Quote:
Originally Posted by Slava
I'm going to pose a question here, just to gauge some opinions. I think that an MLA makes about $130k a year, or at least thats close enough. The committee pay in question would've been roughly $48k ($1000/month x 4 years). Is it reasonable to expect that MLAs have that kind of cash sitting around? Frankly if someone came to me today and said "hey, you were paid too much, albeit in good faith, and we need a cheque for roughly 1/3 of your income" I'd be pretty upset!
I don't mean to suggest that this whole committee issue is right, and am not trying to suggest that people get paid for nothing. I just have a hard time thinking that most of the MLAs in question have that money just sitting there waiting to pay it back.
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As I understand it the committee pay structure started ~ 40 months ago. It was at same time the PC's passed a 35% pay increase for themselves.
Thing is they do it ass-backwards. They say "you get $1000.00/mo. for committee work, up t a maximum of $3000.00" Then they turn around and make sure that everyone (in governing party) is on at least 3 committees. But withhold committee work from opposition as (some type of) punishment.
As far as paying it back, they would be all over the map in terms of how much it is. For Guy B. it is $4000.00 as he only recently got onto that committee, Heather is at 40K, I think Paul's figure in the 12+K range.
For PC Prins, chair of committee, he would be looking at 60K.
So far as I know this is part of their taxable income, so what do they pay back? Just the net they got? Or do they pay the net plus the top up on the source deductions? Do they pay back the gross and have their taxes reassessed? Where's Locke when you need him...LOL
More to your question though. I suspect they could do it in payments.