XPost: can.politics, ont.politics, bc.politics   
   XPost: ab.politics   
   From: ConsRCons@govt.cda   
      
   Any guess which party she belongs to?  And who gave her the senate   
   appointment?   
      
   At this rate, if Harper is trying to wait out a list of Conservative   
   scandals by hiding behind prorogues of government, we may not see our   
   next House sitting until the next election in 2015.   
   ___________________________________________   
      
      
   The Canadian Press - October 1, 2013   
      
      
   Fifth senator lands in expenses controversy, denies improper claims   
      
      
      
      
   OTTAWA - One of the accusers has become an accused in the Senate   
   expenses scandal.   
      
   But Sen. Carolyn Stewart Olsen insists she's been falsely accused of   
   improperly claiming living expenses.   
      
   The Conservative senator — who is closely allied with Prime Minister   
   Stephen Harper and who was instrumental in calling on the RCMP to   
   investigate the allegedly invalid expense claims of four other senators   
   — denies she wrongly claimed more than $4,000 in accommodation and meals   
   at a time when she was not involved in any Senate business.   
      
   "I have reviewed these claims with the Senate finance administration and   
   they have found nothing improper," Stewart Olsen said in a terse written   
   statement Tuesday.   
      
   "I welcome the auditor general's review of all senators' expenses."   
      
   The statement followed a report in The Huffington Post Canada, which   
   alleged that Stewart Olsen wrongly claimed daily living expenses from   
   December 2010 to February 2011 — even though the Senate was not sitting   
   for most of that time and her calendar showed no public business in   
   Ottawa during that period.   
      
   The Huffington Post quotes Stewart Olsen as saying she shouldn't have   
   claimed per diems for days when the Senate wasn't sitting and promising   
   to repay the money if a mistake was made.   
      
   However, her subsequent statement made no mention of repayment or having   
   erred. Stewart Olsen did not respond to a request for clarification.   
      
   Stewart Olsen was a key member of the Senate's internal economy   
   committee, which sat in judgment on the dubious expense claims of four   
   other senators — Mike Duffy, Pamela Wallin, Patrick Brazeau and Mac Harb.   
      
   She was one of three members of the steering committee which oversaw   
   external audits into the quartet's expense claims and ultimately   
   demanded repayment while recommending that the RCMP investigate.   
      
   Stewart Olsen and fellow Conservative Sen. David Tkachuk have also been   
   accused of initially whitewashing a report on Duffy to essentially clear   
   him of any deliberate wrongdoing.   
      
   They've denied those accusations but ultimately changed their tune on   
   Duffy after it was revealed he'd accepted $90,000 from Harper's chief of   
   staff, Nigel Wright, to reimburse the Senate for his invalid housing   
   allowance claims. Wright resigned several days after news of the   
   transaction leaked out.   
      
   Both New Democrats and Liberals called Tuesday for Stewart Olsen to be   
   booted off the internal economy committee, at a minimum.   
      
   "How could she continue sitting there and look at these (invalid   
   expenses) issues in the same Senate when she had been doing the same   
   thing? It's unbelievable," said NDP Leader Tom Mulcair.   
      
   Liberal MP Marc Garneau said Stewart Olsen's credibility is "completely   
   shot."   
      
   But Sen. Gerald Comeau, chair of the committee, said in an interview   
   that he intends to first check with Senate finance officials to see if   
   Stewart Olsen's expense claims were all valid. If so, he said there'd be   
   no need to pursue the matter further.   
      
   There's nothing necessarily suspicious about claiming expenses on days   
   when the Senate or its committees aren't sitting or when a senator has   
   no public Senate business to attend to, Comeau said.   
      
   Senators often return to the capital to work in their Senate offices,   
   consult with their staff, conduct research in the parliamentary library   
   and so on, he noted.   
      
   "I've done it many times myself, actually going to Ottawa to do work   
   which would be kind of impractical for me to do from my home (in Nova   
   Scotia)."   
     _____________________________________   
      
   A little bit of Wikipedia on her:   
      
   However, a fellow Conservative strategist, speaking anonymously to the   
   Canadian Press in 2005, said that "Carolyn Stewart Olsen is an issue for   
   a lot of people — her relationship with the leader and her inability to   
   work well with people."   
      
   Editorialist Adam Radwanski suggested in his blog that she may   
   "reinforce all the leader’s worst, most paranoid instincts."[9] In   
   February 2006, after the departure of Harper's communications director   
   William Stairs, the Toronto Star described Stewart-Olsen going to the   
   "unusual lengths of holding down reporters' hands when they've tried to   
   ask questions or shouting at journalists who don't abide by her rules   
   for press dealings.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)