Premier John Horgan tried to place the legislative assembly expense scandal squarely at the feet of the B.C. Liberals, harkening back to 2011 when the then-Liberal government unilaterally appointed Craig James as clerk of the house.
At a press conference in Prince George, Horgan was asked to comment on sections of Speaker Darryl Plecas’s report that suggested James is not impartial, as his role requires, but closely aligned with the B.C. Liberal party.
“When Mr. James was appointed arbitrarily, at the whim of (then-House leader) Rich Coleman...[it was] absolutely unprecedented in British Columbian history,” Horgan said.
“At the time in 2011, I spoke passionately in the legislature, as did Adrian Dix, about how just plain wrong it was for the B.C. Liberals to assume that they can dictate how our institutions run. It’s not supposed to be that way.”
The clerk acts as the chief executive officer of the legislature, overseeing rules and procedures and the legislature’s $70-million budget.
Following the retirement of longtime clerk George MacMinn, the Liberal government under then-Premier Christy Clark installed James as clerk without the endorsement of all MLAs.
The position is a lifetime appointment in order to ensure the clerk is free from political influence.
The Opposition NDP wanted the clerk’s job posted publicly so applicants could be selected by a bi-partisan committee.
At the time James was appointed, he was also acting chief electoral officer, in charge of administering the referendum on the harmonized sales tax.
His tenure at Elections B.C. was not without controversy, as he came under fire and even received death threats by anti-HST advocates who questioned his decisions on the HST citizen petition and Liberal recall campaigns.
According to the Speaker’s report, which highlights “flagrant overspending” of taxpayer dollars, Lenz shared with Plecas his the view that James was not impartial and that he was in fact very close with the B.C. Liberal party.
Plecas wrote that he spoke with several witnesses, including Lenz, who suggested James was aligned with the Liberals “with some suggesting that Mr. James’ unexpected appointment as clerk of the house was connected to his ‘doing a job’ for the government as acting chief electoral officer.”
Horgan was asked if he feels vindicated for raising his protest to James’ appointment in 2011.
“I suppose that there’s vindication in that, I take no comfort in that though,” he told reporters.
“But rather than vindication I prefer to have an independent, impartial clerk making sure the business of British Columbia is done in an open and transparent way and issues like excessive expenditures on what seem to be pretty bizarre items, just doesn’t happen again.”
In 2012, then-auditor general John Doyle released a scathing report of the legislature’s finances, saying the budget is such a mess it’s impossible for him to tell if any money had been improperly spent.
As a result, James oversaw sweeping financial reforms in the legislature, appointing an audit working group, auditing public financial statements and requiring that MLAs post a scanned copy of receipts online and that constituency expenses are made public.
Horgan said the audit led “to the better practices we have today but clearly those practices have been circumvented by the existing officers of the legislature. So we have more work to do there.”
James and Lenz have maintained their innocence, saying the allegations are “completely false and untrue.”
- Katie DeRosa, Times Colonist
