Angry in the Great White North

In my last several posts, I've been considering the mail sent ahead of Garth Turner's speaking tour. Here's what we know.

• The mail cames from 16 different MPs, including Garth Turner.
• These MPs sent mail, in envelopes, directly to specific addresses, addressed by family name.
• The envelope contained information about where Garth Turner would be speaking.

From a postal worker in Calgary:

This was a mass mailing in the Calgary area. I would guess at LEAST 20,000 pieces in this city alone.

I have a little over 400 calls on my route,a mix of apts.and houses. I recieved 22 pieces of Garth's [flyer envelopes],which is about 5% of the residences. I extrapolated those figures over the points of call in Calgary.

I've reduced it down to the numerical aspects of his observations. I encourage you to check out his full comments.

Garth Turner is visiting LaBroquerie, Calgary, Winnipeg, Regina, Duncan, Victoria, Vancouver, Abbotsford, Kelowna, Edmonton, Red Deer, and Lethbridge. The combined population of these cities is just over 5.6 million people. If Calgary, with a population of just over 1,000,000 souls, received 20,000 flyers delivered by franked mail, then extrapolating we would estimate that over 100,000 letters were sent to individual households to advertise Garth Turner's tour.

If these flyers were delivered at bulk rates, let's say five cents a piece, then the cost to the taxpayer would have been $5,000. Update: It turns out it costs about $20 for the House of Commons to send 4,000 flyers, or $500 to send 100,000 Garth Turner flyers. That would mean that But we've seen how these anonymous flyers have been delivered to individual residences in personalized addressed envelopes, but with no stamps. That's call franked mail, and every MP can send them. Franked mail is to ensure every MP and every Canadian can stay in touch regardless of ability to pay. It's not meant as a way of delivering anonymous flyers. Tthe cost to sort and deliver franked mail is charged to the House of Commons by Canada Post. The House pays this charge out of the common budget for parliamentary functions, and not out of individual MP budgets.

A mysterious group of 15 MPs is helping Garth Turner out sending out these flyers.

Franked mail costs the same as first class mail -- same amount of sorting and so forth required. Say with the envelope and paper, the cost comes out to sixty cents a piece. That would be an expenditure of $60,000 to deliver these junk flyers via envelope ahead of Garth Turner's tour, and charged to you and me.

These are wild arm-waving estimates, so keep a sense of perspective. The expenditure might be much less or much more. But no one is revealing just how much tax money was spent to support Garth Turner's Lost Tory Tour, so it's the best we can do right now.

Who is paying for this?

MP Turner and his wife Dorothy are using flights allocated in his existing office budget. Local volunteers are providing ground transportation. Most hotel rooms have been donated. Other costs will be paid personally by Turner. The goal is zero public cost.

Well, somewhere between zero and $60,000, I'd say. And it could have cost as little as $500 or so.

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