Shortly after 10 am tomorrow morning, Government House Leader Peter Van Loan will rise in the House of Commons to table “An Act to amend the Constitution Act, 1867 (Senate tenure) and An Act to provide for consultations with electors on their preferences for appointments to the Senate.”
Van Loan and Senator Marjory LeBreton, the Leader of the Government in the Senate, will then hold a press conference.
No doubt they will be announcing that Sen. Michael Fortier – appointed by the Prime Minister early in 2006 to howls of outrage from his party’s grassroots so that he could solve a political problem he had vis-a-vis representation in his cabinet from the City of Montreal – will be stepping down immediately. Most Canadians, we assume, expect their politicians to walk the walk if they’re going to talk the talk about Senate reform. Something tells me, though, that Fortier will still be a minister at the end of the day …