Most Canadians want an elected Senate

Re Clean upper house, March 21

I am sure you will recall that in his first platform, before he was elected, Stephen Harper stated quite clearly that he was going to institute an elected Senate.

We all agreed with him. But what did he do? He appointed more senators than any of his predecessors. And brought the grief we had to endure with Wallin, Duffy and Brazeau. And now Meredith.

We all want an elected Senate, representing each of the provinces. And the duties of the Senate are not to simply rubber stamp any bills that come up from the House, sent by the party that appointed them.

They are there to provide us, Canadians with good, sound, sober, wellthought-out, economic and effective decisions that are good for all Canadians, irrespective of their political stripes.

If they don’t do this, or break any rules — moral or financial — Canadians will not re-elect them.

The election of senators can easily be done every time we have a general election, with no extra expense involved. It can be done more easily than trying to dissolve and do away with the Senate. Al Mathias, Toronto

Re Senator Don Meredith’s conduct is nothing

but shameful: DiManno, March 20 The question that always comes to mind with a politician who has been corrupted such as Don Meredith is why those who have fallen from grace must be brow beaten by common sense and morality into doing the right thing?

Does this fallacy of omnipotent importance or power veil a man like Mr. Meredith from the obvious character defects that have come to light in his shameful conquest of an innocent teenager? Or is being a politician tantamount to a “catch me if you can” mentality?

It appears that Mr. Meredith is following the tried-and-true methods of most shamed politicians in sexually charged cases — deflect, defer and hang onto power if you can.

Do the right thing Mr. Meredith and resign. Daniel Kowbell, Mississauga