Taxpayers have been hit with a hefty, multimillion-dollar price tag to renovate Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s mansion on the grounds of Rideau Hall in recent years.

Renovations at Rideau Cottage, the mansion where Trudeau has lived since being elected in 2015, cost taxpayers more than $5 million between 2016-17 and 2023-24, according to access-to-information records obtained by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.

“While there were multimillion-dollar renos being done to Trudeau’s mansion, housing prices have doubled for most ordinary working Canadians,” said Kris Sims, CTF Alberta Director. “Trudeau needs to explain why this cost taxpayers so much.”

Last year, renovations at Rideau Cottage cost taxpayers $1.3 million.

That’s enough money to cover the annual grocery bills of 81 Canadian families, according to Canada’s Food Price Report.

Taxpayers have been on the hook for an average of $630,000 in annual renovation costs at Rideau Cottage since Trudeau moved into the two-storey, 22-room mansion.

Renovations have included improvements to the tennis court and “powder room,” thousands spent on painting, various RCMP security upgrades, new appliances, wall and roof repairs, paving and landscaping services and tree stump removal.

Taxpayers have also been billed for 10 piano tunings, according to the records.

“Does the prime minister’s powder room have a gold toilet? How can these upgrades cost this much?” Sims said. “Taxpayers don’t expect Trudeau to sleep in a tent, but racking-up reno bills costing Canadians more than half a million dollars per year is excessive.”

In addition to the $5 million in renovations at Rideau Cottage, taxpayers have also been on the hook for millions in renovations at Harrington Lake, the prime minister’s lakeside cottage estate.

In 2022, the CTF reported the National Capital Commission, which manages Canada’s six official residences, was spending $11 million on renovations at Harrington Lake.

Included in those costs was the construction of a backup cottage on the property for $2.5 million, and a kitchen renovation that cost more than $700,000.

The federal government spent an additional $6 million on renovations at Harrington Lake between 2016-17 and 2019-20, according to a 2021 NCC report.

Taxpayers were also on the hook for $1 million in renovations at 24 Sussex during the same period, despite the fact the property has sat vacant since 2015.

Despite long-standing claims that Canada’s official residences are subject to “chronic underfunding,”  the CTF previously reported the NCC spent $135 million renovating the properties between 2006 and 2022.

“Canadians need to know why the NCC, a glorified parks and rec department that plants flowers in Ottawa, manages to blow millions and millions of dollars on these swanky buildings without much to show for it,” Sims said. “Why are there now three official residences for our one prime minister, and why did taxpayers pay for an entirely new mansion up at Harrington Lake? Who is living in that new house and why did it cost so much?”