It’s good the Wall government is going to improve the disclosure of cabinet ministers’ expenses.

The changes the government has committed to undertake will improve upon the status quo. However, the proposed changes don’t go far enough and will still leave Saskatchewan behind Alberta, Manitoba and other jurisdictions.

According to a government news release, reports will now be posted semi-annually that disclose details on each minister’s out-of-province travel. The disclosure will also include bills put through by staff who accompany the minister. That’s a good move as such disclosure would have likely prevented the $3,600 car service bill from Minister Draude’s trip to London.

However, there are a few places where the new rules fall short:

First, the new rules cover out-of-province travel expenses, but they don’t cover travel within the province. Certainly one could get a little wild with travel bills within the province too. Perhaps even by abusing usage of the government’s aircraft, as has happened in other provinces.

Further, what about hospitality and meal bills within the province? What happens if a minister or one of their aides abuses their ability to expense meals? This very problem happened in Ontario years back and could easily happen in Saskatchewan. The government of Manitoba requires disclosure of ministers’ expenses in this area. However, the Wall government should go a step further and include assistants’ expenses as well.

The next area where the disclosure rules could improve is in terms of disclosing receipts. Specifically, the proposed rules don’t require receipts to be published.Yet, the Alberta government and City of Toronto currently scan each receipt expensed by a politician and put it online for taxpayers to see. This is the gold standard of disclosure so it begs the question – why wouldn’t the Wall government want to copy what the best are doing?

Finally, the government still hasn’t corrected a problem concerning MLA expenses and caucus budgets. A couple years ago the Canadian Taxpayers Federation noticed expense reports were being produced for each MLA, but the only way you could see them was if you walked into your MLA’s office and asked to see the reports (a sometimes awkward request) or if you went all the way down to the clerk’s office in the legislature.

We asked both the NDP and Sask Party if they would agree to post those reports online, and thankfully, both parties agreed.

However, our second recommendation wasn’t acted upon. You see, if you find an expense listed in the MLA’s expense report that you wish to see the receipt for (eg. perhaps a vague bill for “$2,500 – training seminar fee”), the only way to view it is if the MLA allows you to see it. Clearly that doesn’t make much sense.

There’s also no disclosure over the funds caucuses spend either. What the government needs to do is extend the Freedom of Information Act to include the funds spent by the MLAs, their caucuses and the Legislative Assembly.

Again, the Wall government has taken a good step in the right direction by disclosing cabinet ministers' out-of-province travel costs. Yet, it has fallen short of what other leaders in Canada are doing already.

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