Will Canada have an elected Senate?

[RACooper]

Originally Posted by ariesrising

I think they need to make the seats more equal first - I mean, when Newfoundland and Labrador have the same amount as BC, when BC has a population of over 3 million and Newfoundland has about 500,000 that makes very little sense to me.

Then Ontario has 24 seats for 11 million people while Quebec gets 24 seats for 7 million.

I think they should base the number of seats available on population.

That type of Senate reform I wouldn't mind - the bumping up of seat numbers for some of the "smaller" province (representatively). Say bring the territorries up to 3 each; bump PEI to 6, leave Ontario and Quebec as is, and bump all the rest up to 12 each... spread it around a bit more to reduce some of the regionalism.

Anyways I've always liked that the Senate isn't as beholden to the poltical winds of the day - so it is much easier for them to vote outside of their supposed party lines, and take a much longer term view of things.

Now I know Harper's proposal is part and parcel of the Republic movement in Alberta... case in point they have "Senators in waiting" - Senate aspirants that have been "elected" and are awaiting a vacancy to open up. This has been a bone of contention between Alberta and Ottawa... in that while it all nice and dandy of them to "elect" a Senator, the PM does have to give this person any consideration - in fact the last one that was "elected" than appointed by a PM was back under Mulroney.

The only snag in Harper's plan is either he has to rely on Royal approval (via the Govenor General); or it's another fun round on Constitutional reform... and I'm sure if Constitutional reform comes up, you know Same-Sex Marriage is going to come back to the surface given Harper's social conservative base... and if that is the case, well, all bets are off.