A sports arena is not the place to do the people's business, federal cabinet minister James Moore declared yesterday, as he strongly distanced his government from British Columbia's contentious policy of buying up nearly $1-million worth of Olympic tickets, including many in private suites, for the use of provincial politicians and prospective investors.
"They are free to take that approach," Mr. Moore said, "but I certainly don't plan on doing any government business in the stands of a hockey game. In my judgment, I don't think that's realistic."
The Minister of Heritage and Official Languages said no member of the Harper government will receive any free tickets to the Winter Games, with the exception of some seats at the glittering opening ceremonies, where many heads of state and ministers from around the world are normally present.
If Prime Minister Stephen Harper chooses to take in the gold medal hockey final, for instance, should Canada be one of the teams involved, he will pay for his $775 ticket out of his own pocket, Mr. Moore said.
"He will be sitting in the crowd, not in a suite."
The province, and to a lesser extent the City of Vancouver, have justified their purchase of Olympic tickets and allocation to elected politicians and key bureaucrats as a legitimate expense of doing business, with ticket-holders using them to woo potential clients.
But Mr. Moore said taxpayers already fund a myriad of facilities and meeting rooms.
"If I want to host someone, that's where the work is done," he said.
"In our view, a minister's business is a minister's business. Enjoying a sports event is another matter. That's not where business is done.
"When I watch the aerials at Cypress, I want to watch the aerials. I'm not interested in talking about the G20 summit coming up."
Mary McNeil, provincial Minister of State responsible for the Olympics, could not be reached for comment.
The B.C. government, which, like Ottawa, has access to Games tickets as a member of the so-called Olympic Family of corporate sponsors, funders and officials, opted to buy about 3,200 tickets at a cost of nearly $1-million.
The City of Vancouver has purchased $377,000 worth of tickets to the Games.
The federal government also received an allotment of Olympic tickets, but Mr. Moore said more than 1,500 of the 2,500 admissions have been returned. Those left are being bought at face value, he said.
"Members of Parliament all pay for their own tickets. All of us are paying our way.
"The reality is that no taxpayer is paying for a single federal politician or a single bureaucrat to attend the Olympic Games.
"As a minister, I make enough money to pay my own way to any sporting event I want to go to," said Mr. Moore, a previous Olympics minister in the Harper cabinet and the member for Port Moody-Westwood-Coquitlam.
Opposition MPs have spurned even that, arguing that it is not right for MPs to have special access to Olympic tickets, regardless of whether they pay for them.
"For Liberal caucus members, it was important to be in the same category of regular Canadians," said local Liberal MP Joyce Murray.
"Any MP or senator [who] is interested in acquiring them [can acquire them] as any other Canadian does."
Added Libby Davies of the NDP: "We decided we did not want any preferential treatment, where the public could not get tickets. So we declined them."
With a report from Robert Matas
