In addition to her position as alderman in Uccle, Delwart sits on the board of directors at Fluxys and is secretary general at Mouvement Réformateur (MR).
According to The last hour, which is based on figures from Transparancia, she earns just over 230,000 euros gross annually. But according to a 2017 ordinance of the Brussels Region, that amount exceeds the permitted income limit that politicians may receive from public mandates.
That ceiling is 150 percent of a parliamentarian’s annual gross salary, approximately 190,000 euros. If that amount is exceeded, the salary as ships must normally be adjusted to remain below the limit. That didn’t happen.
Private activity?
According to Delwart, there was a lack of clarity regarding her mandate as secretary general at MR. That was incorrectly counted as a private activity. And in that case the ordinance does not apply.
“It was not entirely clear whether that position counted as a private activity or public,” Delwart explains. “I submitted that issue to the Parliament’s Transparency Service in July last year.”
However, it is the citizens’ movement Transparancia that brought the matter to light, including on LN24 some weeks ago. “We have discovered that her salary as secretary general at the MR is paid by the Chamber. That is written in black and white on the document we have,” says Claude Archer of Transparencia.
According to Claude Archer, this concerns forgery, because she made it appear in her report that the MR, a private organization, paid her salary, and not the Chamber. This made it easier for her to exceed the legal ceiling.
Retroactively
Alderman Valentine Delwart has now moved in The last hour admitted that her mandate as secretary general at the MR is a mandate paid for by a public government.
The error dates back to 2018. According to Transparancia, the ships would have to pay back around 160,000 euros retroactively.
Delwart does not want to discuss that amount for the time being. “We are currently working on a plan for rectification, both in terms of reimbursement to the municipality and taxes. The calculations of the precise amounts are underway and are expected in the coming weeks.”
