Harper's baseball trip hit taxpayers for more than $45,000

[Drongoman]

Try googling "Jack Layton's Expense Reports" or something like that.

I did, look what came up GF!

MP expense reports and Layton has the highest

OTTAWA - Canadians paid out $5,230 for Stephen Harper's phone bill last year and $2,295 in postage for Michael Ignatieff.



Those are some of the smaller expenses Canadians can browse online now that MPs expenses are posted in full.

In total, the prime minister's expenses came to $281,255.67, compared to Ignatieff's $570,984.10.

The expenses released are what each MP charges the House of Commons through their MPs expenses. Most of Harper's expenses would be paid through the Prime Minister's Office.

Among party leader's, NDP Leader Jack Layton racked up the highest expense account despite being the leader of the smallest party. Layton billed taxpayers for $628,913.68, including $14,676 for his phone bill and $49,013 for "Ten percenters" -- the campaign-style mailings that MPs are allowed to send out on the taxpayer dime to ridings held by political opponents.

http://www.thesudburystar.com/community ... x?c=141857

[Static]

The true cost of the baseball trip will never be revealed.
All costs related to security are hidden from public scrutiny because of so called "National Security" reasons.
So any and all security costs are simply absorbed by us. They could add up to 10 or 20 million dollars in hidden expenses. You can't even run the plane for $45,000.
Seats for example at the game. Canada probably bought the entire section surrounding the PM for security reasons and populated them with private security personnel. The list of security expense is endless, all for a PM who acts like a spoiled child.


How many billions were spent on security for the G20 summit? We only know about the public one billion dollars. What about the hidden "National Security" expenses?

When it comes to "National Security" friends of the government are on the gravy train.

How would security and other hidden costs for a baseball game even come close to $20M, or $1m for that matter? I have been to private parties where the people have chartered 2 boeing jets to fly 300 people for a week in Mexico, rented a complete resort, had the Symphony of Fire people do the fireworks, armed security and motorcade, for $1m. But, I am interested to see your breakdown though.

[econovan64]

How would security and other hidden costs for a baseball game even come close to $20M, or $1m for that matter? I have been to private parties where the people have chartered 2 boeing jets to fly 300 people for a week in Mexico, rented a complete resort, had the Symphony of Fire people do the fireworks, armed security and motorcade, for $1m. But, I am interested to see your breakdown though.

removed - Jennylives.

Harper managed to hide all but $45,000 under National Security. Ottawa budgets billions and billions under that heading. Whats 20 million when you have billions to throw around.

How would Harper feel safe in a US ball park when he doesn't feel safe on a commercial jetliner. But the rest of us are told its safe.

[Urbane]

Among party leader's, NDP Leader Jack Layton racked up the highest expense account despite being the leader of the smallest party. Layton billed taxpayers for $628,913.68, including $14,676 for his phone bill and $49,013 for "Ten percenters" -- the campaign-style mailings that MPs are allowed to send out on the taxpayer dime to ridings held by political opponents.

http://www.thesudburystar.com/community ... x?c=141857

Very interesting. I'm looking forward to what Econo has to say about this.

[econovan64]

Among party leader's, NDP Leader Jack Layton racked up the highest expense account despite being the leader of the smallest party. Layton billed taxpayers for $628,913.68, including $14,676 for his phone bill and $49,013 for "Ten percenters" -- the campaign-style mailings that MPs are allowed to send out on the taxpayer dime to ridings held by political opponents.

http://www.thesudburystar.com/community ... x?c=141857
Very interesting. I'm looking forward to what Econo has to say about this.

And how many baseball tickets are included in this? I don't see any reference to baseball tickets.

All that shows is how much harder Layton worked and how much more work his office got done, probably while Harper was attending baseball games at public expense.
removed - Jennylives

[Urbane]

And how many baseball tickets are included in this? I don't see any reference to baseball tickets.

All that shows is how much harder Layton worked and how much more work his office got done, probably while Harper was attending baseball games at public expense.

Maybe you should start a new thread about your pet peeve instead of cluttering up this one with off topic crapola.

I see Harper and baseball in the current topic, but not in your post.

If there had been any doubt (there wasn't) we've now smoked you out.

[grammafreddy]

How would Harper feel safe in a US ball park when he doesn't feel safe on a commercial jetliner. But the rest of us are told its safe.

You say that as if it was his choice to fly on the government jet rather than a commercial one. Do you think he has a choice about what kind of aircraft he uses?

[econovan64]

How would Harper feel safe in a US ball park when he doesn't feel safe on a commercial jetliner. But the rest of us are told its safe.

You say that as if it was his choice to fly on the government jet rather than a commercial one. Do you think he has a choice about what kind of aircraft he uses?

