{"id":101896,"date":"2017-05-10T22:12:07","date_gmt":"2017-05-11T02:12:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=101896"},"modified":"2017-05-10T22:12:07","modified_gmt":"2017-05-11T02:12:07","slug":"im-available-every-day-manitoba-premier-wont-defend-costa-rica-work-ethic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2017\/05\/10\/im-available-every-day-manitoba-premier-wont-defend-costa-rica-work-ethic\/","title":{"rendered":"‘I’m available every day:’ Manitoba premier won’t defend Costa Rica work ethic"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Manitoba<\/a>
Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister says he doesn’t have to explain his work habits or reveal how he communicates with staff while at his vacation home in Costa Rica. (Photo: Brian Pallister\/Facebook<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WINNIPEG\u2014Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister says he doesn’t have to explain his work habits or reveal how he communicates with staff while at his vacation home in Costa Rica.<\/p>\n

\u201cI work harder than any premier that’s been around here for a long, long time. I don’t have to defend my work ethic to you or anyone else,\u201d Pallister said following question period Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m available every day and I’m in touch virtually every day.\u201d<\/p>\n

The issue of Caribbean communications has become a dominant theme in Manitoba politics since Pallister said in December he planned to spend between six and eight weeks a year at his vacation home. He later revised the estimate to five weeks.<\/p>\n

Pallister has said he works hard while on vacation and communicates regularly with his staff and others. But he cites security concerns for not revealing how he stays in touch.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m not outlining the detail of how I communicate because it would defeat the purpose of the security which I want around all information.\u201d<\/p>\n

NDP justice critic Andrew Swan has accused Pallister of being completely disconnected from work, because documents obtained through Manitoba’s freedom-of-information law show no records of phone calls between Pallister and senior staff during his last four trips to Costa Rica.<\/p>\n

Pallister has said taxpayers do not pay a dime for his communication costs while he’s away, which leaves open the possibility that he uses personal phones or email addresses that would not be subject to freedom-of-information requests.<\/p>\n

The New Democrats had their own Caribbean communications problem this week when it was revealed NDP backbencher Rob Altemeyer rang up a $5,000 cellphone bill during a wedding vacation in Mexico earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Altemeyer said Wednesday he thought he was using the hotel’s wireless network instead of his cell signal and never received a message from his cellphone provider _ Bell-MTS _ that he was using international roaming fees.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am talking with the service provider to see if we can come to an understanding on resolving it,\u201d Altemeyer said.<\/p>\n

The bill, like all other monthly invoices, was sent directly to the Members’ Allowances Office _ the legislature bureau that oversees politicians’ spending accounts, Altemeyer said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bills have already been paid by the time I see what the amount is … and this month I found out _ after the bill was paid\u2014that it was a lot more than it usually is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bell-MTS said all users are warned of roaming fees when they cross international borders.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WINNIPEG\u2014Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister says he doesn’t have to explain his work habits or reveal how he communicates with staff …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":96710,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1482,18,16],"tags":[14027],"class_list":["post-101896","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-breaking","category-news-ca","category-news","tag-brian-pallister","mauthors-steve-lambert","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101896","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101896"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101896\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/96710"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101896"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101896"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101896"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}