B.C.’s finance minister is under fire about the bill she and her team racked up during a 2023 junket.
Brenda Bailey was the minister of jobs, economic development and innovation when she and five staffers travelled to Boston for a biotechnology conference.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation says documents it obtained through freedom of information show the team ate at high-end restaurants and billed for more than $6,600 for a car service over the four days.
“This absolutely raises questions about whether Minister Bailey is fit to serve as our finance minister and do the hard work of finding savings for British Columbians,” Carson Binda with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation told Global News.
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During an afternoon press conference on Wednesday, Bailey defended the trip and related spending, saying she would do it again.
“We don’t get to choose where we go to eat on these junkets,” Bailey said.
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“We are a part of a group that’s travelling around to different meetings, so it’s not that I had the option to go to a Wendy’s. This is a structured program that we’re meeting with investors and we go the places that they are at.”
Bailey said that these trips bring tens of millions of dollars in investments to B.C.
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