{"id":854367,"date":"2026-08-11T16:48:11","date_gmt":"2026-08-11T16:48:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/854367\/"},"modified":"2026-08-11T16:48:11","modified_gmt":"2026-08-11T16:48:11","slug":"miramichi-mp-cant-refuse-pay-raise-house-of-commons-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/854367\/","title":{"rendered":"Miramichi MP can\u2019t refuse pay raise, House of Commons says"},"content":{"rendered":"

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The House of Commons says it had no choice but to increase the salary of a New Brunswick MP, whether he wanted the raise or not.<\/p>\n

In an affidavit filed in Federal Court, House clerk Eric Janse says all members of Parliament must be paid the amounts set out in legislation, and it would be illegal and inconvenient to deviate from that.<\/p>\n

Miramichi-Grand Lake Conservative MP Mike Dawson filed an application for judicial review in Federal Court in June, trying to stop Parliament from awarding him the $8,800 raise.<\/p>\n

Janse filed his affidavit in response last month.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe House Administration is of the view that the applicant’s sessional allowance must, as a matter of law, be paid in the amount prescribed by the Parliament of Canada Act, including all applicable annual adjustments,\u201d it says.<\/p>\n

WATCH | \u2018A matter of law\u2019: No exceptions on MP raises:\"\"<\/p>\n

MP must accept pay raise, House of Commons says<\/p>\n

Exempting Miramichi MP Mike Dawson from the salary increase would break the law, official says in court filing<\/p>\n

Allowing Dawson to turn down the increase would also require House staff \u201cto undertake administrative measures\u201d for Dawson alone \u201cto establish and maintain a separate calculation of the Applicant’s sessional allowance\u201d every year for as long as he\u2019s an MP.<\/p>\n

The base salary for members of Parliament was $208,900 last year and rose April 1 to $217,700.<\/p>\n

Under federal legislation, MP pay is indexed to a formula based on private-sector salary hikes.<\/p>\n

But Dawson believes it\u2019s wrong to accept an $8,800 raise when many Canadians are struggling with the cost of living.<\/p>\n

Dawson said that as a business owner, he was expected to easily deduct federal taxes from his employees\u2019 pay and this shouldn \u2019t be any more complicated.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe seem to be all right to put somebody on the moon, but we can\u2019t stop a pay raise,\u201d he said. \u201cEverything\u2019s electronic for pay. It\u2019s just a matter of clicking a button.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first-term MP has been donating his raise to charity but said he should be allowed to object to it altogether.<\/p>\n

Olivier Duhaime, a spokesperson for House of Commons Speaker Francis Scarpaleggia, said neither Scarpaleggia nor Janse would grant an interview about the case.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Duhaime said full legal arguments in the case are expected to be filed in the next two months.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 2 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":854368,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[49,48,44],"class_list":["post-854367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=854367"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854367\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/854368"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=854367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=854367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=854367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}