Beyond The Commons

Aaron Wherry covers all the goings-on in and around Parliament Hill. Follow Aaron on Twitter: @aaronwherry

Categories: Beyond The Commons, Capital Read

This is the week that was

by Aaron Wherry on Friday, June 11, 2010 12:13pm - 42 Comments

Here is a story about the exact type of portable toilet used for the Stornoway garden party.

Tags: garden party, Michael Ignatieff, Stornoway

More by Aaron Wherry

http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

NDP MP Thomas Mulcair was quick to point out the contradiction.

“On the one hand he’s lecturing the government on extravagant spending. On the other hand he’s going out and renting a gold-plated loo.”

You reap what you sow.

Wallace Cleaver

Of course, the difference is Liberal Party money vs taxpayer money….

http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

By "reap what you sow", I mean that pettiness begets pettiness.

Emily

$1.2B is a lot of things, but petty it ain't.
Lord Kitchener's Own

Hey, if I decide to spend my own money on a Ferrari for myself, am I still allowed to criticize the Prime Minister if he uses taxpayer dollars to buy all of his Ministers BMWs, or, by this reasoning, would that just be me being petty?

http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

I don't think it's petty to question G8 summit costs. It's important and necessary to do so. However, I found the Liberal's "fake lake" narrative to be petty, probably because of all the distortions and silly props.

Pettiness begets pettiness. In a political environment where the Liberals make hay for three straight days in QP about fake lakes and backdrops, it's understandable that Thomas Mulcair would think: "What's good for the goose is good for the gander".
Lord Kitchener's Own

I guess I just figure that whining about $57,000 of taxpayer money being spent on a temporary fake lake for a three day summit is INFINITELY less petty than whining about a political party spending $1,600 in party funds to rent a really nice porta-potty for three parties.

None of which is likely to prevent the CPC from running with the NDP's line, and featuring a pic on their homepage of Michael Ignatieff sitting on a toilet made of gold with his pants around his ankles. Wait for it…

john g

If this is how the Liberal party spends their money then Harper is right, it really is time to turn off the public subsidy.

Renting a $1600 porta-potty at an exercise designed to highlight government waste? How politically tone deaf can you possibly get?

Emily

The Liberal party is spending it's own money….they get donations you know, from people all over the country.

The Cons are spending tax-payer dollars on fake lakes.

The garden party was just a garden party, not political. The PMs garden party is also upcoming.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

The garden party was just a garden party, not political.

Um, really? Then why the wading pool props and media photo-ops?
Emily

Jokes are allowed.
http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

And, it has been rented for 3 events, not just one. They had pasta – one of the most frugal dishes one can make.

Lord Kitchener's Own

How politically tone deaf can you possibly get?

I've seen worse examples.

How about a PM claiming that we were never going to go into recession about a month after the rest of us were technically already living through a recession?

Or deciding (apparently) to sole-source the largest defense contract in the country's history, while our economy is still recovering from a large recession, and less than a month after the Defence Minister stood in the House of Commons and promised that there would be a competitive bid process (unlike those SOBs on the other side who used to run the place)?

Or, let's get right down to it, shall we. Spending $19,000 a day in taxpayer money for a fake lake for a three day event is EXPONENTIALLY more tone deaf than spending $534 a day in party money to rent a nice outdoor toilet for three outdoor parties.

sbt

"How about a PM claiming that we were never going to go into recession about a month after the rest of us were technically already living through a recession?"

Yeah that was soooo dumb. Totally cost him the election and he's been taking a beating over his handling of the economy ever since. Perhaps you should have picked the 'rich artists at galas' comment that might have actually cost him the majority last time out for your example of tone-deafness.
Lord Kitchener's Own

One doesn't always lose elections just because one is totally tone deaf and flip flops every other week. The Harper government is exhibit one of this fact.

Lord Kitchener's Own

Renting a $1600 porta-potty at an exercise designed to highlight government waste? How politically tone deaf can you possibly get?

I think I thought of a better example. How about a host government spending more taxpayer money on a summit than any other host government in the summit's history (or, at best, the SECOND most money of any other government in history) for two summits focused on how to pull the world out of a stunning economic recession?

