ONLY SENATOR FOR THE JOB
B.C.’s Woo likely to lead group
A powerful group of independent senators will choose its leader next week and, so far, only one person is in the running.
B.C. Sen. Yuen Pau Woo has put his name forward for leadership of the Independent Senators Group on a “ticket” with Sen. Raymonde Saint-Germain, who would act as deputy.
Their candidacy comes at what they call a “pivotal” moment in the Senate’s history.
Another senator, Larry Campbell, had been keen on the job. But he recused himself last week, according to the group’s current leader, Alberta Sen. Elaine McCoy.
Nominations for the positions of “facilitator” and “deputy facilitator” are open until Friday but McCoy and Woo both implied there are no rumours others will apply.
A decision will come Monday as senators gather for a summit where they will also try to nail down policies for how the group is governed.
McCoy has decided to step down from her role but will remain involved and offer guidance to whoever steps in next.
“Some people are calling me the godmother,” she said.
The Independent Senators Group is soon to be the biggest group in the Senate.
Its members already outnumber the Senate Liberals more than two-to-one, and are about to surpass the membership of the Conservative Senate caucus.
Under a new appointment process established by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, senators now come to the chamber expecting to be independent of a political caucus.
With a big influx of new senators last year and 10 vacancies that Trudeau could fill anytime, the chamber is evolving rapidly.
The Senate has become more likely to amend government legislation and has successfully “improved” Liberal bills, as McCoy put it, about a quarter of the time. According to analysis by the ISG, government bills have also, on average, spent less time in the Senate than in the House of Commons.
Ministers have been more likely to meet with individual senators about government bills.
Lobbyists have started approaching senators at a much higher rate than they used to.
“It goes without saying that we are at a pivotal moment in the history of the Senate,” reads a letter Woo and Saint-Germain wrote to colleagues earlier this month, launching their candidacy.
Woo and Saint-Germain were both appointed to the chamber last November. Woo said they believe in shared leadership and a “collegial approach.”
Woo sponsored this year’s budget bill in the Senate, which senators almost split into two bills (a separate one for the Liberals’ new infrastructure bank) and tried to amend to remove an escalator tax on alcohol. Ultimately, the House of Commons rejected the amendment and senators passed the bill unchanged — but it proved a dramatic test of the Senate’s agency.
On Monday, in addition to choosing its leadership, the ISG will discuss policy proposals from six “task forces” that worked to draft documents over the summer, McCoy told Postmedia News.
Leadership will be formally handed off in October.
A first test for the new leader will be to negotiate a new committee agreement with other caucuses.
The current arrangement, which has Conservatives holding a majority of committee chairs, expires on Halloween. Woo said he thinks the distribution of seats and chairs should be proportional. He will also advocate for more funding.
The ISG’s budget sits at $722,000 annually as agreed upon at the end of last year, compared with more than $1 million each for the Conservatives and Liberals.
“Soon we’ll be definitively the largest group, and there should be a fair distribution of the resources,” Woo said.