NORTHWEST TERRITORIES

Former cabinet ministers will be restricted from obtaining work from the GNWT for one year after resigning or not being re-elected, but in turn will be paid a 12-month transition allowance for that time, no matter how long they have served in the house.

Amendments were made to the Legislative Assembly and Executive Council Act Thursday, affecting both cabinet ministers and MLAs.

Until Thursday, ministers, like MLAs, would receive one month transition allowance for every year served. Now, once someone has served as a minister, they automatically receive a year of transition allowance, which equates to about $94,000, the wage of an MLA.

"To me, it's fair and to me the impact is small," said Tu Nedhe MLA Tom Beaulieu, who presented the act.

The amendment affects three ministers - Michael McLeod, Jackson Lafferty and Robert C. McLeod - who have been in the house for less than 12 years.

Beaulieu said the reason for the transition allowance is in many cases it is difficult for a former member of the assembly to find a job that isn't connected to the government, especially for members from smaller NWT communities.

"In a lot of cases the government's the only show in town.

"If they could not get a job at all outside of the government, they would actually end up having no income for having run as an MLA," he said. "So we thought if that was going to be the case, if we're going to do one, then we should do the other, to continue to provide them some income while they're unable to go back to work with the government or anyone who's contracting with the government or any government agency or certain boards."

Weledeh MLA Bob Bromley said although he agreed with some of the amendments, like extending restrictions to government boards and agencies, he didn't agree with extending transition allowance to 12 months for all ministers.

"The transition allowance is related to your years served, you earn a transition allowance," he said. "These are

taxpayers dollars and essentially in my mind, it (the amendment) robs Peter to pay Paul. It still uses taxpayers' dollars to purchase the prohibition and I don't think that's proper."

Bromley has been pushing to amend the act since last year, when he raised concerns about the sole-sourcing of contracts to John Todd, a former finance minister, and Brendan Bell, a former minister of Industry, Tourism and Investment.

He said because ministers possess privileged information, when they step out of their job, they have an unfair advantage.

Bromley said because MLAs don't have the power or privileged information ministers do, they shouldn't be restricted from obtaining work with the GNWT during their transition period.

"I can't see that there would be much opportunity for conflict (for MLAs) because we simply don't have the power that the ministers have."

There are exceptions to the restrictions, though, said Bromley, who pointed out the Conflict of Interest Commissioner has the power to approve or reject an application by a minister or MLA to work in a government position.

"The commissioner can review and we've put mechanisms in place through regulations that can be done effectively and quickly," he said.

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