Republished June 08, 2015 - 2:22 PM
Original Publication Date June 08, 2015 - 11:30 AM
OTTAWA - The body that polices spending in the House of Commons has moved to reactivate a court challenge launched by the NDP against a ruling that dozens of its MPs improperly used parliamentary resources for partisan purposes.
The board of internal economy has sent a letter to the Federal Court, requesting resumption of the legal proceedings.
The court challenge has languished since it was filed last fall as the NDP and the board fruitlessly attempted to negotiate an out-of-court settlement.
At issue are two rulings by the secretive, multi-party board, which the NDP maintains is a kangaroo court driven by partisan motives.
The board has ordered 23 New Democrat MPs to reimburse just over $1 million in free parliamentary mailing privileges used to blanket 26 ridings across the country with almost 2 million partisan missives.
It has also ordered 68 current and former New Democrat MPs to repay $2.7 million taken from their Commons budgets to pay the salaries of staffers in satellite party offices.
News from © The Canadian Press, 2015