Auditor General’s report uncovers breaches in campaign contracts

WINNIPEG – Manitoba Liberal Leader Dr.Jon Gerrard today demanded an explanation from the NDP as to why a contract for over $250,000 issued by the Spirited Energy Campaign was not tendered or reported, and why a number of other smaller contracts were also not tendered or reported.

“This is an outright breach of policy and it raises red flags on the issue of accountability,” Dr.Gerrard said. “The law clearly states that any contract in excess of $1,000 must be reported.”

The Premier claims that there was not enough time to disclose information and that the campaign was run entirely by the private sector.

“What we have here is an election scheme that backfired. The bottom line is that the Spirited Energy Campaign was launched to make Manitobans feel good about their province and by extension fell good about their government,” Dr. Gerrard said. “This campaign was supposed to promote Manitoba but there was no promotion of Manitoba outside of Manitoba. Sadly this campaign appears now to be a manual on how to mismanage $3.1 million of tax payers’ money.”

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