NDP MLA Jenny Kwan said on Friday that she will pay back $34,922 for travel expenses charged to Vancouver charity Portland Hotel Society.

The Vancouver-Mount Pleasant MLA claimed that her ex-husband, Dan Small, had told her that the trips to Europe and Disneyland with him and her two kids were not being paid by the PHS where he was director of policy research and funding development.

Kwan said she was going to take responsibility for the trips and pay for them even though she didn’t have all the information about the expenses.

She said she will be taking an unpaid leave of absence as an MLA, but will not be resigning.

Kwan was one of the leaders of the small group of MLAs who forced then-NDP leader Carole James to step down. Many angry and bitter NDP supporters feel that if James had stayed on, the party would have been power today. James’ successor Adrian Dix completely messed up the election campaign last year.

The provincial government announced on Thursday that it had reached an agreement with the Portland Hotel Society (PHS) to protect health and housing services for the organization’s clients.

The board of directors resigned and a new interim board had been appointed to oversee the restructuring of PHS operations. The senior management team was terminated by the outgoing board and will be replaced by an interim executive selected by Vancouver Coastal Health and BC Housing. Together, the interim board and management team will implement a restructuring process aimed at maintaining existing services.

Significant concerns about Portland Hotel Society management practices were identified through an external financial review conducted by KPMG Forensic for BC Housing and an internal audit by Vancouver Coastal

Health Authority. The findings include:
* Unsupported expenses, including out-of-country travel, entertainment and catering;
* Misuse of corporate credit cards, missing receipts and inadequate approval of expenses;
* Unusual payments to affiliate companies set up and owned by PHS personnel; and
* Inadequate criminal record checks, contrary to the Criminal Record Review Act, that increased the risk of abuse to vulnerable adults.