Abolish the Senate – send them all packing.

 

By Ray Rivers.

BURLINGTON, ON.  May 22, 2013.  Four Senators and the Prime Minister’s chief of staff either out of a job or wondering how long they are going to keep the one they have.  That is what happens when you don’t give the children something constructive to do – they just get into mischief. 

 The Senate serves no useful purpose.  This well financially padded play-pen for worn-out political hacks has no meaningful role in our democracy.   Senate reform, you say?  Sure, but why not just get rid of it? 

 Modeled after the British House of Lords, the Canadian Senate was supposed to be the chamber of ‘sober second thought’, a place from which the landed gentry could repel the populists, keep the mob from taxing away their wealth.  The kind of place where Conrad Black would feel comfortable pontificating, as he, no doubt, did in the ‘real’ House of Lords in London.

Why, when Trudeau patriated the Canadian Constitution in 1982, why didn’t have the good sense to ‘whiteout’ all the language describing the Senate, its composition and function?  Then we wouldn’t be needing a constitutional amendment to get rid of it now.  Can’t you just imagine the discussions which took place in Charlottetown and Quebec in 1864 – Sir John A and 35 other well-suited men, all crowding around a table trying to piece together the British North America Act.  As they neared a deal on the constitution they backslapped each other, agreeing on the dominance of the House of Commons and its location in Ottawa. 

 Still self-congratulating each other, they traipsed off to London two years later for the hard sell.  Queen Victoria, studied the plans for a moment, then looking up at these upstarts scowled, “What, no upper chamber? Pity.”   And that may well be how the Canadian Senate got created – a regal after-thought.

 Albertans like Peter Lougheed and Stephen Harper, had long preached the merits of an elected (triple E) Senate, but anyone with a serious grasp of political science would know they were talking through their ten gallon hats.  Two elected bodies?  Both believing they are the rightful government? How would that work?  Congressional grid-lock in the US would look like child’s play here, were we to go down that road.  There is no place for a second governing body in Canada’s parliamentary democracy.

 Why, when Trudeau patriated the Canadian Constitution in 1982, why didn’t we have the good sense to ‘whiteout’ all the language describing the Senate, its composition and function?  Then we wouldn’t be needing a constitutional amendment to get rid of it now. 

 Of course Ontario, Nova Scotia, B.C., Manitoba and Saskatchewan have already called for abolition, the Official Opposition is on-side, and we should note that every upper house at the provincial level, including Quebec’s, has been abolished.  So let’s do the right thing – put it out of our misery.

 Meanwhile back at the ranch, there is this Duffy affair.  Bizarre and stinking.  Who actually believes that Stephen Harper wasn’t aware of the payoff? And if he was, why the dance he’s been giving us.  A week ago, I would have believed him, but then I could swear I saw his face on gawker.com – or was that the Mayor of Toronto, smoking crack?  

Ray Rivers writes weekly on both federal and provincial politics, applying his more than 25 years as a federal bureaucrat after which he decided to write and has become a  political animator. Rivers was a candidate for provincial office in Burlington where he ran against Cam Jackson.

 

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2 comments to Abolish the Senate – send them all packing.

  • Navigator

    I was all for abolishing the Senate, but now I see that Justin Trudeau wants to keep it because it gives Quebec extra advantages. So now I am not sure, because that makes sense to me as well.

  • anthony

    Guest author? I could tell by the quality in writing. It actually flows and makes sense. Or does it?