Waste of taxpayers dollars?

[Topaz]

The Labour Min. Blackburn, has been renting aircraft to travel from his riding to Ottawa. He has rented 14X at a cost of 68,000 to taxpayers. 7 of the flights are to Gatineau to CFB in Bagotville Que ,near his ridng. 3 of the 14 flights his press sec. went part of the way. This is also the minister who name was on a list of Cons who over spent on their elections. First, it was the Quebec Libs and now its the Quebec Cons!

[no queenslave]

The Labour Min. Blackburn, has been renting aircraft to travel from his riding to Ottawa. He has rented 14X at a cost of 68,000 to taxpayers. 7 of the flights are to Gatineau to CFB in Bagotville Que ,near his ridng. 3 of the 14 flights his press sec. went part of the way. This is also the minister who name was on a list of Cons who over spent on their elections. First, it was the Quebec Libs and now its the Quebec Cons!

Privileges of swearing to obey the queen and her laws.

[Borg]

The Labour Min. Blackburn, has been renting aircraft to travel from his riding to Ottawa. He has rented 14X at a cost of 68,000 to taxpayers. 7 of the flights are to Gatineau to CFB in Bagotville Que ,near his ridng. 3 of the 14 flights his press sec. went part of the way. This is also the minister who name was on a list of Cons who over spent on their elections. First, it was the Quebec Libs and now its the Quebec Cons!

And there is a scandal here?

He is well within his rights to do this. Staffers are allowed on board - I believe - if that specific assistant is required for business purposes.

And your point was?

Borg

[Moxie]

Well the former Liberal PM bought a new plane for himself, yet Sea King Pilots died flying a helo that is forty years old. He also canceled it's replacement, what are Pilots Lives worth these days? At least no one is dying because he's flying.

[geoffrey]

The Labour Min. Blackburn, has been renting aircraft to travel from his riding to Ottawa. He has rented 14X at a cost of 68,000 to taxpayers. 7 of the flights are to Gatineau to CFB in Bagotville Que ,near his ridng. 3 of the 14 flights his press sec. went part of the way. This is also the minister who name was on a list of Cons who over spent on their elections. First, it was the Quebec Libs and now its the Quebec Cons!

Bagotville is pretty far from Ottawa... that's what a 5 hour drive? That's unreasonable. And I doubt if there is regular Air Canada first class service, but I may be wrong.

[M.Dancer]

Bagotville is pretty far from Ottawa... that's what a 5 hour drive? That's unreasonable. And I doubt if there is regular Air Canada first class service, but I may be wrong.

I too would doubt a commercial carrier lands at an airforce base.

[Michael Hardner]

That might explain the $5000 per flight.

[jdobbin]

And there is a scandal here?

He is well within his rights to do this. Staffers are allowed on board - I believe - if that specific assistant is required for business purposes.

And your point was?

He probably had to fly out there all the time so that he could announce one spending program after another.

http://canadianpress.google.com/article/AL...pGFs9FteU6WxwNQ

The Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean region has benefited from a disproportionate amount of political largesse doled out by Jean-Pierre Blackburn, the federal minister responsible for the area, documents suggest.

The documents obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act say that of 228 announcements made by Economic Development Canada for Quebec last year, nearly 20 per cent went to this part of the province, which has only four per cent of Quebec's inhabitants.

In his first year as minister, Blackburn participated in 75 announcements by Economic Development Canada, including 28 for the Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean region.

He made 147 speeches, including 33 in his riding or neighbouring constituencies.

No other region received so much attention from Blackburn.

For example, he made eight announcements in the Gaspe, six in Quebec City, five in the Eastern Townships and three on the island of Montreal.

Morever, the expenses are not exactly transparent for the flights. He billed those flights to his ministry.

http://canadianpress.google.com/article/AL...zX70Q8LP_kdMxaA

None of the aircraft rentals appear in Blackburn's required public disclosure of travel expenses. Instead, they're found in his department's list of procurement contracts, alongside translation services and information technology contracts.

[Michael Bluth]

Morever, the expenses are not exactly transparent for the flights. He billed those flights to his ministry.

Minister's have two budgets two work from.

Their MP budget and their Ministry budget. Costs come out of both at different times for various reasons.

Any accusations of lack of transparency over that is ridiculous.

It obviously wasn't too difficult to find.