When I was in school, I didn't even know we had a Senate. I thought a Senate was an American thing.
It was about the time that I voted for the first time that I began to get interested in the Canadian political system and I finally learned about the Canadian Senate.
During the 1980s, whether or not we had a Senate seemed to be irrelevant. Yes, every now and then, you would hear about someone being appointed or a Royal Commission but no one really paid a lot of attention to the actions of the chamber of sober second thought.
Even for much of the 1990s, the Senate was a non-issue until Preston Manning and the Reform Party came up with a campaign strategy that involved either abolishing the Senate or establishing a Triple E body. Basically, their argument was that the Senate was a waste of taxpayer's money as it was constituted, so either get rid of it or make it over into something that doesn't waste taxpayer's money.
It is hard to argue with the idea. It is a motherhood and apple pie issue.
No one in their right mind is going to say that motherhood is a bad idea. And no politician is going to argue that we should keep wasting money.
The debate about the Senate, though, was a little more subtle. On the one side was the Reform Party, followed by the Canadian Alliance, followed by the Conservatives saying that we need to do something with the Senate.
On the other side were the Liberal governments of the day saying that there is nothing wrong with the Senate, that is does valuable work, and that the government shouldn't go about trying to fix something that isn't broken.
This brings us to the rise of the Conservative Party and Prime Minister Stephen Harper. The present Senate scandal has focused attention on the red chamber in a way seldom seen before.
What to do about it?
The Fathers of Confederation put the Senate in place as a way of ensuring that regional disparities in population or size did not come to dominate government. The Senate was supposed to ensure all of the provinces have a more-or-less equal say.
It was amazing foresight on their part to realize that Prince Edward Island might one day have a total provincial population that was dwarfed by medium-sized towns in the rest of the country or that Toronto would grow to be the sprawling metropolis that houses one fifth of the people in this country.
The Senate was designed to protect the rights of minorities in all of their forms. Certainly, it was intended that provinces with large populations could not stomp on the smaller provinces.
However, because the members of Senate are appointed by the sitting Prime Minister, the composition of the Senate has always looked more like a retirement home for political hacks and party faithful than a true body for sober second thought.
What to do about it?
Mr. Harper has often quoted: "Probably on no other public question in Canada has there been such unanimity of opinion as on that of the necessity for Senate reform." which is from 1926. Clearly this is a long standing Canadian question.
But if we are to reform Senate, what should it become? Elected Senators with four year terms, much as we elect MPs? Longer terms to eliminate short term thinking? Better equity? Or should it still provide over-representation for the smaller provinces?
As Senator Wallin observed on the floor of the chamber, the present scandal couldn't have done a better job of whipping up an appetite for Senate reform if it had been deliberately set up.
And who knows what tangled webs politicians weave? Maybe this is exactly what Mr. Harper had in mind. He is a man with a reputation for the long game and deep tactical thinking about politics. Maybe the idea was to make the Senate so outrageous that citizens would howl for change.
You can just see the political ads for the next election: "Vote Conservative because we made the Senate into a joke but we have the solution."
What to do about it? No one has a clear answer yet.
However, the present scandal keeps getting deeper and muckier. It is not going away any time soon. At some point, the whole truth or, at least, the best truth as we know it, will emerge and someone will be wearing egg on their face.
Even if it is not the Prime Minister, though, you can't help but feel that he will be splattered a bit in the process.
Stephen Harper, leader in charge of the Conservative brand and likely future Senator, is looking a little tarnished these days.
But, for that matter, so is the whole Senate.
