Saskatchewan: land of living skies, butt of many jokes, and home to the three highest-spending members of the Canadian Senate.
Well, whether Saskatchewan is actually their home is part of the problem, but let’s leave that aside for now.
Postmedia has crunched the numbers from December 2011 to December 2012 — the last period for which numbers are publicly available — and it doesn’t look good in terms of “spending taxpayers’ money.” Leading the pack is none other than Conservative senator Pamela Wallin, who claimed nearly $50,000 more in expenses than the next highest spender from Saskatchewan.
Saskatchewan’s senators charged taxpayers more than $2 million for travel, accommodations, office expenses and acts of hospitality. This does not include their annual base salaries of $132,300.
That certainly doesn’t sound good, but don’t worry. I’m sure these expenses are being examined by a neutral third party who will clear up all this confusion without being personally tarnished in any way by overspending.
David Tkachuk, the Saskatchewan senator who chairs the Senate’s committee on internal economy which currently leads the internal investigation of senator expenses, spent $234,245.
Oh.
Well this seems a little weird, but maybe it’s just a Saskatchewan thing — and there’s only six senators from the province, so how bad can it really be? The Senate as a whole probably has very firm rules about spending and this isn’t a widespread problem at all.
Or is it? Apparently Senate rules are a little “unclear” about what falls under living expenses, what kinds of travel expenses are covered, and whether senators’ allowances cover their family and staff members. Hospitality expenses are also cloudy; one senator racked up thousands in hospitality expenses in part by giving away “pens, bookmarks and a deck of playing cards.”
Amid all this wild spending, P.E.I. Senator Mike Duffy has just agreed to pay back tens of thousands for maintaining a second home in Ottawa, ludicrously claiming that his primary residence was a cottage back on the island that isn’t even accessible for half the year due to winter weather.
Oh yeah, and let’s not forget that one senator is currently facing charges for assault and sexual assault.
Hey, members of the Canadian Senate, what the hell are you people doing?
As Jacob Serebrin noted a couple weeks ago, these scandals always inevitably lead to talk of Senate reform. In fact, a new poll shows overwhelming support for either reform or outright abolition of the upper chamber, with less than a quarter of Canadians supporting the status quo. With all the crazy shit coming out of the Senate, many people are reasonably asking why we should continue giving out cushy lifetime appointments that seemingly have endless discretionary spending attached. Why wouldn’t we reform the Senate?
Consider me on #TeamStatusQuo.
The Senate plays an important role in Canada not despite its undemocratic nature but precisely because of it. If senators were elected, like some suggest should be the case, we would have two houses of Parliament competing with one another for votes and legitimacy. It would lead to gridlock. Keeping one unelected (and deeply unpopular) chamber means that it acts as an advisory body of sorts that helps to improve the legislation signed into law without daring to hijack the political agenda. And because of the high turnover in the Commons, most parliamentary knowledge in Canada really does reside in the Senate, without which all our laws would be worse.
And finally, abolishing the red chamber would really suck for those of us whose only goal in life is to be appointed to the Senate one day. It’s a dream job, really. You get to look over legislation all day, talk to lots of smart people about their fields of expertise, and you have three different cafeterias nearby (previously four).
The good news is that abolishing the Senate or even reforming it is a constitutional nightmare, so nobody really wants to open that Pandora’s box. The bad news is that the current crop of appointees are living it up like Kevin McAllister at the Plaza Hotel with Dad’s credit card.
There are only so many more scandals the public will endure before the shit hits the fan, and then boom, there goes my Senate appointment, you assholes. Just hold it together for another 20 years. By then I’ll have performed enough sexual favours for enough powerful people that I will hopefully be able to partake in some of the shenanigans. I’ll even spend my own travel allowance on cocaine for one of our wild Senate orgies.
But until then, just take it easy with the expense claims, people. Christ!
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