In the wake of the audits of Senators Wallin, Duffy, Harb and Brazeau, and with much of the business in Ottawa in general, there has developed a Cult of the Auditor, be it the Auditor General, or the outside Deloitte auditors in the more recent examples. And why not? They’re not partisan, and they call it like it is. But as much as people decry the lack of accountability in politics these days, be it in the Senate or ministerial accountability, or whatever, they are immediately quick to rush to the say-so of auditors, who themselves are completely unaccountable. It’s a curious thing, but it’s one of the biggest problems that is infecting Canadian politics these days, which is reflected in the controversy around the Parliamentary Budget Officer. Rather than MPs doing their own work of scrutiny, they fob it off to the PBO now because they’re non-partisan and “credible,” and parties can hide their attacks behind those reports. It now becomes a game of “See! Even the AG/PBO/etc. says that these guys are terrible! Let us beat them with the sticks that others have provided for us without any means of accountability, because they are credible and non-partisan!” It’s an awful game, and it has utterly degraded our political discourse and capacity in this country. Auditors, or the PBO, are no longer seen to be doing the jobs that they were supposed to, but are becoming proxy ammunition in political games because the partisans can’t be bothered to do the heavy lifting themselves. And that is a problem, most especially if we are demanding accountability.
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