Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne is defending the province’s decision to give Pan Am Games executives bonuses for keeping the sporting event on schedule and within budget.
Opposition parties have been critical of the Ontario government’s use of taxpayer dollars to provide bonuses to the already high-earning executives.
“Most Ontarians don’t get that kind of a bonus for simply doing their jobs and I think that this is something that Ontarians will not like,” said provincial NDP Leader Andrea Horwath.
But the province says it is standard practice that helps guarantee the success of major sporting events.
“We had an incredibly successful Games,” Wynne told reporters on Wednesday. “If you look at multi-sport games around the wold, the same kinds of arrangements are in their contracts so that there’s a guarantee that certain targets and certain achievements will be accomplished.”
An estimated 53 executives will split $5.7 million in added pay, with some receiving bonuses worth as much as their salaries, which range from $250,000 to $428,000.
In a bid to attract top-level talent, TO2015 executives were guaranteed the payouts as “completion incentives” to keep staff from leaving early and so that the Games would come in on time and on budget.
Michael Coteau, the Ontario minister responsible for the Pan Am Games, says the event ultimately came in more than $50 million under budget, despite fears that security for the Games would end up costing more than the budgeted $239 million.
“Great work by Infrastructure Ontario (for) making the right types of decisions and putting in the right types of contracts,” he said.
But opposition parties at Queen’s Park are questioning the validity of those numbers.
The Progressive Conservatives have sent a note Ontario’s auditor general formally requesting a value-for-money audit of the Pan Am Games.
The Tories say there is a lack of transparency in the province’s calculations and that Pan Am executives aren’t providing enough details about costs.
“You’ve a situation where you’ve got 50 employees that make six figures having bonuses up to $480,000,” said PC critic for the Pan Am Games, Steve Clark. “It’s totally unacceptable.”
The province said the cost of the extra pay was already calculated in the Pan Am Games’ $2.5 billion budget. And with the $50-million surplus, the federal on provincial governments will be getting back some of the money budgeted for the Games.
The final cost bonuses are still being calculated and will be handed out in the coming weeks and months.
With a report from CTV Queen’s Park Bureau Chief Paul Bliss
