Opposition ‘politicking’ on Weedmark private flights unless evidence exists, says policy expert

As Saskatchewan’s Opposition presses a government backbencher to release receipts showing he paid out of his own pocket for private flights to attend government events, a policy expert says the criticism amounts to political posturing unless evidence emerges that public dollars were used.

Kevin Weedmark, Saskatchewan Party MLA representing Moosomin-Montmartre, says he paid out of pocket for flights across the province to attend government events on Aug. 27.

The assertion follows mounting questions from the NDP after a now-deleted “day in the life” video from a person travelling with Weedmark was posted to social media.

Weedmark says it would have been difficult to drive across the province to attend events in Lloydminster and Saskatoon.

The video also shows Weedmark stopping in Regina before returning to Moosomin.

“As a result, I decided to charter a plane from a local company at my own personal expense. There were no taxpayer dollars involved,” Weedmark said in a statement Sept. 8.

The NDP also pointed to a second video from August 2025, from the person travelling with Weedmark, showing a group of individuals touring Jim Pattison Hospital and the Ronald McDonald House in Saskatoon. The video has since been deleted.

“Does he expect us to believe he’s paid for all of these flights? Travelling for work out of his own pocket?” Meara Conway, the NDP’s deputy house leader and health critic, told reporters Monday.

The NDP is also questioning a flight taken on June 1, 2025, on a jet that has the same registration number as the planes in the social media videos, linking flight records to Weedmark’s location at an opening reception for the first ministers’ meeting in Saskatoon.

But Weedmark denies the NDP’s claim he flew last June to or from Saskatoon to attend that reception, saying he drove instead.

“The NDP’s latest attempted smear is a blatant lie,” Weedmark said in a statement shared with media Monday.

Global News reached out to Weedmark for an interview, but did not hear back.

There is no rule requiring a public official to prove to the Opposition that they paid out of pocket, said Ian Stedman, an associate professor who specializes in government ethics at York University.

“Unless the Opposition has some evidence to suggest that he is paying with taxpayer dollars, then all this is politicking and trying to get him to respond in a way that puts him in a bad light,” Stedman said.

When it comes to spending public dollars, Stedman says MLAs are typically expected to do so as economically as possible.

“Even if he is permitted to do it for his transportation, and he has a big budget, the next question is, is that the right thing to do with public dollars? And one is a rules question, and one is a perception and public trust question,” he said.

The matter also would not constitute a conflict of interest unless taxpayer dollars were spent where they were not supposed to be, said Stedman, including private interests or non-permitted expenses.

“A conflict of interest arises when you make a decision in your public capacity to benefit yourself or improperly benefit someone else and their private interests and their private capacity,” he said.

“This doesn’t appear to be that.”

In Saskatchewan, the Board of Internal Economy requires public officials to disclose their expenses and any gifts and benefits they receive each year as part of their conflict-of-interest statements.

The province’s conflict of interest commissioner investigates any potential breach at the request of another member, the premier or the legislative assembly after determining whether there are reasonable and probable grounds to proceed.

“This ensures that the threshold for proceeding to an investigation is based upon something more than innuendo, gossip, or hearsay,” Maurice Herauf, Saskatchewan’s conflict of interest commissioner, told Global News in an emailed statement.

Scott Andrew, owner Air Andrew, the company operating the three flights in question, told Global News that his company has not received money from the Saskatchewan Party.

Andrew is also pushing back on the NDP’s flight cost estimates, which it is sharing with the public, assigning a price tag of around $50,000 to each flight.

“If you looked at that Lloydminster trip that everybody’s yapping about, if I did it today, it would be less than 20,000 bucks,” Andrew said.

The latest MLA disclosure statements containing travel expenses from April 1, 2025, to March 31, 2026, are expected to be provided to the Speaker on Sept. 30 and made public “shortly thereafter,” according to the Legislative Assembly Service.

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