Nova Scotia parliamentary expenses scandal

The Nova Scotia Parliamentary Expenses Scandal is a political scandal in the province of Nova Scotia that was revealed in 2010.

Part-way through the first session of the 61st General Assembly, the NDP, under Premier Darrell Dexter, announced that it would "eliminate an MLA severance payment as well as their ability to sell their office furniture and equipment." According to a report by the CBC, the severance package alone was costing the province $600,000 after the results of the last election. The province did not want MLAs who resign or are defeated to profit from selling their office furniture, and wanted the furniture to become provincial property when the MLA was done with it. The report viewed this as the first step in changing the rules regarding expenses of Nova Scotia MLAs.

The situation truly began on February 3, 2010, when Jacques Lapointe, Nova Scotia's auditor general, released a 142-page report suggesting that "several politicians had filed 'excessive and unreasonable' claims, in part because of inadequate spending controls." According to the CBC, "MLAs in the Nova Scotia Legislature are entitled to spend $45,000/year in payments that require no receipts. While Lapointe did not name any MLAs in his report, and said that no one had violated the law currently in place, all three parties in the Nova Scotia legislature were blamed for reckless spending, and announced his hope that more attention would be focused on repairing the expenses system rather than on demonizing legislators.

In the wake of the Auditor General's report, Speaker Charlie Parker compiled a full list of "questionable expenses", which was made public on February 8.

On February 9, 2010, the first political casualty of the scandal occurred when Richard Hurlburt, Progressive Conservative MLA for Yarmouth, resigned days after the Auditor General's report had shown he had spent about $8,000 on a generator, for his home. The Speaker's list of expenses also showed that Hurlburt had "bought a 42-inch television worth $2,499, which he paid $579 to have installed" in his constituency office in Yarmouth.

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Wikipedia