The release last week of auditor general Merwan Saher’s report into former premier Alison Redford’s actions is a welcome development in more ways than one.
On the one hand, it outlines what was apparent to many people all over the province — that the premier’s office was seemingly playing fast and loose with the public purse.
Using government aircraft for partisan and personal travel, booking those flights with false passengers to allow the premier to travel alone or with a small entourage, taking expensive first-class commercial flights and staying in fancy hotels, the Sky Palace — those actions are all the antithesis to supposed respect for taxpayers.
On the other hand, the report is an excellent chance to see just how endemic Redford’s attitude was throughout the PC party rank and file.
While words generally have to be taken at face value when the speaker him- or herself does not have a history of misdeeds, it is certainly refreshing and welcoming to hear Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock MLA Maureen Kubinec come out so forcefully in condemnation of the former premier’s actions.
“I’m not happy with what happened, but certainly those were not my practices at all,” Kubinec has said. “I don’t see that it should impact our day-to-day life in Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock.”
Much has been said about the PCs’ culture of entitlement as a result of more than 40 years of uninterrupted governance.
Whether Redford’s actions are the result of that alleged entitlement, or whether she was a lone wolf, so to speak, will certainly prove to be a topic of debate in the lead-up to the 2016 election.
Whatever the case may be, her actions and the auditor general’s report ought to serve as a wake-up call for both the PCs and all other parties.
While some cases of supposed overspending may be defensible in a pinch – for example chartering a flight to quickly return to Alberta in the event of a sudden disaster – they no longer are justifiable on a wholesale basis, if they ever were to begin with.
Times have changed, and accountability is more rigidly enforced than every before.
It’s important politicians remember that.
