B.C. Premier Christy Clark has called a July 10 by-election in the Liberal stronghold of Westside-Kelowna, though word that she approved hefty raises for loyal appointees may still make for a rocky campaign.
MLA elect Ben Stewart resigned last week to let Clark take another run at a seat in the Legislature after losing to NDP challenger David Eby in May.
Stewart won in a landslide, and the riding should provide a safe seat for the Premier, but local voters are already grumbling about news that she quietly raised pay limits for several Liberal staffers.
Clark defended the increases Wednesday and insisted they didn’t cause the Liberals’ staff budget to increase “by one penny.”
“Some people have got pay increases, some people have got pay cuts,” Clark told CTV News. “In fact, the budget has gone down.”
The Liberals’ political staff budget is reportedly set to drop from $5.741 million to $5.711 million this year.
Asked why she chose to spike pay for high-level appointees while reducing pay for other staff, Clark said acted on the advice of her chief of staff Dan Doyle.
“I inherited a bit of a mess on the pay scale,” she said. “The chief of staff, he came to me and said look, this isn’t being done fairly. It’s not really very rational. Some people are being paid more than others and it doesn’t make sense. So let’s fix it, let’s rationalize it.”
Under the new maximum pay limits, Doyle is eligible to earn $230,000, up from $195,148, though he is believed to be passing on a raise.
Salary caps were also increased for her deputy chief of staff, press secretary, ministerial assistants, media monitoring manager and others.
Ministerial assistants, who received a new title of ministerial chiefs of staff, can now earn $105,000 per year instead of $94,500, putting them almost in line with MLAs.
“It’s close. It should be close, they work hard too,” Clark said.
The Premier has promised to set up a second home in the Westside-Kelowna riding she hopes to represent, and will be campaigning in the coming weeks with Stewart, who represented it the last four years.
New Democrat Carole Gordon, a Kelowna elementary school teacher, is challenging the Premier after losing the riding by more than 5,500 votes last month.
Gordon says seniors' care, childcare and women's issues are among the top issues in the area.
The Conservatives is running realtor Sean Upshaw in the riding, while the Greens will not be fielding a candidate.
The cost of the by-election to taxpayers is yet-unclear, but the last three have cost British Columbians about $500,000 each.
Voters in the riding can register until June 19. For more information, visit the B.C. Elections website.
With a report from CTV British Columbia’s Rob Brown
