Wed, August 3, 2022
EDMONTON — Alberta Opposition Leader Rachel Notley says the United Conservative Party government, particularly former finance minister Travis Toews, must bear the responsibility and fallout for the record-setting six-figure bonus payment to the chief medical officer of health.
Notley said Wednesday she isn’t passing judgment on whether the payout to Dr. Deena Hinshaw is merited.
But she said the payout has to be set against a government that, at the same time, was trying to cut the pay of front-line health workers in collective bargaining during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It is jaw dropping to me that they would then turn around and offer up a 60 per cent bonus to someone who had — by her own admission — chosen not to completely exercise her authority and (instead) hand over decision-making power to an incredibly ill-informed cabinet,” Notley told reporters in Calgary.
The CBC, gleaning information from the government’s sunshine salary list, reported Monday that Hinshaw received a bonus of almost $228,000 for COVID-19 work in 2021 — the highest such cash benefit payout to any provincial civil servant since the list went public six years ago.
That figure, on top of her regular salary, put Hinshaw’s pay at more than $591,000.
Unions, including the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees have, like Notley, lambasted the payout as a travesty given the concurrent government steps to reduce pay and jobs in front-line health care.
Notley also said Toews’ claim he didn’t know about the payment cannot be believed.
“If it is true, then it is demonstrative of someone who has no business being finance minister in any government, and certainly not leading in government,” she said.
“There’s just no way that this should have happened under his watch.”
Toews is one of seven contenders seeking to replace Premier Jason Kenney, who announced he will soon be resigning the leadership after gaining a lacklustre 51 per cent support in a party leadership vote.
He and two other candidates left cabinet to avoid a conflict of interest during the race.
Christine Myatt, Toews’ spokesperson, responded to Notley in a statement.
"Mr. Toews did not authorize or approve this payment. In fact, he was not aware it was made. It appears this bonus was paid out by the public service without ministerial sign off,” said Myatt.
“Mr. Toews believes that Albertans expect their tax dollars to be spent wisely and with the greatest oversight.
“That is why he has promised to change the rules to ensure this does not happen again."
Toews’ campaign team tweeted out Wednesday a graphic stating that no new bonuses would be authorized without a cabinet minister’s explicit authorization.
The payout has reopened public divisions and debate over Hinshaw and the government’s handling of the pandemic and the health restrictions it imposed to combat the spread of the illness.
Kenney and Hinshaw have been criticized for acting too late in multiple waves of the pandemic. Hinshaw has also been criticized for not exercising more authority under emergency legislation, but instead subordinating her role to one of cabinet adviser rather than independent decision maker.
The issue threatens to become a wedge topic in the leadership race, with candidates such as former Wildrose party leaders Danielle Smith and Brian Jean wooing the section of the party base that bitterly resented vaccine mandates and other government-mandated restrictions.
“(The slogan) ‘we’re all in this together’ didn’t mean what we thought it did," Smith wrote on Twitter Monday. "Albertans are rightly stunned and outraged they gave Dr. Hinshaw a $228K COVID bonus."
Smith has promised that if she wins the Oct. 6 vote to replace Kenney, she will not impose any such restrictions again.
Jean wrote on Twitter on Monday: “While Albertans were losing businesses, while our health system was collapsing under mismanagement, the people on the Sky Palace balcony signed off on an all-time record bonus.”
Sky Palace referred to Kenney, Toews and others, being caught on camera having drinks and ignoring gathering rules while on the balcony of the Federal Building, near the legislature, during COVID-19.
It has come to symbolize the one-rule-for-us, another-for-them criticism of Kenney’s administration during COVID-19.
Alberta Health has said Hinshaw was paid as per a long-standing policy and financial calculation tied to emergencies.
The payout was one of the COVID-19 bonuses paid to 107 employees in management totalling $2.4 million.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 3, 2022.
Dean Bennett, The Canadian Press
UCP leadership candidates at odds over Alberta public health official pay bonuses
Tue, August 2, 2022
Some UCP leadership candidates who served in cabinet said they had no knowledge of cash bonuses awarded to Alberta's chief medical officer of health and other managers for their work during the pandemic. (Jeff McIntosh/The Canadian Press - image credit)
Several UCP leadership candidates who served in cabinet posts say they didn't know about the pandemic cash bonuses awarded to Alberta's chief medical officer of health and 106 other managers.
Leadership hopeful Travis Toews' spokesperson, Christine Myatt, said the former finance minister didn't authorize or have knowledge of a nearly $228,000 cash bonus paid to Chief Medical Officer of Health Dr. Deena Hinshaw in 2021.
Myatt referred further questions to the government.
Fellow leadership contender and former Community and Social Services Minister Rajan Sawhney also said via email she was not part of the decision and is "unfamiliar with the specific circumstances involved."
She, like many candidates, has pledged to hold a public inquiry into the Alberta government's response to COVID-19. Sawhney said this would include the roles played by health officials.
Leadership hopeful Leela Aheer, who was shuffled out of cabinet in July 2021, said the Alberta government owes the public an explanation of how the additional $2.4 million in pandemic pay given to 107 managers was calculated.
She worries those civil servants are being unfairly targeted for a decision beyond their control.
"We need to make sure that people understand what we're doing and why," Aheer said. "The reason the public is outraged right now is they don't understand."
Government spokespeople have not answered questions about who approved the additional pay.
The government has said the bonus pay was determined using a formula the public service commission uses to compensate managers for excessive overtime during public emergencies.
CBC News reached out to Rebecca Schulz for a response but, at the time of publishing, hadn't received a response.
Leadership hopefuls who weren't in cabinet scoffed at the idea the former ministers were unaware of the expense.
"Cabinet has made two years of bad decisions," MLA and leadership candidate Brian Jean said. "And this is one more of the latest insults. Cabinet needs to explain how this happened. All the money comes from the same place."
Independent MLA Todd Loewen, who is also seeking party leadership, is also pledging to hold an investigation into pandemic management if party members chose him as leader. He said in a video posted on Facebook on Tuesday that managers receiving bonus pay doesn't make him feel any better about the government's choices.
Danielle Smith called the bonuses "tone deaf."
"It is now clear we weren't all in this together, as many were making big bucks off the crisis. Our frontline health-care workers, including our doctors and nurses, pushed themselves to the brink. It's a slap in the face to each of them," she told CBC News via text.
Party members are slated to choose a new leader Oct. 6.
Unions say bonuses insulting to front-line workers
Meanwhile, the leaders of unions representing Alberta healthcare workers reacted with frustration and anger to news of the manager bonus pay.
The Health Sciences Association of Alberta (HSAA), which represents nearly 30,000 health-care workers, has just inked a contract that gives around 20,000 Alberta Health Services workers a one per cent pay increase in 2020-21. It's part of a total 4.25 per cent raise over four years.
HSAA website
To see Hinshaw receive 63 per cent more pay in the same year is "insulting," HSAA president Mike Parker said Tuesday.
Parker contrasted the expense with government arriving at the bargaining table seeking wage rollbacks as high as 11 per cent for some workers.
"The only reason the system was still operating was that our folks kept coming to work and staying extra. Doing more," he said.
The ranks of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees include 55,000 health-care workers, such as laundry, housekeeping, and food services workers and maintenance staff.
Union vice-president Bonnie Gostola says those workers are in the midst of voting on a new contract that includes no new pay for 2020-21 and modest increases for the following two years.
She said it was a struggle to get "pennies" from the government in negotiations, even after all their efforts during the pandemic.
"I was very insulted for our members, and many others in health care," Gostola said.
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