Calgary MP says Liberal government wasted millions on quarantine hotel stays
A Calgary-area MP is questioning why the federal government spent almost $7 million last year for a quarantine hotel in the city that only 15 people stayed at.
Michelle Rempel Garner has been a critic of the quarantine hotels since day one.
She now says the amount of money spent on them is wasteful – so wasteful heads should roll.
At the beginning of the pandemic, the federal government set up quarantine hotels in four Canadian cities with operating international airports.
In Calgary, it spent close to $27 million over the next two and a half years to use the Westin Calgary Airport hotel.
Through the last half of the fiscal year in 2020, it spent $8.9 million here and housed 119 travellers.
In the 2021-22 fiscal year that jumped to $11.13 million but so did the number of people – up to 1,356.
Then, last year up to October when the program ended, it spent $6.79 million but only housed 15 travellers.
"This is gross mismanagement and waste," Rempel Garner said.
Rempel Garner says when she saw the price paid in 2022 for using the hotel, which works out to just over $450,000 per traveller, she was stunned.
"Think about that amount of money. You know, (it) could be used, especially in Calgary, to buy a house." Rempel Garner said.
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation wants answers.
"People really are having a difficult time affording the necessities and then you hear just these examples of extreme waste coming from Ottawa, and I think that's going to hurt for many Canadians who are struggling," said Franco Terrazzano with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation.
When tracked down by CTV, the federal transportation minister said the government was facing an unprecedented crisis and placed a higher value on saving lives than on saving money.
"The public health measures that we put in place saved thousands of lives," Transportation Minister Omar Alghabra said.
"Of course, we have time to look back and learn from those lessons, but at the time we did what we felt was necessary to protect the health and safety of Canadians."
In the House of Commons, Rempel Garner grilled the federal health minister.
"How many other hotels did this happen at? And has anybody been fired for this waste?" she asked during question period.
"Our primary responsibility has been and remains to protect the safety and the health of Canadians, including the tens of thousands of people who had to access the designated quarantine facilities," Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos said.
Not all this money actually went to the Westin hotel chain.
Some of it went to other businesses over the two and a half years.
Here in Calgary, the Canadian Corps of Commissionaires got $1.7 million.
The Red Cross, close to $1.5 million.
And Winmar, a cleaning company, received $1.14 million.
Aaron Paramedical and Fenton Bus Services also got small sums.
How much money was spent on quarantine hotels in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal is not yet known, nor how many people stayed at them.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories

U.S. assassination attempt charges 'confirm' Trudeau's claims about India had 'real substance,' former national security advisers say
The indictment of an Indian national for the attempted assassination of a Sikh separatist and dual U.S.-Canadian national 'validates' Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's allegations that the Indian government may have been involved in the killing of a Canadian citizen as having 'real substance,' according to two of Canada's former national security advisers.
BREAKING Bonnie Crombie wins Ontario Liberal leadership after 3 rounds of voting
Ontario Liberals have selected Bonnie Crombie, a three-term big city mayor and former MP who boasts that she gets under Doug Ford’s skin, as their next leader to go head to head with the premier in the next election.
What was a hospital like in medieval times? Researchers analyzed 400 skeletons to find out
In medieval times, hospitals took care of the 'poor and infirm,' but how were inhabitants selected and what were their lives like? Researchers analyzed 400 skeletons to find out.
Search for runaway kangaroo in Ontario continues
The search continues for the kangaroo that is hopping around somewhere in Ontario after it escaped zoo handlers from a transport truck Thursday night.
7.6 magnitude earthquake strikes off the southern Philippines and a tsunami warning is issued
A powerful earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 7.6 struck Saturday off the cost of the southern Philippines island of Mindanao and Philippine authorities issued a tsunami warning.
Hoopla expected to hit new heights as Sinclair's farewell game in Vancouver nears
Canada's lopsided 5-0 win over an experimental Australia side in the rain Friday at Starlight Stadium and the hoopla surrounding it provided a taste of what is to come in Christine Sinclair's farewell game at B.C. Place Stadium.
'Big, dark canvas of despair': Rick Hansen speaks on how his mindset changed after being paralyzed
Rick Hansen's life changed the day he was told he'd never walk again, but instead of letting his disability stand in his way, he became an advocate for accessibility rights and a Paralympic Athlete. Here's how that happened.
'Every tool at our disposal': Lawyers submit amended application to challenge Sask. pronoun legislation
LGBTQ2S+ advocates are not backing down in their legal fight against the Sask. Party’s Parents’ Bill of Rights, submitting an amended application against the legislation on Friday evening.
Amid housing crisis, jail seen as preferable to living on the street
Michael Keough has to pause in the middle of his phone call from Newfoundland and Labrador's largest jail to cough and wipe his eyes -- there's black mould on the wall where the phones are, he explains, and it irritates him after a while.