REFORM CALLS FOR
AN EFFECTIVE SENATE

Shirley Abraham, President of Reform BC, asks the voters of British Columbia to call for a moratorium on appointing senators until a senate review has been completed. BC senator Ed Lawson will be retiring from his long-held post in the Senate within the next month and Abraham proposes that he not be replaced.

Reform BC has long worked for an Elected Senate with an Equal representation from each province and territory. Prime Minister Paul Martin has shown that he is open to change and Auditor General Sheila Fraser is highly capable of tracking waste in government. Abraham asks, “Is this the time to review the Senate? If the people of Canada knew how much the Senate costs, might they instead prefer that a portion of that cost be allocated to health care?”

Abraham compares our Senate to that in the U.S. “With one-tenth the population we have 104 Senators, compared to their 100. I’m not proposing that we need to follow U.S. political custom but it does seem that we may be over-governed at this level. Perhaps three or four senators from each of Canada’s ten provinces and three northern territories would serve us well and at greatly lower cost. If those Senators are elected we no longer have the government appointing their favourites to support their policies.”

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