Canada PoliticsFormer senator says Senate expense shenanigans are nothing new
This probably shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone but a retired senator says that Mike Duffy and Pamela Wallin weren't the first ones to have — allegedly — fudged their expense claims.
In an interview with APTN News, former Senator Thelma Chalifoux was asked if she saw people using loopholes for personal benefit during her time in the red chamber. Here's her response:
"Oh yes, but it was all under the table and it wasn't publicized.
See and this is what it is now. Now people are beginning to ask questions and they're beginning to look and they're beginning to challenge.
And so this makes the big difference and it's long overdue. Our Parliamentarians must be accountable."
Chalifoux was appointed to the Senate by Prime Minister Jean Chretien in 1997 and served until she turned 75 in 2004.
The full APTN interview can be seen here.
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According to the Edmonton Journal, Senators only began publicly reporting their quarterly expenses in January 2011.
These quarterly reports, available online, show top line figures for expense categories including office expense, hospitality, living expense, travel and other travel.
Gregory Thomas of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation argues that there needs to be more public disclosure.
"The facts are that MPs and Senators created this mess themselves because they put themselves above the laws, they release themselves from the Access to Information Act," he told Yahoo! Canada News, in an interview earlier this month.
"They refuse to put their expense documentation online."
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Thomas warned that scandals like Duffy's are just the tip of the iceberg. He suggested that MPs and senators follow the lead of Alberta where their MLAs essentially post all their receipts online.
"If they just followed the same rules everyone else does in government then we would have heard this story years ago and Mike Duffy wouldn't have had the opportunity to dig himself $90,000 into the whole," he said.
"I believe there are a whole [bunch] of other scandals that haven't come to light because all the documentation isn't made available."
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