A former campaign worker says the NDP altered election returns without his knowledge after the 1999 election, cashing in on $76,000 the party later had to repay.
Jim Treller, who was the official agent and money manager for former Rossmere MLA Harry Schellenberg’s campaign, said he filed the paperwork properly following the 1999 election. He counted union workers as donations-in-kind in his return, but says the party later changed that accounting to list union workers as expenses.
In a complex backing-and-forthing of cheques between that party and big unions, the change netted the NDP $76,000 in taxpayer-funded campaign rebates it didn’t deserve.
"We were charging for expenses we didn’t have," said Treller, now a math teacher at the University of Winnipeg Collegiate. "That’s not appropriate."
Treller said a public inquiry into the mess ought to be called, a notion Premier Gary Doer dismissed last week when word of the rebate controversy erupted.
source: Winnipeg free press
