Quebec taxpayers were billed almost $60,000 for Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) Economy, Innovation and Energy Minister Pierre Fitzgibbon’s trip to Davos, Switzerland to attend the World Economic Forum (WEF).
As reported by Le Journal de Montreal, this is not Fitzgibbon’s first expensive ministerial trip.
The bill for the Jan. 2023 trip includes $30,579 spent on transportation, with a $8,609 business class airfare and $21,000 on chauffeur services for eight days. $14,481 was spent on accommodations and other fees, while $11,492 went towards the travel costs of an accompanying staffer.
The total cost of the trip was $56,553.
Le Journal notes that the $21,000 spent on chauffeur services came despite free shuttles being available in Davos to, among other things, reduce pollution.
Ministerial spokesperson Mathieu St-Amand told Le Journal the expensive chauffeur service was also used by Investissement Quebec employees. The travel costs of these employees are not known at this time.
St-Amand also noted that economic missions “often bring in new foreign direct investment, as well as creating export opportunities for Quebec companies”.
At the WEF, Fitzgibbon met with business leaders from Amazon, Moderna and SNC-Lavalin among others.
Canadian Taxpayers Federation Quebec Director Nicolas Gagnon called out Fitzgibbon’s “princely tastes.”
“We expect a Minister of the Economy to go out and meet with economic players and bring back investments, but that being said, it’s still being done at a very high cost,” Gagnon told Le Journal
“We don’t see any indication that the Minister is trying to spend a little more prudently, In the end, it’s the taxpayers who pay for his princely tastes.”
Fitzgibbon spent $125,000 on ministerial travel in the first three months of 2023. He spent over $300,000 on travel between 2022 and 2023, and almost $250,000 on trips between 2019 and 2020.
The minister’s most expensive missions include a December 2019 trip to Korea, Japan and China which cost taxpayers $147,000 (for five people), and the spring 2019 trip to Germany to attend the Hannover Fair, which cost taxpayers over $155,000 (for 14 people).
Fitzgibbon also attended the WEF in 2022, with the latter costing $44,097. A Nov. 2022 trip to Egypt to attend the United Nations COP 27 climate change conference cost $42,589, a Jul. 2022 trip to the U.K. to attend the Farnborough air show cost $56,106 and a Mar. 2022 trip to Israel to attend the Mission Innovation event was priced at $21,601.
In contrast, the travel expenses of other CAQ cabinet members have been less costly. For example, a six-day ministerial trip to Europe by Deputy Prime Minister Genevieve Guilbault cost taxpayers less than $8,400 – making Fitzgibbon’s $8,609 WEF business class airfare more expensive than Guilbault’s entire trip.
In addition to controversies surrounding expenses, Fittzgibbon has run into troubles with the province’s ethics commissioner multiple times since being elected in 2018. He has so far faced six ethics investigations.
He also resigned from cabinet in 2021 following a report that found he violated the National Assembly’s code of ethics by opting not to sell shares in firms doing business with the province. The commissioner had recommended that Fitzgibbon be barred from sitting in the legislature – an unprecedented move.
Fitzgibbon, however, chose to remain in the legislature. He was re-elected in the Oct. 2022 provincial election and subsequently reappointed to cabinet – amid him being a close friend of Premier Francois Legault.
