Sen. Vernon White is leaving his Senate post, saying he will be moving to Finland where his wife is originally from.
“My wife is from Finland, and we will get to spend time with them, which for now is very important to us,” White said in an email to The Epoch Times. “I have some work lined up overseas and will see where that takes me.”
White said that since he came into the Senate in 2012, he always said he would not stay for the full tenure allowed, and anticipated that he would only stay six to nine years.
White has a doctorate in police leadership from Charles Sturt University and a master of arts in conflict analysis and management from Royal Roads University. He has taken on guest lecturing roles in Finland and done work at many universities as a part-time or visiting professor. Currently, he is a fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute.
Before working in the Senate, he worked in the RCMP and was the police chief in Durham, then for Ottawa Police, and was a member of the National Security and Intelligence Committee of Parliamentarians.
White was appointed to the Senate by former Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper in 2012. After winning the 2015 election, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau dissolved the Liberal caucus in the Senate, saying he wants to remove partisanship in the Upper Chamber.
White says recent changes have not meant that the Senate is “more or less effective,” but that it’s “rather different.”
“I think the independence of the Senate has changed the environment, and we now have four groups/parties, rather than two prior to my arrival,” he told The Epoch Times.
“As I have said many times, the best work done in the Senate is the work of committees. Often the House has neither the time or maybe the inclination to delve into an issue to the level needed. The Senate work helps to educate parliamentarians on the issues Canadians face.”
