Let’s get one fact clear from the outset: Senator Pamela Wallin is not the only person to pad an expense account.
Since time immemorial, a great many people have surreptitiously added a few dollars here and there to such accounts.
What has been exposed by the Deloitte independent audit of Senator Wallin is not a few dollars here and there, but looks more like a quite accomplished serial fraudster at work.
Literally scores upon scores of inadmissible travel expenses uncovered; beginning in 2009 when, at age 56, she was first appointed to be a Conservative senator by Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
The Senator called the audit “fundamentally flawed and unfair,” in arriving at the total of ineligible expenses in excess of $120,000, and counting.
Surely, with the RCMP now on the case, the logical question is: does someone who has been using expense accounts honestly for many years, suddenly decide to use them fraudulently at age 56?
It may be prudent for the relevant accountants to check Senator Wallin’s expense claims when she worked as Canadian Consul in New York, and even before that when in the employ of CBC and CTV.
When all those avenues are checked out, your readers may have the answer to this question: who is fundamentally flawed and unfair?
Bernie Smith
Parksville