Taxpayers pay the bills for politician’s expenses and they deserve to see the receipts.

Right now, in Manitoba, cabinet ministers and the premier post quarterly expense statements online. These statements show the purpose of the trip and the total spent in several broad categories like “airfare,” and “accommodation, meals and phone calls.”

What the statements don’t show are the itemized receipts. That’s a problem for taxpayers trying to keep the government accountable.

For example, Premier Wab Kinew took a trip to Washington D.C. in February. That trip cost taxpayers $4,051. The costs were broken down as $1,481 in air fare, $2,450 in accommodation, meals and phone calls and $120 in other transportation.

Now, these could be completely justifiable expenses. Travelling costs money. But without the receipts, taxpayers have no way of knowing whether Kinew was purchasing a meal from the local diner, or splurging taxpayer cash on caviar.

And that’s only Kinew’s specific expenses, the expenses of staff he brought on the trip isn’t disclosed publicly at all.

Families Minister Nahanni Fontaine went on a trip last March and the expense release form showed the trip cost taxpayers $6,649. But details dug up by the Canadian Press through freedom of information requests, show that the total cost of the trip, including staff, was $23,105.

And that’s the problem. The only way for a taxpayer or a journalist to access the fine details and expenses of accompanying staff is to send in a freedom of information request to the government. That means potentially waiting more than a month for the information and being hit with fees to get information that taxpayers should be able to see for free.

In Alberta, if a politician or senior official spent more than $100 of taxpayers’ money, they have to provide an itemized receipt that’s posted online for all to see. It’s the gold standard in expenses transparency in Canada.

This summer, the Alberta government quietly tried to dump its longstanding policy of proactively posting expense receipts online. That was a mistake. After outrage from taxpayers, the government reversed the decision and restored the receipt transparency.

Alberta NDP leader Naheed Nenshi said reversing the decision is a “no-brainer.”

Manitoba taxpayers deserve that same level of transparency for both politicians and senior officials. It helps taxpayers hold politicians accountable and it stops politicians from wasting money in the first place because they know they will have to post the receipts and defend their choices. Sunlight is the best disinfectant.

This level of transparency would have helped Manitobans get clearer answers in the past. Former premier Brian Pallister took two trips to Ottawa with some questionable expenses in 2021. He spent $1,300 on the category of “other transportation.” At that time, Kinew said: “It certainly raises questions as to what that $1,300 was spent on.” That was the right question for Kinew to ask and having access to the receipts would have made it easier to hold Pallister to account.

At the time, a spokesperson for Pallister said that other transportation could “include car rentals, travel agent fees, taxi cabs, essentially any transportation that is not airfare.” That’s not clear enough for taxpayers because doesn’t tell them if he spent money renting a Corvette or a Corolla.

The NDP’s 2023 election platform declared that “A Manitoba NDP government will strengthen democracy in Manitoba by promoting transparency and accountability.”

Kinew didn’t start off on the right foot on this after becoming premier. He failed to post required expenses for about the first year of his government, despite repeated calls to do so.

After finally posting the receipts, Kinew said he would look at including staff and bureaucrat travel expenses in the proactive disclosures. That’s the right move. And it should also include itemized expenses.

Taxpayers deserve to see what they pay for.

That means showing the receipts.