The BC Conservatives are calling out the NDP government for hiring one of the premier’s friends with a lucrative contract.
Comedian Charlie Demers is getting paid $165 per hour to help write speeches for the NDP leader.
Demers will earn up to $150,000 for the first two years of the deal and the contract includes an extension option that would boost his compensation up to a total of $450,000.
The Conservatives say this hiring decision is tone deaf in the face of the province’s record deficit.
“It really comes down to decision-making that people are making at the higher levels,” Peter Milobar, the BC Conservative finance critic, told Global News.
“We have spending, rampant in government, out of control, and the decision-making by the premier in the backdrop of a supposed hiring freeze is to hire a personal friend to write jokes.”
However, Premier David Eby said that Demers is one of a group of speech writers.
“Today, for example, I’m delivering five speeches,” Eby said.
“I would love to be able to write my own speeches the way that I used to. But I do need support to be able to respond to each event that I go to. Speech writers are a necessary part of the job.”
Demers’ contract was signed in February and Eby said that so far, he has been paid $14,000.