Michael Thompson, an inventive councillor in Toronto, has claimed $300 expenses to cover the cost of a pastor “blessing his workplace” at City Hall.

His office is blessed at the start of every new Council term.

Even Westminster’s most ingenious and resourceful MPs failed to come up with such a cunning claim.

No reaction yet from Fat Rob Ford, Toronto’s populist Mayor who doesn’t claim expenses himself.

He doesn’t need small change.

The right wing union basher is independently wealthy.

Senator Lavigne resigns

The Canadian Senator who was caught fiddling his expenses has resigned, allegedly to “protect his $80,000 a year pension”.

The story has been running for ages in the Canadian press with roars of outrage accompanying every twist and turn.

The unelected and unloved Senate has even fewer friends now.

The overwhelming majority of Canadians want to see the upper chamber reformed but how and when?

The obstacles are formidable. 

Just like the House of Lords

Lavigne is due to be sentenced in May.

Count me in

I am a great fan of the census.

I hope it will survive the short-sighted cost cutters who want to substitute information from town halls, housing associations, credit rating agencies, tescos and the like for the fine granularity of the census which has been with us every decade since 1841 – except during WWII.

It is an invaluable time line, connecting distant generations, that shouldn’t be casually thrown overboard.

As it happens, last week I met for the first time Tom Marshall whose great great great grandfather, Thomas Marshall, sold a corner of his farm in Whitburn, Scotland to my great great great grandfather, Archibald Prentice.

Tom lives in Canada - half an hour’s drive from where I am.

And his son lives just around the corner.

Archibald would have been astonished.

I still am.