B.C. MLAs will hand over control of their constituency expenses to a central office in the legislature after a fraud involving thousands of taxpayer dollars at a Victoria MLA’s office.
An all-party committee of MLAs voted this week in principle to the change, which will eliminate the bulk monthly cash transfers that MLA offices receive from the legislature. Instead, a central financial office will hold the money, and directly pay bills submitted by constituency offices.
The change will come into effect after the May provincial election.
“What is envisaged here really is to eliminate the transfer of funds completely,” said Finance Minister Mike de Jong, the legislative management committee’s ranking Liberal member.
“So the constituency office would notify the central office and the bill would be paid directly from there.”
The change comes after Marni Offman, a former assistant in Victoria-Swan Lake NDP MLA Rob Fleming’s constituency office, pleaded guilty in October to two charges of theft of more than $5,000 in public funds from the MLA’s office account between 2009 and 2015.
De Jong said the financial changes were “in large measure” a result of the fraud.
“MLAs have realized there was a vulnerability there,” he said.
MLAs receive $119,000 a year for constituency office expenses. The funds are transferred in bulk payments each month, except for rent and staff salaries already paid directly by the legislature. MLAs estimate they have between $15,000 and $25,000 left over each year that they can spend at their discretion on office supplies, advertising and other expenses.
Money that isn’t spent in any month stays in bank accounts held by each MLA. But under the new system, those bank accounts might cease to exist.
Auditors have in the past urged more control, noting it’s difficult to track the money when it is transferred in bulk, and that the bank accounts have little oversight.
NDP MLA Shane Simpson said the change will also ease staff workload. “I think generally people felt it was a pretty good idea,” he said, adding several details still need to be worked out.
MLAs have made other changes in recent years. They moved to new accounting software and now publicly report office, travel and other expenses — with digital copies of receipts — monthly on the legislature website.
