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Sometimes, it pays to challenge the findings of the auditor general.
Ten months after the release of Michael? Ferguson’s sweeping — and scathing — review of senatorial expenses, a former Supreme Court justice has slashed the total owing for the fourteen senators who challenged his findings by nearly 45 percent.
In his report, Justice Ian Binnie — who was appointed to arbitrate disputed claims in the wake of Ferguson’s report — concluded that nearly half of the $322,611 in expenses initially found to be inappropriate were actually justified.
The final total for the fourteen who fought Ferguson’s findings: $177, 898.
“I impute no bad motives to any of the senators,” Binnie said.
“I didn’t feel like, for the most part, they were gaming the system,” he told reporters, although he felt that there may have been certain principles that were “overlooked” — like, for instance, that one has to actually pay out the expenses in order to be reimbursed, which was an issue with the claim filed by Senator Jean-Guy Dagenais, whose total owing dropped from $3,538 to $2.267.15.
Binnie also suggested that transparency in dealing with potentially questionable claims at the Senate internal economy committee could also reduce instances of inadvertently inappropriate reimbursement requests: as the committee operates in secrecy, senators aren’t aware of precedents set in previous decisions.
?The arbitrator stressed that he made a point of not getting into certain issues at play in the trial of Sen. Mike Duffy, including the use of public funds for partisan activities.
He did, however, observe that it was “perfectly clear” to him that the Senate “is a partisan institution (and) the parties are at war with one another.” Binnie added that parties are free to continue that battle, except during elections when the use of Senate resources is expressly prohibited.
“It is, root and branch, a political institution.”
He noted his inquiry didn’t include any cases where expenses were disallowed on the basis that it involved partisan activities, although he did deal with claims related to charitable fundraising.
Some, like Nova Scotia Liberal Joseph Day, saw their bill reduced by thousands of dollars — just under $17,000 to $3,050, in his case.
Senator Sandra Lovelace saw her repayment bill drop from $75,227 to $38,023, while her Conservative colleague Pierre-Hughes Boisvenu had his tab reduced from $60,168 to $20,467.33.
Not one of the fourteen had their tab wiped out entirely, however — and ?Binnie sided with Ferguson’s figures in four cases; Lowell Murray ($15, 324) Robert Peterson ($11,493) and Terry Stratton ($5,467), all of whom are now retired, and sitting senator Dennis Patterson ($13, 762).
Seven senators singled out for repayment obligations in Ferguson’s report chose not to take their cases to arbitration.
查看原文...
Ten months after the release of Michael? Ferguson’s sweeping — and scathing — review of senatorial expenses, a former Supreme Court justice has slashed the total owing for the fourteen senators who challenged his findings by nearly 45 percent.
In his report, Justice Ian Binnie — who was appointed to arbitrate disputed claims in the wake of Ferguson’s report — concluded that nearly half of the $322,611 in expenses initially found to be inappropriate were actually justified.
The final total for the fourteen who fought Ferguson’s findings: $177, 898.
“I impute no bad motives to any of the senators,” Binnie said.
“I didn’t feel like, for the most part, they were gaming the system,” he told reporters, although he felt that there may have been certain principles that were “overlooked” — like, for instance, that one has to actually pay out the expenses in order to be reimbursed, which was an issue with the claim filed by Senator Jean-Guy Dagenais, whose total owing dropped from $3,538 to $2.267.15.
Binnie also suggested that transparency in dealing with potentially questionable claims at the Senate internal economy committee could also reduce instances of inadvertently inappropriate reimbursement requests: as the committee operates in secrecy, senators aren’t aware of precedents set in previous decisions.
?The arbitrator stressed that he made a point of not getting into certain issues at play in the trial of Sen. Mike Duffy, including the use of public funds for partisan activities.
He did, however, observe that it was “perfectly clear” to him that the Senate “is a partisan institution (and) the parties are at war with one another.” Binnie added that parties are free to continue that battle, except during elections when the use of Senate resources is expressly prohibited.
“It is, root and branch, a political institution.”
He noted his inquiry didn’t include any cases where expenses were disallowed on the basis that it involved partisan activities, although he did deal with claims related to charitable fundraising.
Some, like Nova Scotia Liberal Joseph Day, saw their bill reduced by thousands of dollars — just under $17,000 to $3,050, in his case.
Senator Sandra Lovelace saw her repayment bill drop from $75,227 to $38,023, while her Conservative colleague Pierre-Hughes Boisvenu had his tab reduced from $60,168 to $20,467.33.
Not one of the fourteen had their tab wiped out entirely, however — and ?Binnie sided with Ferguson’s figures in four cases; Lowell Murray ($15, 324) Robert Peterson ($11,493) and Terry Stratton ($5,467), all of whom are now retired, and sitting senator Dennis Patterson ($13, 762).
Seven senators singled out for repayment obligations in Ferguson’s report chose not to take their cases to arbitration.
查看原文...
