Stop the gravy train?

Photo: CTF-Aaron Wudrick

A new petition, on its way to the Prime Minister, has been signed by more than 46,000 Canadians.

The petition calls on the Trudeau government to end a decades-old policy that allows former governors general to bill taxpayers for their expenses.

“When you leave your job, you shouldn’t get to keep your expense account – it’s that simple,” said CTF Federal Director Aaron Wudrick. “Canadians are outraged that this policy is in place and they’re demanding it be changed. The Prime Minister needs to fix it.”

As an example of the kind of impact this spending has on the country's coffers, former governor general Adrienne Clarkson has billed taxpayers more than $1.1 million in expenses since leaving office in 2005.

“Like governors general, many Canadians do important charitable and volunteer work after they retire – only they don’t get taxpayers to cover their expenses,” said Wudrick.

Wudrick says the Canadian Tax Payers Federation delivered the petitions to the Office of the Prime Minister on Wednesday morning.

Wudrick says petitions like this one that get a large response they like to personally hand deliver, "we think it makes it more difficult for politicians to ignore petitions of this nature when we deliver them this way. Wudrick also says, "some of the time they just sort of batten down the hatches and hope the storm passes."