Salary bill for Harper cabinet largest ever
Posted May 23, 2011 04:40:27 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
OTTAWA – Tightening a belt is tricky when you have to wrap it around 39 people.
The annual salary bill for the ministers and junior ministers appointed to Stephen Harper’s latest cabinet is about $9-million — the largest ever.
And it comes at a time when the Conservatives are struggling to slash $4-billion from the bureaucracy and billions more in the coming years to balance the books.
And don’t forget the staffers — the Conservatives quietly approved increases in the maximum salaries political staff are entitled to receive.
The changes went into effect Apr. 1, despite the government’s promise to balance its budget a year ahead of schedule, in 2014-15.
Derek Fildebrandt of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation says his issue isn’t with cabinet ministers salaries, but with the “outrageous” pensions they collect at age 55.
He notes that for every dollar an MP puts into their pension plan, taxpayers contribute another four.
