the retiree in both cases. But it鈥檚 unlikely Stewart will need any help. His financial disclosure form suggests he鈥檚 very affluent.
Clark made a number of hockey analogies in paying tribute to Stewart for offering his seat. But the one that seems most apropos is that he is now the guy who took one for the team.
Just So You Know: The press conference in which Stewart and Clark appeared was heavy on the Okanagan鈥檚 premier-producing history, as W.A.C. Bennett and his son Bill both represented the area during their respective terms as premier. With that in mind, Stewart picked an auspicious date to announce his plans to resign.
It was June 5, 1973, that W.A.C. Bennett resigned his South Okanagan seat to make way for his son. Bennett had won his seat in the general election the previous year, but his government was defeated. Bill Bennett won the September byelection by 3,000 votes.
