Riding the government plane
Expense: New Brunswick is one of only four provinces that still owns a private aircraft to shuttle government ministers. Can we still afford it?
Greg Weston
Telegraph-Journal
Published Saturday September 3rd, 2011
Appeared on page A1
FREDERICTON – Government records show that Premier David Alward and his cabinet ministers made frequent use of the province’s airplane during their first months in office – despite their highly touted cost-cutting efforts.
Flight records show members of the Alward government used the twin-engine plane on 71 of their first 160 days in office, for an average of almost three days each week.
The price tag for operating the plane totalled $810,212 in the first six months of the Alward administration.
The biggest single cost of the airplane during the period in question – Oct. 15, 2010 to March 23, 2011 – was the cost of flying it empty after delivering or picking up its government passengers.
Taxpayers paid close to $90,000 in total for those 80 empty flights.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation, a government watchdog group, says the provincially owned aircraft is a waste of taxpayers’ money.
The organization points out New Brunswick is the only province in Atlantic Canada – and one of only four provinces in all of Canada – with a dedicated plane for use by the premier, cabinet ministers and senior officials travelling on government business.
“It’s these kinds of perk expenditures which really anger the average taxpayer,” Kevin Lacey, Atlantic director for the federation, said in an interview.
The plane was bought by the previous Liberal government in 2008 at a cost of $5 million, a move the Tories strongly criticized at the time but appear much more willing to accept today.
The Tories did not use the plane in their first months in office as much as the Liberals did in their final months when, among other things, they were trying to work out a deal for the sale of NB Power.
According to the numbers, the Tories logged 210 hours in the air during their first six months in office – almost 10 per cent less than the Grits did over the same period the previous year.
Transportation Minister Claude Williams, the minister responsible for the government plane, says the Tories are making the most efficient use possible of an asset they inherited when they took office.
“This is about being effective and doing business,” he said, adding that the ministers who use the plane the most are from “remote” parts of the province.
The government estimates it costs $1,500 an hour to operate the plane.
The flight costs come out of the Department of Transportation’s budget, but are then charged to individual departments based on their respective use.
The flight records were released to the clerk of the legislative assembly at the request of the Liberals. A request by the Telegraph-Journal for more recent records was denied.
The records show the plane being used mainly for routine trips, such as the premier travelling to meetings, appearances and events around the province that couldn’t be done without flying.
But there are multiple examples of ministers – primarily Health Minister Madeleine Dubé, Post-Secondary Education, Training and Labour Minister Martine Coulombe and Economic Development Minister Paul Robichaud – flying between their northern ridings and Fredericton, often when the legislature isn’t sitting or without a pressing event on their schedules.
In most cases, the plane leaves or returns to its Fredericton base each day, often empty.
For example, on Nov. 12, 2010 the plane flew to the St-Léonard airport to pick up Coulombe, the MLA for Restigouche-la-Valleé, along with her executive assistant. The pair arrived in Fredericton at 8:36 a.m. and, a few hours later, returned north. The legislature hadn’t yet opened at that point and the department didn’t release any news about her time in Fredericton.
Similar examples involving Dubé appear throughout the logs.
For instance, the plane flew to St-Léonard to pick up Dubé, the health minister, on the morning of Feb. 1 and flew her to Fredericton. The MLA for Edmundston-Saint-Basile was then whisked back to her riding at the end of the work day, where she stayed for four hours before again taking off for the capital in the late evening.
That day’s travel alone amounted to more than two hours in the air and about $3,300 in cost to the department.
Dubé defends her use of the government plane.
“I use the plane to help me balance the demands of my role as Health minister with my responsibilities to my constituents,” Dubé said when asked about her frequent flights.
“For example, I often need to stay in the riding until late in the evening and I have early morning meetings with departmental stakeholders in Fredericton or elsewhere in the province the following day. Without access to the plane, I wouldn’t be able to do either job as well as my constituents and all New Brunswickers expect.”
The 220-kilometre stretch of Trans-Canada Highway between St-Léonard and Fredericton takes two hours to drive, if the posted speed limit is followed. The flight logs show a travel time of 30 minutes. The result is a time saving of about 90 minutes, but a cost that’s considerably higher than driving.
