Anyone who thinks of the Senate as a non-partisan place has been sleeping at the switch or knows nothing of Canadian history. From a pragmatic point of view the senate has existed to restrain the next political parties agenda. So if you can create a majority for your party, and lose the next election, true power is held off until the next election, which you better win, or the same will happen to you.
This is exactly what happened over the course of the last 8 years. Even thought the Conservatives were in the government and had the power to appoint, it took them until this spring to capture the majority in the senate.
All senates are partisan. Look any where it the world and you will see that it is true. Our senate could be bi-partisan, or even multi-partisan, if there was any good will at all built up. But there wasn't. For 6 years bills could be passed in the house but stalled by the Liberals in the Senate. And it was. What ever senate reform might look like, we probably won't really see it for another 3 years--after a significant amount of conservative law/bills are passed. If Harper is given a 2nd majority mandate, and he was still appointing senators, he might install an NDP person like Jack Layton for a Liberal seat vacated.
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