The number of employees at the taxpayer-funded Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) making six-figure salaries each year has doubled since the Liberal government took office in 2015, according to the Canadian Taxpayer Federation (CTF).
In fiscal year 2015–2016, CBC had 438 hires who took home six-digit salaries that year. That group of CBC staff has steadily expanded ever since and doubled to 949 people by fiscal year 2021–2022, according to
the “sunshine list” obtained by the CTF through an access-to-information request. A sunshine list is a listing of salaries, benefits, and other relevant information that provides transparency to government expenditures.
The growth of such employees translates to nearly $120 million in Canadian taxpayer money paid to CBC employees in 2021–2022, an increase from about $60 million in 2015–2016, the document shows.
“Taxpayers don’t need all these CBC employees making six-figures,” Franco Terrazzano, federal director of the CTF, said in
a press release on Feb. 22. “What value are taxpayers getting from all these extra CBC staffers with big salaries?”
The CTF noted that the number of CBC employees earning an annual salary of more than $100,000 rose by 14 and 13 percent in 2020–21 and 2021–22, respectively—during the time when other Canadian businesses struggled with the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
There are now 220 more CBC employees receiving a six-figure salary than before the pandemic, the CTF said.
The internal records, extracted on Jan. 24, 2023, only included data for “permanent employees” with CBC.
The cost of the CBC shouldered by taxpayers has spiked since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was first elected in 2015, the CTF said, citing its annual reports showing annual funding to the federal Crown corporation having increased by $203 million since.
Salary Hike for Bureaucrats
The CTF urged the federal government to implement a sunshine list
last August after
a government document obtained at the time revealed 114,433 employees received more than $100,000 in 2021.
This included an additional
45,426 federal bureaucrats who received six-figure salaries compared to before the pandemic, the CTF said.
Some bureaucrats got more than a raise.
Executives and some in upper management positions in the federal government were paid over $190 million in bonuses during the pandemic year of 2021, according to
an Inquiry of Ministry tabled in the House of Commons last year. The documents, obtained by Blacklock’s Reporter, showed that the largest payout went to 295 executives who made up 96 percent of senior management at the Department of Justice, who were allotted $17.9 million.
In November 2022, the
CTF also reported that more than $156 million in bonuses and pay raises have been awarded to CBC employees since 2015, including $51 million in bonuses and pay raises paid out during the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021.
“The CBC shouldn’t have doled out bonuses while taxpayers lost jobs and businesses during the pandemic,” Terrazzano said in a Nov. 8, 2022
press release.
“If the CBC has enough money lying around to hand out millions in bonuses and raises during a pandemic, then taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to fork over more money.”
