Health reasons linked to senator’s resignation

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This article was published 07/08/2013 (4685 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Manitoba senator who made headlines last summer over an airline incident involving his much younger wife has quietly resigned from the upper house.

Sen. Rod Zimmer, 70, stepped down on Friday. He has battled repeated health problems in recent years.

His resignation creates a second Manitoba vacancy in the Canadian Senate, leaving the province with only four members.

Sen. Terry Stratton, a Conservative, reached the mandatory retirement age of 75 on March 16.

Zimmer, a longtime Winnipeg businessman and Liberal party fundraiser, was travelling on an Air Canada flight from Ottawa to Saskatoon last August when his distraught 23-year-old spouse confronted him over the lack of care he was taking with his health. Maygan Sensenberger later pleaded guilty to causing a disturbance on the flight and was given a 12-month suspended sentence with probation.

Zimmer, who was appointed to the red chamber in 2005, had toiled in relative obscurity in the Senate until then.

His parliamentary colleagues Tuesday recalled his gentle demeanour and his good attendance record — when his health permitted.

Zimmer, a throat cancer survivor, was placed in intensive care in hospital in May with pneumonia. It was the second time he had been hospitalized for the respiratory illness this year.

However, the former Manitoba Lotteries Foundation executive and 1999 Pan American Games organizer, was in attendance as the Senate session ended on June 20.

“He looked in good spirits and so, of course, seeing this (Zimmer’s resignation) makes me sad because we can only speculate that it is for health reasons that he may have done this,” Manitoba Conservative Sen. Don Plett said Tuesday.

Plett said Zimmer’s difficulty in speaking, caused by his longtime battle with cancer, limited his role in the upper chamber. He was, however, able to converse effectively one-to-one and in a smaller group setting. “I really enjoyed his participation at committee,” he said.

Manitoba Liberal Sen. Maria Chaput said the resignation did not surprise her as Zimmer has been in ill health for some time. “Just by looking at him he was really not getting any better,” she said.

Zimmer could not be reached for comment on Tuesday.

There are now five vacancies in the 105-seat Senate, which has been embroiled in a scandal over questionable senator expense filings.

Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal MP for Winnipeg North, said Prime Minister Stephen Harper should take great care in filling the vacancies.

“The behaviour of a few senators has put a dark cloud over the Senate,” Lamoureux said Tuesday. The best thing Harper can do in the short term to fix the chamber and improve its image, he said, “is to make better appointments.”

larry.kusch@freepress.mb.ca