Send in the clowns.

Federal bureaucrats bought hundreds of thousands of dollars in tickets to circuses and concerts, balls and ballets, galas and award shows, football and hockey games, dance festivals and musicals – then sent the bill to taxpayers. 

Bureaucrats spent $721,000 on event tickets between January 2023 and June 2024, according to government recordsobtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. Average monthly spending during that 17-month period was $42,400. 

“It’s nice that bureaucrats can find time during their busy ‘work’ days hiking our taxes and not returning our phone calls to spend our money at games, concerts and circuses,” said Franco Terrazzano, CTF Federal Director. “Taxpayers can’t be blamed for thinking this government is a circus, but these bureaucrats can damn sure be blamed for billing taxpayers for circus tickets.”

In May 2023, bureaucrats at Global Affairs Canada spent $6,800 on tickets to Cirque du Solei in Vienna, Austria, which retailed for $284 apiece. Months later, GAC bureaucrats expensed $512 worth of Cirque du Solei tickets in Seoul, South Korea. 

GAC also racked up $24,484 in spending on tickets to the musical Come From Away in Australia, Japan and the United States. The department also dropped $20,000 in taxpayer cash on tickets to a ball in Taipei, Taiwan in November 2023. 

Event tickets were purchased across Canada and the United States, as well as around the world, including Poland, Norway and Turkey, among other countries. 

“Government bureaucrats billed struggling taxpayers $42,000 a month on tickets, so they owe taxpayers an explanation of what value we got from their nights out,” Terrazzano said. “While taxpayers were worrying about filling the fridge, the only thing these bureaucrats seem worried about was whether a pillar might obstruct their view at the ballet." 

The Canada Infrastructure Bank bought an $8,000 table at the Urban Land Institute Toronto’s “Meet the Chief Planners” event in March 2024. 

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission spent $2,195 on tickets for two bureaucrats to attend the Canadian Screen Awards in May 2024, held at the CBC Broadcast Centre in Toronto.

The priciest single ticket expensed was from the Canadian Museum of History, which spent $2,500 to send its CEO to a gala in New York City. 

A lone bureaucrat expensed a $175 ticket to the Toronto Symphony Orchestra’s Home Alone in Concert in December 2023, while another spent $120 on Jurassic Park in Concert at the National Arts Centre in Ottawa. 

Other events bureaucrats attended on the taxpayer dime include the Juno Awards, RBC Bluesfest, Festival du Voyageur and the Yorkton Film Festival. 

Canada Post declined to reveal how much it spent on event tickets, claiming that “information is financial in nature and has always been treated as confidential.” 

Canada Post reported a $748-million pre-tax loss in 2023. 

The government records were released in response to an order paper question submitted by Conservative MP Jamie Schmale (Haliburton-Kawartha Lakes-Brock). 

The records don’t provide an explanation for why the tickets were bought and provide no indication any money was reimbursed to taxpayers.

“Taxpayers are already forced to pay for the bloated salaries of these bureaucrats, so if they want to go to a concert, gala or sports game, the very least they could do is pay for it themselves,” Terrazzano said.