Dispensing with salary reinforces the notion that everyone else is just in it for the money. It turns an issue of access to public life for all people into a negative. Like many populist gestures, it inverts a democratic principle, making the powerful appear without motive and the people appear craven.The reality is that paying politicians – and paying them appropriately – serves to improve our government and our society.
More: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/second-reading/the-importan...