A New Brunswick judge has denied claims he recommended that MLAs should increase severance packages for retiring legislature members.

CBC News reported two weeks ago that a number of MLAs leaving office this year would get up to $42,000 in severance payments.

Loredana Catalli Sonier, the clerk of the legislature, said a 2007 commission on MLA compensation headed by Mr. Justice Patrick Ryan recommended the re-establishment payments.

But on Wednesday, Ryan said that was not the case.

The report said, "the purpose of a re-establishment payment is to financially aid a former member to re-enter the workforce," not to retire, he pointed out.

Ryan said the decision to vote for universal severance deals was made by the MLAs, not him.

New Brunswick introduced limited severance packages called re-establishment allowances in the mid-1990s for MLAs who lost their seats before reaching the eight years required to qualify for an MLA pension.

The money was meant to help ease former members back into the workforce and paid a maximum of $27,000.

Big raise in payments

But in 2008, MLAs voted to increase the maximum payment to $42,500 and to make the allowances available to everyone, including politicians who quit or those who retire on a full pension.

That change went unnoticed until last month.

The MLAs also voted for an 85 per cent increase in their pension benefits, giving themselves one of the richest political plans in the country.

"This recommendation is not as clear as it could be," Tom Bateman, a political scientist at St. Thomas University, said Wednesday. He said it appeared the MLAs saw room for interpretation in Ryan's call for slightly enhanced severance payments and expanded the program to include all MLAs.

"I'm surprised constantly when elected officials get caught with their pants down on things like this, because this is a no-brainer. They know it's a nuclear kind of political question, so deal with it up front," Bateman said.