He has a responsibility to lead by example. He dictates cuts and he squanders money openly.

Choices he has include acting responsibly in his own affairs which he clearly chooses not to do do.

When it comes to safety in public he is a sitting duck at a US sports stadium for any terrorist to take a pot shot at. How many security people does it take to secure a stadium full of fans?

If he wants to go gallivanting all over the continent and take in entertainment he should be doing it on his own dime. Buy his own plane, hire his own body guards or pay the full cost of such a lavish lifestyle.

Aircraft are very expensive to buy, to operate and to maintain. Apart from the millions they cost to buy they use millions in operating costs and every so many hours they are completely refit, that means torn down and everything rebuilt. Not like cars that can be nursed along forever. An aircraft must be in top shape at all times. This is measured in hours, anywhere from 1200 to 3000 hours between total refits that cost more millions. So the hours wasted flying on personal trips ad up and bring on the overhaul much sooner. Hidden cost s again not accounted for by Harper.

Trudeau for example was known to go on dates with celebrities like Barbra Streisand. A classy guy who did these things on his own dime and captured the nations imagination while doing it. Meanwhile he wasn't gutting programs that peoples lives depend on to meet US corporate demands.

[Static]

Econo, one is able to charter a Challengar Jet, similar to the one the PM uses, from New York to London for $22,000. That is via a private charter that has profit built into the price. Considering he took a 2 hour flight, the PM's would cost no more than 40% of that since the jet does not have to be run for profit. Furthermore, he is not a target for terrorism, so the security would most likely be no more than 10-15 people. Foreign governments tend to provide most of the security as well, so I doubt PM brought that many.

He is our PM, and obligated to represent Canada properly. Going to a baseball game on the taxpayers dime while he is away for business is OK to me. Even if he did not conduct business, the cost to the tax payer would be peanuts. As a taxpayer, I see nothing wrong.

[econovan64]

He is our PM, and obligated to represent Canada properly. Going to a baseball game on the taxpayers dime while he is away for business is OK to me. Even if he did not conduct business, the cost to the tax payer would be peanuts. As a taxpayer, I see nothing wrong.

That may be fine during times of economic growth and full employment. But we have high unemployment and here is a PM who has invoked an austerity budget cutting back much needed services in every direction you can imagine and many you cannot..

For example "A group dedicated to improving health outcomes for Canada's Inuit says it won't be able to carry on with much of its work because of a loss of funding from Health Canada." http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2012/04/16/pol-health-cuts.html

Harper probably lumps these people in with the ghetto dwelling Asians and Easterners who didn't vote Conservative eh!

On closer examination many of his cutbacks are intended to disable his "enemies" Elections Canada for example.

The man is is like a school yard bully working on his way to becoming dictator. He is not leading by example. The message is clearly, "Do as I say, not as I do".

And again, the cost of the aircraft. If the private sector can supply it for $22,000 then you know the feds are paying multiple times that as they do for everything. And most of the costs of his ball game are hidden from public scrutiny.

[Drongoman]

Trudeau for example was known to go on dates with celebrities like Barbra Streisand. A classy guy who did these things on his own dime and captured the nations imagination while doing it. Meanwhile he wasn't gutting programs that peoples lives depend on to meet US corporate demands.

A prime minister going on dates with Barbra Streisand is setting a good example? Classy guy? Oh my goodness gracious. Wowsers. It's amazing how history can be revised so easily from the truth. Trudeau squandered billions of dollars of taxpayer money with stupid decisions, including introducing the bilingualism policy that is still costing us billions per annum today. Ask the people of Salmon Arm, whom Trudeau gave the finger to in 1982, if Trudeau is a "classy guy". He was one of if not the worst prime minister this country has ever had, bar none, and you really should stop using him, and his dates with Barbra Streisand, as an example of what our prime minister should be like, if you want to be taken seriously (though I think that ship sailed awhile ago).

[Urbane]

This thread is nothing more than an "I hate Harper" thread. Most people understand that there are protocols when the PM travels and they also agree that he deserves some vacation time. It's a complete non-issue.

[econovan64]

Trudeau was PM during a period of economic stability, high employment like we have never seen since and low youth unemployment. However he never once claimed to be responsible for such good times. He was riding the wave of global prosperity. Harper sees a blip of .001% drop in unemployment last week and tries to take the credit for it. However he does not take responsibility for the record high unemployment during his entire rule.

I recall the Trudeau era very well as a young man. You couldn't walk down the street in any town in this province at 10 AM without people stopping and asking if you wanted a job. Those days are long gone.

