Senate reform and lost income

The Senate-reform legislation has been introduced (see link here) and if you were wondering why some (not all) of the Harper appointees had reservations, perhaps here's a bit of an explanation.

Under this bill, senators appointed after 2008 will have to leave the Senate nine years after the act takes force.  The only exceptions are senators appointed before 2008 and Harper appointees who will turn 75 in the next decade.

Here's a handy guide to what that means to the Harper appointees, assuming the law comes into force next year (and that's a big 'if' by the way.) 

Fabian Manning,  entitled  to retire in 2039, will lose 18 years of potential income, as will Don Meredith and Claude Carignan.Other big losers include Patrick Brazeau, who has to retire 28 years early, Leo Housakos, 22 years early; Yonah Martin, 19 years early.

 

Michael MacDonald,  entitled  to retire in 2030, nine years  lost income. Pamela Wallin, seven years; Salma Ataullahjan, six years;  Larry Smith, Elizabeth Marshall, five years.

Stephen Greene, is entitled  to retire in 2024. So it's just three years lost income for Greene, as well as Pierre-Hugues Boisvenu, John Wallace, Percy Mockler.  Four years lost income for Judith Seidman and Don Plett. Dennis Patterson and Dan Lang would lose only two years.

Fred Dickson is   due  to retire in 2012. No lost income. Ditto for all these senators, who are due to retire before these term limits  have an effect: Vim Kochhar, Bert Brown, Suzanne Fortin-Duplessis, Irving Gerstein, David Braley, Michel Rivard, Bob Runciman, Mike Duffy, Doug Finley, and Carolyn Stewart-Olson.

I should say -- I have no clue which of these senators is objecting to the reforms (if any) and whether those objections revolve around potential personal income loss. What is clear, though, is that their support of nine-year term limits has a real, material cost.

 

Comments

[William J.Balacko]

Sounds pretty confusing to me .Why don,t they just get rid of the place.I,m sure the bulk of Canadians won,t object

[mike]

Lost Income? Give me a break. Most of the Tory senator are career political hacks or independently wealthy business people. Is Braley really in it for the money? Duffy, Finlay and Gerstein would all be gainfully employed by the party machine were they not in the senate.

[Ian Brodie]

There's no lost income here. They all knew the term limit was coming and agreed to it when they were appointed. The press releases issued at the time make that clear.

Ian Brodie

[fey strickland]

Isn't a verbal yes the same as a written yes.What ever happened to ethics. Come on, Canadians should not expect government support from cradle to grave.Free loaders are a menace to our system

[attheedge]

Boo hoo, so cry me a river. Does anyone really care about how much a senator will lose other than the senators themselves? Abolish the senate and save the taxpayers a few dollars. Of course as someone else pointed out, they'd only move into other government positions and suck up more tax dollars there with bogus committees and wasteful and unnecessary enquiries. Spare us.