A Canadian government official was forced to resign after posting a video pretending to be home with the closure of the coronavirus – when he was in St. Louis.
Rod Phillips, Ontario’s finance minister, shared a clip of himself in a sweater and drank an eggnog in front of the fireplace, thanking the Canadians for not avoiding essential travel during the holidays.
“I want to thank each and every one of you for what we do to protect our most vulnerable,” Phillips said in the video.
Other posts on his Twitter account also suggested he was living in snowy Ontario, including a Dec. 17 photo of him throwing Canadian maple syrup over pancakes, and one visiting local businesses on Christmas Eve.
It appears that Phillips has been on the Caribbean island of St. Louis since at least Dec. 13. Barts – a favorite playground of the rich and famous – was, reports Newstalk 1010.
Opposition parties and health officials have demanded that Phillips be fired.
He was ordered to return to Ontario, and Prime Minister Doug Ford promised to have a “very tough conversation” with Phillips when he returned on Thursday.
Later Thursday, Ford said it had accepted Phillips’ resignation
In a statement, Phillips said he was “deeply” sorry about the beach holiday.
“It was a mistake and I apologize,” he said, acknowledging: “I am leaving on a personally paid trip to St Barts on December 13 after the legislative session.”
At Pearson Airport, he told reporters he had made a ‘stupid, stupid mistake’ by undertaking the trip, the CBC reported.
“I make no excuses for traveling when we should not have traveled.”
With Post threads