Attack on office staff forces MLAs in Nova Scotia to revisit decade-long budget freeze

Next month Nova Scotia politicians will be forced to do something they haven't done or even wanted to do in a decade — seriously consider increasing their office budgets.

And it's because a man recently assaulted a constituency assistant and a student volunteer at the office of Liberal MLA Brendan Maguire. Police are still seeking the assailant.

The representative for Halifax-Atlantic said it's time to increase constituency budgets so that MLAs could hire two people to staff their offices, making those employees less vulnerable to attack or harassment.

Constituency office budgets have been frozen since 2013. Despite regulations that allow for increases tied to the cost of living, provincial politicians have either refused to discuss or repeatedly blocked increases to their office expenses.

Under the rules of the legislature, MLAs are entitled "one full-time constituency assistant or the full-time equivalent" but they can use their monthly expense allotment to hire part-time staff. Allowable constituency expenses range from $5,454 a month to $5,829 a month, depending on the size of the constituency. Constituency assistant salaries are paid over and above those office expenses.

The reluctance to increase MLA office costs is not a surprise to political scientist Lori Turnbull.

"I think there is a tendency for us to not want to spend money on politics or not to spend money on the administration of government, or at least as little money as possible," said Turnbull, a Dalhousie University professor in the faculty of management. "I think politicians feel that sensitively, they don't want to explain to the voter why they're raising what can be seen as their own expenses.

"So they tend to stay away from it, if they can."

It's why, along with their constituency budgets, politicians have refused to increase their salaries, despite independent panel reviews recommending they should.

The issue is so politically sensitive that, during his first year in office, Premier Tim Houston took the extraordinary step of recalling the House in the summer to prevent what would have been the first salary increase in nine years. An independent review panel had recommended a 12.6 per cent increase, but Houston repeatedly said it would be inappropriate to agree to a raise.

"This is not the time to be adjusting the compensation of MLAs," Houston told reporters on Aug. 2, 2022, the day the House voted unanimously to block the panel's recommendation. "We have record-high inflation, we have a number of issues the province is faced with."

Assault may spark change

That same inflation has increased the cost of running a constituency office but members of the House of Assembly management commission have blocked increases in 2022 and 2023, either by legislating away the increase or making it subject to the committee's approval and then rejecting it.

But last week's assault may force politicians to change course. Both opposition leaders feel safety should trump frugality.

 "We seriously, as a management commission, [have] got to sit down and have a conversation about making sure that the offices are properly staffed, and making sure that we can put [in] some improved security features," said Liberal Derek Mombourquette. "We're talking about people's safety.

"We have to make sure that our staff are looked after and protected and they feel supported in the workplace and safe."

New Democrat Susan Leblanc echoed that sentiment.

"I wholeheartedly agree" with Maguire's call for two constituency assistants per office, the norm for the offices of members of parliament.

"The folks that work in my office are always happier when there's someone else working," said Leblanc, who uses her constituency budget to pay for part-time help. "They feel more secure and more able to handle people who come in who might be at risk of expressing violent thoughts or committing a violent action."

The Progressive Conservatives control a majority of votes on the House of Assembly management commission so the support of the party in power is needed to approve any budget increase.

Government House leader Kim Masland was noncommittal in a written response to CBC News.

"We will look at any supportive measures that can increase the safety of our offices so they can best continue to serve the community," she wrote.

Speaker Karla MacFarlane, who chairs the commission, has asked the three provincial caucuses to come up with proposals ahead of a mid-January meeting of the commission.

"This will allow time for a considered response to this unfortunate situation and ensuring that MLA offices remain a safe work environment," wrote MacFarlane in an email to CBC. "I share [the] concern for the safety of our constituency assistants and want to ensure that the Commission is able to have an informed discussion on this matter so that it may have the opportunity to provide a reasoned and effective response."

For Turnbull, the only way MLAs will be able to agree to increase their constituency budgets is for them to set aside partisan interests.

"If all of the parties said, look, this is important, we have to do this," said Turnbull. "You don't get democracy or anything else for free in this life and we have to make the appropriate investments to keep our workers safe."

Turnbull said the move would generate some public backlash but all-party agreement would limit the political damage.

"If they all can, kind of, agree to have one another's backs, I think it would go through and we'd all live with it."