Joffré

I'm actually a tiny bit impressed that the mere presence of Kory Teneycke in the Sun's parliamentary bureau has already inspired them to stoop so low. Embarrassed for everybody working in that office, but impressed.
http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

kady.omalley wrote:
Posted 2010/06/11
at 12:46 PM ETGood news, CBC-Hater! I have confirmed that both the Stornoway and 24 Sussex garden parties are paid for entirely by the respective political parties,

http://intensedebate.com/people/WDM WDM

CBC-Hater over at Kady's corner of the internet is a real treat. I thank my lucky stars that I have not been struck with a case of paranoia like that fine fellow.

http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

Yup, he spends each and every day crying Liberal bias and attacking Kady. This guy needs to get a life.
http://intensedebate.com/people/gord83 gord83

Maybe th libs are trying to start a new movement

Lord Kitchener's Own

Oh, that's just WRONG.

LOL

http://intensedebate.com/people/Ricard_S_Argent Richard_S_Argent

Of course if the Liberals want to waste THEIR money on fancy toilets to impress donors (instead of, you know, advertising and whatnot)…then I guess that's their prerogative.

http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

It's for "3" days – and that money wouldn't buy much advertising. They tried it this year because last year there were so many complaints about the regular porta-potties.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Ricard_S_Argent Richard_S_Argent

Oh I agree with you. I guess my point was the Liberal Party can spend the Liberal Party's money any way they see fit :)

Bob

Except with the public subsidy, it's not just the Liberal Party's money.

http://intensedebate.com/people/Ricard_S_Argent Richard_S_Argent

painful.
Loraine Lamontagne

The only comparison possible is one of attitude. I'm sure some of you have read the Globe's report today, including a link to an old New York Times article on the G-7 meeting, dubbed the Chevrolet meeting by Chrétien. He wanted to avoid the xcessive spending of the previous summit in Venice, which had been dubbed the Cadillac Summit.

Chrétien allowed McCain's Food, some NS winery and others to advertise their products in exchange for them providing food. Chrétien borrowed two cherrywood tables for the negociations from the Venice Summit organizers.

Aline Chrétien recycled some of the fabric used at the Halifax summit and had curtains made with it for the dining room at 24 Sussex.

I guess we just go from one extreme to the other.

Then again, maybe Laureen Harper will recycle the artificial lake and have it moved to 24 Sussex. Of course, she'll have to drive the truck.
Lord Kitchener's Own

I don't think it would be wise for the Tories to travel too far down that road. As they have more money than the Liberals (and receive a higher subsidy), there are probably hundreds of examples of the Tories spending their party's money even more frivolously than this (and I have no objection to that either).
http://intensedebate.com/people/OntarioTown OntarioTown

Like a permanent makeup lady and Harper's constantly made up face – oh, and she's a psychic.

http://intensedebate.com/people/danby danby

Perhaps, for that one glorious day, Mr Ignatieff could boast that Liberal sh!t didn't stink……

http://intensedebate.com/people/Ricard_S_Argent Richard_S_Argent

well played sir.

:)
http://intensedebate.com/people/LynnTO LynnTO

Alternately: And it was then he realized it might be the only throne he'd ever really sit on.

(Let the pun-off begin…it's Friday!)
http://intensedebate.com/people/danby danby

Fundraising must be going better; I didn't realize the Liberals were so flush with cash
Reader

I really don't give a sh*t.

http://intensedebate.com/people/tedbetts tedbetts

I thought brand new toilets cost $200,000.

At least that is what my government is telling me.
http://intensedebate.com/people/Crit_Reasoning Crit_Reasoning

The Liberals' platinum porta-potty also includes a small door on the roof so that puffins can use it to hide their excrement.
Dee

Some simple math: $1,000,000,000 > $1500. It's quite a bit easier to be outraged at the Conservatives for blowing $1 billion of taxpayer's money for G8/G20 through their mismanagement and incompetence. There's no way security costs should have been this high for a three day event.

Gotta love Canwest (part of that "left-wing media") for lacking perspective. But then again journalists are usually not that great at math.

hosertohoosier

Because important international engagements should be hosted for $0?

Hopeful Joe

Firstly, if I was giving money to the Liberal Party (though I never would) and found out that they were spending it on gold-plate toilets for their Garden Party, I’d be pissed.
Sadly the question goes deeper when you find out that they were cost-cutting to afford the luxury throne by getting the resident chef of Stornoway to prepare the food. Do the tax-payers pay for that chef? I think we do.
This, of course, brings us back to the reason why the Liberal’s fortunes are “in the toilet”, namely a sense of entitlement .
What a vicious, ugly circle.