The Yukon Party is sharpening its teeth on the Liberal government when it comes to taxpayer protection.

On Dec. 21, the Yukon Party, as the official Opposition, introduced a bill to strengthen the Taxpayer Protection Act by what it calls “increasing transparency and improving government’s accountability to the legislature when it comes to borrowing money.”

For most of the fall session, party members were hectoring the government on its decision to increase the territorial government’s debt limit to $800 million last spring.

“In June, without any public consultation or democratic oversight, the territory’s debt limit was doubled to $800 million. According to the Yukon 2019/20 Public Accounts, the current long-term debt is now $228.4 million,” a statement from the party suggested.

“The Yukon government has the ability to borrow money without the approval of the legislative assembly. This bill proposes changing that, and would require prior authorization by the legislature before government borrows money.”

The government said at the time some of the extra spending was needed to pursue its multi-year renewable energy projects agenda as part of the long-term ambition to reduce the territory’s greenhouse gases.

Brad Cathers, the party’s finance critic, said “the Liberal government has the ability to borrow over $570 million without telling Yukoners about it until after the fact.

“We believe government should have to seek approval of the legislature before taking on long-term debt. This legislation sets out our vision for strengthening the Taxpayer Protection Act to provide that increased democratic oversight.”

Yukon Party MLAs have asked about this issue several times over the last three months.

Premier Sandy Silver has scoffed at their questions. He said it was public knowledge the government was going to seek the increased limit.

“We have been down this road quite a few times,” he said Dec. 7.

“Again, we brought up in the legislative assembly the fact that we were going to Ottawa and that this request was happening well before that. We have talked about that in the legislative assembly.

“The government’s current borrowing limit is $800 million, set by two regulations under the Yukon Act, which is Canadian legislation,” Silver added.

“It is allocated between Government of Yukon and the corporations — Yukon Development Corporation, Yukon Energy Corporation, Yukon Housing Corporation, and the Yukon Hospital Corporation.

“The limit was increased earlier this year by the Government of Canada, and of the $800-million borrowing limit that was set in the Yukon’s borrowing limits regulations, $590.5 million — which is about 73.8 percent — is still available to fulfill outstanding and future approvals of debt.”

Despite the Dec. 22 end of the session, the bill remains on the legislative table and will have to be dealt with or removed from consideration during the next sitting of the assembly.