Trudeau didn't kiss American *bleep* and didn't bow to the queen. He had style and flair and was always smiling, but dealt with serious problems decisively when he had to. No proroguing from his leadership. No running and hiding in the shadows. He faced a lot of criticism but always lived up to his beliefs in this nation. Not the USA.

You can ride Harper all the way to the dump.

[econovan64]

This thread is nothing more than an "I hate Harper" thread. Most people understand that there are protocols when the PM travels and they also agree that he deserves some vacation time. It's a complete non-issue.

Vacation time? The PM has many vacation options, existing and already paid for by us.

[Drongoman]

Trudeau was PM during a period of economic stability, high employment like we have never seen since and low youth unemployment. .

I do like your ability to spin the past into some romantic version of what things were really like, but you are pretty much dead wrong about Trudeau in every way possible. You are right about the global prosperity, but it is to weep to think where we'd be as a nation if we hadn't had such a giant loser of a prime minister as Trudeau, and instead had had a decent man with integrity and brains like Robert Stanfield as prime minister instead. Canada is strong, thanks to courage of Paul Martin, and now Steven Harper in staying the course, but they had to come a long way in righting a ship that was put asunder by the policies of Trudeau, and then the deficit spending of the Mulroney years.

Pierre Trudeau inherited a strong, growing and diversified Canadian economy.

When Trudeau at last left office for good in 1984, Canadians were still feeling the effects of Canada’s worst recession since the Great Depression. Eight years later, the country would tumble into another and even worse recession.

The two recessions 1981-82 and 1992-93 can both fairly be laid at Trudeau’s door.

Pierre Trudeau took office at a moment when commodity prices were rising worldwide. Then as now, rising commodity prices buoyed the Canadian economy. Good policymakers recognize that commodity prices fall as well as rise. A wise government does not make permanent commitments based on temporary revenues. Yet between 1969 and 1979 – through two majority governments and one minority – Trudeau tripled federal spending.

Nemesis followed hubris. Commodity prices dropped. Predictably, Canada tumbled into recession and the worst federal budget deficits in peacetime history.

Trudeau’s Conservative successor Brian Mulroney balanced Canada’s operating budget after 1984. But to squeeze out Trudeau-era inflation, the Bank of Canada had raised real interest rates very high. Mulroney could not keep up with the debt payments. The debt compounded, the deficits grew, the Bank hiked rates again – and Canada toppled into an even worse recession in 1992. By 1993, default on Trudeau’s debt loomed as a real possibility. Trudeau’s next successors, Liberals this time, squeezed even tighter, raising taxes, and leaving Canadians through the 1990s working harder and harder with no real increase in their standard of living.

Do Canadians understand how many of their difficulties of the 1990s originated in the 1970s? They should.

To repay Trudeau’s debt, federal governments reduced transfers to provinces. Provinces restrained spending. And these restraints had real consequences for real people: more months in pain for heart patients, more months of immobility for patients awaiting hip replacements.

If Canada’s health system delivers better results today than 15 years ago, it’s not because it operates more efficiently. Canada’s health system delivers better results because the reduction of Trudeau’s debt burden has freed more funds for healthcare spending. The Canadian socialist Tommy Douglas anticipated the Trudeau disaster when he said that the great enemy of progressive government was unsound finance.

Pierre Trudeau was a spending fool. He was not alone in that, in the 1970s. But here’s where he was alone. No contemporary leader of an advanced industrial economy – not even the German Social Democrat Helmut Schmidt or the British socialist James Callaghan – had so little understanding as Pierre Trudeau of the private market economy. “Little understanding?” I should have said: “active animosity.”

Trudeau believed in a state-led economy, and the longer he lasted in office, the more statist he became. The Foreign Investment Review Agency was succeeded by Petro-Canada. Petro-Canada was succeeded by wage and price controls. Wage and price controls were succeeded by the single worst economic decision of Canada’s 20th century: the National Energy Program.

The NEP tried to fix two different prices of oil, one inside Canada, one outside. The NEP expropriated foreign oil interests without compensation. The NEP sought to shoulder aside the historic role of the provinces as the owner and manager of natural resources. I’ll return in a moment to the consequences of the NEP for Canada’s political stability. Let’s focus for now on the economic effects.

Most other Western countries redirected themselves toward more fiscal restraint after 1979. Counting on abundant revenues from oil, the Trudeau government kept spending. Other Western governments began to worry more about attracting international investment. Canada repelled investors with arbitrary confiscations. Other Western governments recovered from the stagflation of the 1970s by turning toward freer markets. Under the National Energy Policy, Canada was up-regulating as the US, Britain, and West Germany deregulated. {b]All of these mistakes together contributed to the extreme severity of the 1982 recession. Every one of them was Pierre Trudeau’s fault. [/b]