Trudeau’s process was not independent, and neither were the Senators appointed, as PM chose all advisory committee members, and could secretly ignore their secret recommendations
If Carney doesn’t make the appointment system fully independent, it will be more evidence of how power-mad he is – best solution is abolition
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Thursday, May 7, 2026
OTTAWA – Today, as nine Senate seats sit empty and six more senators will retire this year, and Liberal PM Mark Carney continues to refuse to answer questions about what exact process he will use for appointing senators (other than indicating he will likely use a partisan process as Justin Trudeau used), Democracy Watch called on federal party leaders to agree to move forward with a proposal:
1. To abolish the Senate;
2. To have an elected Senate, or;
3. To have an actually fully independent committee do a public, merit-based search for no more than 1-3 fully qualified candidates for each Senate seat, and then an all-party committee should, by consensus, make the final choice of each senator.
Given:
1. the partisan charade of former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Senate appointment process, which didn’t change anything substantive (as DWatch pointed out in January 2016);
2. that having appointed Senators is fundamentally undemocratic;
3. the problems with any other possible Senate appointment reforms, and;
4. that the House can be reformed to give it the same regional balance and powers of review that the Senate has;
Democracy Watch’s position is still that abolition of the Senate is the best solution. To give the House of Commons more of the key characteristics of the Senate, more seats from outside Central Canada should be added to the House, and changes made to free MPs from the control of their party leader.
Despite Trudeau’s claims, his Senate appointment advisory boards were not independent as he chose all the members, which made them partisan, and he could secretly ignore their secret list of nominees (and they had no power to disclose when he did this), and the system was policy that could be abandoned at any time (as opposed to being enacted in law).
Trudeau’s partisan, patronage-ridden process resulted in him appointing many partisan Liberals as senators overall, most in recent years, out of the 100 senators he appointed. As well, all appointees were still required to meet the discriminatory constitutional requirements for senators of being at least 30 years old, and own property worth at least $4,000 and other assets worth at least $4,000.
“Trudeau’s change to the Senate appointment process was a partisan charade, as no one is independent if they are dependent on the Prime Minister for having their position on an advisory board or as a Senator,” said Duff Conacher, Co-founder of Democracy Watch. “Just like past prime ministers, Trudeau chose a group of people to consult with in secret about who to appoint as senators, and then secretly chose whomever he wanted to appoint, including many ruling party supporters.”
“The Senate is fundamentally undemocratic and should be abolished for that reason alone, and a Senate loaded with ruling party patronage cronies is a useless waste of money so, if the Senate is not going to be abolished, then senators should at least be made fully independent through a fully independent appointment process,” said Conacher.
“If Mark Carney returns to ruling-party crony senator appointments, or does anything less than work with other party leaders to establish a fully independent appointment process, he will provide further evidence that he is a power-mad, fundamentally undemocratic prime minister,” said Conacher.
A fully independent Senate appointment process won’t change anything in terms of the Senate’s powers, which should always bow to the democratically elected House (which is part of the reason the Senate is an undemocratic waste of time and money). However, an independent process would at least result in qualified, independent-minded people being appointed who wouldn’t roll over to protect the ruling party and would actually, expertly and effectively hold the government to account if it was lying or spinning about the effects of its legislative or spending proposals.
In addition, the Senate should change its rules to limit itself to, at most, a six-month delay of any bill passed by the House. The UK House of Lords has had this limit on its powers since 1911.
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FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT:
Duff Conacher, Co-founder of Democracy Watch
Tel: (613) 241-5179
Cell: 416-546-3443
Email: [email protected]
Democracy Watch’s Shut Down the Senate Campaign and Stop Muzzling MPs Campaign