In another instance, Justice Minister Marie-Claude Blais and her assistant took the 30-minute flight from Fredericton to Moncton on Dec. 1. The plane then returned to Fredericton to take Economic Development Minister Paul Robichaud and his assistant to the Hub City – arriving there 93 minutes after Blais and resulting in two round trips.
Williams says the plane allows busy ministers to better do their jobs, which often require attending several meetings around the province.
“If you’re in Moncton and you have to go to Edmundston, or if you’re in Shippagan and have to go to Saint John – if you have to drive, it’s a day’s drive,” the minister says.
But given New Brunswick’s huge debt and the government’s across-the-board spending cuts, Lacey says such travel is an extravagance. He says a good comparison is neighbouring Nova Scotia, where the government sold its airplane years ago.
“There’s no plane in that province and politicians seem to be able to get to their jobs and their announcements with little or no problem,” Lacey says.
“For the average taxpayer who has to travel for their job, they travel around by car. New Brunswick isn’t that big of a province.”
Some northern New Brunswick centres are a significant distance away from Fredericton, but other Canadian provinces have drives of 10 hours or more between towns and cities.
Lacey says he doesn’t understand the New Brunswick government’s desire to maintain an expensive aircraft in a time of restraint.
“Given the state of the province’s finances, watching ministers travel around on private planes is an insult to taxpayers and New Brunswick should go the route that most provinces are going, which is limiting the use of private planes or eliminating it.”
In Nova Scotia, government spokeswoman Janet Lynn McNeil says there has not been a government plane dedicated for use by the premier and cabinet ministers for many years.
“We have no plans to change that in the future,” she said.
“Planes in Nova Scotia are leased for a day at a time when that is cost-effective.”
The government of New Brunswick has operated an executive flight service since the days of Richard Hatfield. The current twin-propeller 2006 Beechcraft King Air B200 was purchased by the Shawn Graham government for $5 million in 2008 as a replacement for a 1992 Beechcraft that was leased for the previous seven years.
The Progressive Conservatives, who were then in Opposition, derided the decision, pointing to the added cost during a climate of budget cuts – but are now defending the plane’s use while in government.
Another factor in favour of the plane, they say, is the lack of a commercial alternative between many New Brunswick destinations, especially the smaller airports in more remote parts of the province.
However, 62 flights during the period in question were either from or to cities such as Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto or Halifax – all of which are serviced by private airlines.
Such flights accounted for 80.3 hours in the air, totalling $120,450 by the government’s estimated cost. That equals a one-way cost of almost $2,000 per flight, which, even with more than one person on board, remains above commercial rates.
There are also instances where a minister was flown to Ontario and the plane returned to Fredericton empty. After a few days, the empty plane was dispatched to pick up the minster and return home – meaning two flights were made without any passengers and the air travel expenses were doubled in the process.
In one such case, the plane was dispatched to Toronto to collect Economic Development Minister Paul Robichaud on Oct. 25. The minister was then flown to Pokemouche before the empty aircraft returned to its base in Fredericton.
In total, Robichaud’s one-way private flight required the government plane be in the air for almost six hours at a cost of $8,850 – rather than opting for a two-hour commercial flight between Toronto and Fredericton and driving to his home riding.
The aircraft is available for use by the premier, cabinet ministers, deputy ministers, senior staff and government guests, as authorized by the minister or deputy minister, and is for government business only.
The Department of Transportation is responsible for arranging the plane’s flight schedule to ensure it’s operated efficiently.
“It’s the same system that’s been in place for a long time and it’s to carry out government business,” Williams says of the criteria for using the plane.
“It’s a very simple system. If a minister needs to go meet stakeholders or needs to go to a meeting or for whatever reason, they’ll just book the plane.”
But Williams says no special directive has been given to use the plane less and he doesn’t have the authority to discern between necessary and unnecessary usage.
Ultimately, the minister says the goal is to make the best possible use of the government asset.
“We’ve got a plane. There’s a cost to the plane. If we park the plane, it’s still going to cost. I think we want to make the best use of the plane to carry out business,” he says.
“We are doing every effort to make sure that the requests from different ministers or departments are co-ordinated.”
In the name of finding new sources of revenue to help balance the books, the Tory government has publicly mused about selling provincial assets, including NB Liquor, the Algonquin hotel in St. Andrews and even the provincial parks system.
Williams won’t say whether he’s specifically considered selling the plane, but says every government asset is on the table.
