POILIEVRE'S READING LIST — We know the Conservative leader was a Calgary Sun paperboy. We know he started devouring conservative economic texts at a young age, including Milton Friedman’s "Capitalism and Freedom" (h/t CAMPBELL CLARK). He doesn't seem to mind JORDAN PETERSON's musings. But how does PIERRE POILIEVRE start his day? Playbook may have found part of the answer in a massive, publicly available database where MPs disclose every cent they charge to taxpayers for salaries, travel, hospitality and contracts. We sorted and filtered a year's worth of parliamentary expense claims covering the period between Oct. 1, 2021 and Sept. 30, 2022. We'll spend the rest of this week telling you what we spotted among the tens of thousands of line items. There's a lot of substantive ground to cover. But we'll start with the things Poilievre has us pay for him to read. — Mainstream habit: The quarterly reports published online show Poilievre billed taxpayers for C$1,979.68 in "Printed Matter, Books, Newspapers and Subscriptions." That includes C$545.22 for the Financial Times, $449.99 for Bloomberg, C$279.60 for the Globe and Mail, C$199 for The Economist, C$155.64 for the Wall Street Journal, and C$140 for the National Post. His office also shelled out C$314 for Blacklock's Reporter. The Tory leader also spent C$60.78 on a subscription for a data repository called Trading Economics, as well as C$69.46 to Apple and C$61.99 to Medium. Rounding out the list: C$13 to the iStock photo service, and C$5 for an access-to-information request. DIGITAL OPS — On the eve of the last federal election, Globe reporters BOB FIFE and STEVEN CHASE stoked a minor controversy when they found Liberal MPs were paying parliamentary funds to a pair of companies that have long played serious roles in the party's digital campaign operations. The Globe tallied up several years of funds paid to NGP VAN, an American company that also works with Democratic Party campaigns, and Data Sciences, a firm owned by TOM PITFIELD — a childhood friend of the prime minister. At the time, the Liberal Research Bureau insisted the parliamentary funds were not paying for campaign work — only constituency-related work. Ethics commissioner MARIO DION soon after poured cold water on opposition accusations of foul play. — The present day: Liberal MPs have continued to contract both companies. The total value of those expenses for the past year is C$300,823.92. Playbook asked the Liberal Research Bureau, which provides support to the caucus, to explain the line items. Here's what managing director LINDA CAMPBELL had to say: “Members of Parliament have a responsibility to ensure they represent their constituents’ views in Ottawa and assist them with any issues that arise, from employment insurance to visa inquiries, among others. In order to assist with this communication and workflow, MPs from multiple parties have used different versions of a program for parliamentary functions, including for constituency case work. "The Liberal caucus has used NGP Van software since 2009. The Software can be used to track correspondence with constituents and help Members of Parliament understand the top issues in their constituencies, among other things. "NGP Van is not able to provide bilingual support for their program, which is crucial for Liberal MPs as they communicate in both official languages. Data Sciences has the rights to NGP Van and is able to provide support in both French and English." THE BIG NUMBERS — Sitting MPs expensed just a hair over C$148 million in total over the four most recent publicly available quarters. Here's the top-line breakdown: → Salaries:$94,114,702.48 → Travel:$20,903,387.80 → Hospitality:$885,294.50 → Contracts:$32,869,261.10 — What kinds of contracts? Advertising, office rental, cell phone and internet, courier services, computer repair, banking fees, cleaning products, renovations, framing services, office plants, training, janitorial services, pins and flags, postage, security equipment, and even bottled water. The expenses are broken down by dozens of categories. — Pesky cell phone bills: MPs managed to spend C$12.2 million on office rentals and C$6.6 million on advertising. Fair enough. They need to work somewhere and tell their constituents how to find them. They also wrote checks to telecoms like Bell and Rogers to the tune of nearly C$1.9 million for phone and internet. Hey, they need smartphones and connectivity. But those weren't mere monthly bills and fees. Voice and data plans only added up to C$929,949.70. MPs' offices racked up C$212,515.72 in overage fees alone over the course of the year. — The banality of scandal: Liberal minister AHMED HUSSEN has earned scathing Global News headlines for inking C$93,000 in contracts over several years with MunchMore Media — a foodie comms shop where the director is the sister of Hussen's policy director. Those entries are listed in expense filings as simply "communications officer." MPs' overall 12-month bill for contracted "communications officers" added up to C$771,301.73. Most likely don't share a similar familial connection, but Hussen is far from alone in paying for outside comms help and leaving taxpayers to foot the bill. — Coming tomorrow: More from the Expense Files.
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