Auditor General for a day

First we spent billions chasing Olympic gold, and now this.

This year Canada will be hosting the G8 and G20 summits in Huntsville and downtown Toronto respectively and money is no object. The word is out. Stephen Harper and the Conservatives are big spenders and Canada has lots of money. Now everybody wants to hang out with us and be our friends.

Some Canadians, especially the ones who aren’t wealthy and powerful, are questioning the way Ottawa is spending money like a drunken sailor. The security costs for these two events alone are over a billion dollars and the meetings haven’t even started yet. No wonder Auditor General Sheila Fraser is waiting in the wings.

I’m sorry but I just can’t wait for her report. Besides, when the audit is finally done it will cost us millions more and we still won’t know the truth. And so, as a concerned citizen I have decided to conduct my own common sense, regular guy audit to help put things in perspective. There will be no additional charge to Canadian taxpayers for this service.

I’m just going to present a few interesting facts and you can draw you own conclusions. Here’s your chance to be Sheila Fraser for a day.

How much is a billion dollars anyway? Well, for one thing you could take Canada’s neediest 20,000 families and write them each a cheque for $50,000. That money would be put to good use. Or, you could buy every man, woman and child in the country a fancy chicken dinner and 12 Canadian beers. Who wouldn’t appreciate a nice meal and a couple of cool ones after a hard day? We could call it G-ate.

Now let’s do some comparison shopping. Last year in Pittsburgh the G-20 cost $18 million for security. The G-8 in Italy cost $359 million. In the March 2010 budget the Conservatives allocated $179 million for security for the G8/G20 summits this June. So far the price tag for this extravagance is $1.1 billion and rising. Stephen Harper is going to earn a lot of air miles on his gold card for this one.

The experts tell us security is expensive. Just building a three metre high metal fence around the Town of Huntsville for the two days of the conference will cost almost $4 million alone.

Re-paving all those highways isn’t cheap and neither is the rental on all those armored limousines, not to mention the tote bags and notepads.

Believe it or not they are even planning to hose down the gravel on the side of the roads to get it back to pristine condition. I read it on the Internet so it must be true. I wonder which one of the G20 leaders is allergic to dirty gravel?

Federal Transport Minister John Baird put it this way, "The reality is, in a post 9/11 environment, security will not come cheaply."

Hey Minister Baird, George W. Bush called and he wants his view of reality back. The politics of fear is getting very old.

There are those who say it is vitally important for these leaders to meet face to face so they can discuss the global economy, trade, health and the environment. If only there was some sort of electronic communication Internet thingy they could use so they wouldn’t have to spend so much money.

Oh well, I guess talk isn’t that cheap either.

Let’s look at their track record so far. What did the global village get for all that money?

Considering that the world is on the verge of economic collapse, the world’s largest corporations need billions of taxpayer dollars to correct decades of mismanagement, entire countries are going bankrupt and just for good measure let’s throw in that gaping, oil-gushing hole at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico, I’d say the results are mediocre at best. Probably not that cost effective either.

So how about it world leaders? Maybe next time you could all meet on a conference call or something.

You could even get together on Facebook or some other social network. Security should be a breeze and your announcements could be posted for all to read, or not.

Is it worth all those billions of dollars for 20 guys to have a fancy meet and greet at our expense?You be the judge and the Auditor General will figure it out later.

And Sheila Fraser, feel free to use my findings in your final report.