The leader of the BC Green Party called the new revelations from Speaker Darryl Plecas about the legislature spending scandal sickening, and blasted other political parties.
"I thought this place needed new voices, diverse voices, I had no idea what I was getting myself into," Andrew Weaver told CTV Vancouver.
In an explosive interview with CTV News, Plecas and his chief of staff Alan Mullen detailed the pushback they faced while writing their bombshell report and what they say they uncovered.
"Elected officials absolutely had to know what was going and they did nothing about it," said Plecas.
Weaver called for the evidence to be made public to help restore public trust in the legislature.
"If you're going to make such an allegation, I hope to heck you have the information and evidence there to put forward. Because we need to deal with this now. Not later, now," he said.
He says the allegations, if true, show that the legislature has systemic issues that need to be addressed.
"We're getting awfully close to needing a full-scale corruption inquiry here in the province of British Columbia," he said.
The Green Party Leader also spoke of his frustration with how the allegations have been handled by the NDP, with whom the Greens signed an agreement allowing the party to form government.
"I'm not satisfied at all with how the BC NDP government have been positioning themselves in this, in terms of ensuring we get to the bottom of this," said Weaver.
Weaver also took the Liberals to task, condemning their responses to the allegations.
"I'm not happy at all, with what I perceive to be some of the language coming from the BC Liberal office," he said.
But the leader of the Liberal Party says the new revelations from Speaker Darryl Plecas about the legislature spending scandal are based on "little more than innuendo."
Andrew Wilkinson issued a statement Friday saying he's unaware of any criminal activity amongst Liberal MLAs, and took a swipe at Plecas's and Mullen's comments.
"Mr. Plecas and Mr. Mullen have made serious allegations of criminal activity in the Legislature based on little more than innuendo," he said in a statement.
"Mr. Plecas should promptly report any such concerns to the police."
At an event in Washington state on Thursday, Premier John Horgan said any concerns about laws being broken should be taken to police.
"We do make laws, and we're not supposed to break laws, but I've not seen any evidence that's the case," said Horgan. "If Mr. Plecas has that evidence, he should lay it before law enforcement."
He says he's unaware of any NDP MLAs facing investigation, and emphasized working with Plecas.
"Much of the spending scandal that’s been exposed by Speaker Plecas is a result of activities that happened in the recent past. He's taken steps and we want to work with him in the legislature to clean up the system," said Horgan.
