I have been meaning to write this Blog for some time now; but other things have kept cropping up.
Simply stated, I believe Dear Sheila is going too far when she demands to examine the books of individual Parliamentarians.
Once again, I know that I am going against the grain of public thinking but Permit Me To Explain My Position:
But first I digress.
In a recent column, John Robson of Ottawa Citizen fame, wrote an excellent article on why he too does not agree with a Sheila Fraser Audit. John talks about rights of Parliamentarians vis a vis the bureaucracy and that Parliamentarians should rule supreme. On that I fully agree.
John also points out quite correctly that Parliamentarians themselves have an internal body that conducts its own audit on their expense accounts.
Although I agree with John, my opposition to an AG Audit is based on less noble principles.
I am mainly opposed to it since I know that it will result in yet another circus of criticism on minor and inane matters.
The Media talks about openness and that the taxpayer has a right to see how MPs are spending their hard-earned dollars. And the Media is quite correct. But that, ladies and gentlemen, is not why the Media wants to gets its grubby little hands on this information. They want to use it to embarrass Parliament - to create stories about how wasteful our representatives are - as has happened in Britain and more recently in Nova Scotia.
They are looking to create juicy (little) news stories that in the end will only lessen public respect for its leaders.
In ordinary times we could afford such nonsense but these are not ordinary times. We have a world economy on the verge of collapse while the Media and Opposition Parties here in Canada deal solely with the trivial: The Detainee Issue; The Guergis Affair; Man-made Lakes and so on.
Issues that at the end of the day I submit do not amount to a hill of beans.
And now the Media pounces on the Audit Issue that will only continue continue to divert attention away from what is really important.
In these troubling circumstances - quite frankly - I do not care if an individual MP has purchased a wide screen TV for his office - or even, double charged on his/her mileage.
Again that is not to say that such misuse of our taxpayers' dollars is right - it most certainly is not. But we have lost so much time chasing shadows that the real issues - the economy, the environment, our broken health and school systems continue to be ignored.
In this sense, I am mad at Sheila Fraser. In just the area of finance, she of all people should be aware of how precarious things are for our Government and in that regard I have to question why she would raise this matter save for the fact that it would garner her attention.
Up to this point, Sheila Fraser has done a commendable job as A.G. but perhaps the time now has come for her to stand down.
As I see it ...
"Galagher"
