Paula Simons

Paula Simons was appointed to the Senate of Canada in 2018, representing Alberta. She came from a career as a journalist — a longtime columnist and editorial writer at the Edmonton Journal — and brought to the Senate the habits of mind that good journalism develops: skepticism of power, attention to evidence, and willingness to ask inconvenient questions. Her journalistic background has translated meaningfully into her Senate work in ways that are not always the case when media figures enter public life. She has been a voice for press freedom and freedom of expression, a critic of legislation she felt overreached, and a senator willing to raise concerns about bills that arrive from the Commons with insufficient scrutiny. Alberta senators appointed through the independent process have an unusual political position: they represent a province that is deeply skeptical of the Senate itself, deeply skeptical of the government that appointed them, and has often advocated for Senate abolition or fundamental reform. Simons has navigated this by emphasizing her independence and her journalistic commitment to accountability rather than her political alignment. The structural critique — that the Senate cannot be truly independent when all its members are appointed by prime ministers and draw federal salaries — applies to her as to every other senator. But within that structure, she has used her platform more honestly than most, and her Alberta perspective brings something the chamber would lack without her.