We Are On A Roll Stephen.....Let's Not Screw It Up

By considering the use of government jets as the spoils of war. If we were critical of the liberals on this issue we should take the high ground and pay all the freight when it is appropriate.

Harper pays little for partisan use of gov't jets
Updated Wed. Feb. 28 2007 8:50 PM ET
Bruce Cheadle, Canadian Press

OTTAWA -- Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his Conservatives are paying just a small fraction of the cost of partisan and personal junkets aboard the military's fleet of Challenger executive jets.

And documents show that the Prime Ministers' Office changed the formula for calculating flight costs after Harper's first partisan journey - a move that slashed subsequent Conservative party repayments.

Neither the original formula nor the reduced charges came anywhere close to what Harper himself in Opposition had called "$11,000 per hour Challenger jet flights" by the previous Liberal government.

The invoices, obtained by The Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act, show a total of three Challenger flights by Harper in 2006 for which the military billed the Prime Minister's Office.

The first flight was Feb. 10, 2006, shortly after the minority Conservatives won power. Harper's return trip to Halifax from Ottawa for the retirement party of Nova Scotia premier John Hamm was deemed a partisan exercise, and the Conservative party paid the freight.

The invoice from National Defence, which lists Harper and six staff on board, calculated the trip cost "3.1 flying hours X $2,139.00/hour."

The total bill: $6,630.90.

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