Auditor to urge alleged misspending cases be sent to RCMP
OTTAWA — Canada’s auditor general will recommend the Senate refer 10 cases of alleged misspending by former and current senators to the Mounties, naming names and detailing the disturbing findings that have raised concerns of criminality.
The report will also contain about a dozen recommendations to help the upper chamber prevent further abuse of expenses.
The 10 senators — most of whom are retired — have been informed in writing Michael Ferguson’s final report on Senate spending will single them out and will urge the upper chamber to call in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police over their expense files, the Ottawa Citizen has learned. Ferguson is also expected to explain in detail what his auditors found in each of those 10 cases.
The 10 senators will have the right to challenge his findings to an outside arbitrator. If they choose not to, the Senate will send the file to the Mounties promptly.
(Any finding by the arbitrator their spending was, in fact, justified would force the Senate to pick sides between the arbitrator’s views and those of the auditor.)
If any files involving retired senators go to the RCMP, the Senate is prepared to take those retirees to court to try to recoup wrongfully claimed expenses.
The details come from multiple Senate sources with knowledge of Ferguson’s final report and the Senate’s planned response.
Ferguson’s office would not comment on the final report.
“Our work is ongoing, and it is our intention to have a report ready to deliver to the Speaker of the Senate in the first week of June,” it said in an unsigned email. “We don’t discuss the contents of our audit until it is made public.”
Quietly, senators admit they are bracing for the worst. Ferguson’s audit teams have pored through two years of spending receipts from senators, doing a line-by-line review of travel spending, phone calls, office contracts, lunch receipts and even asking for details about postage used for Christmas cards. The review itself has taken two years, with auditors investigating the spending habits of 117 past and present senators.
The most problematic expense claims have previously been pegged by Senate sources as being worth more than $100,000 in some cases, with housing and travel claims at the root of concerns. Between 20 and 30 more senators will have details of their problematic claims outlined in the final report.