CTV - via the Canadian Press’s Shawn McCarthy - got it wrong.
Badly wrong.
So too did the Globe: they relied on McCarthy’s story.
VOCM got it wrong, too.
They relied on NALCOR and the provincial government. After all, Danny Williams admitted he hadn’t read a translation of the decision; he was relying on four pages of “errors” from the decision by the Quebec energy regulatory board on three applications by Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro related to transmission lines through Quebec.
The Montreal Gazette got it right.
So too did CBC St. John’s, graced for the first time in a while by Hisself live and in person.
Here’s the CBC lede:
Quebec's energy regulator has turned down a request from Newfoundland and Labrador to intervene in an ongoing dispute over pushing power from a proposed hydroelectric megaproject across Quebec's power lines.
And here’s the Gazette [link above]
Hydro-Quebec's existing power lines don't have the capacity to transport energy from a new hydroelectric project in Labrador south to export markets, Quebec's energy board said in a controversial ruling Wednesday.
The CP story started out completely wrong:
Quebec’s energy regulator dealt a blow to Newfoundland and Labrador’s plan to develop a massive power project on the Lower Churchill River, denying the province’s push to have Hydro-Québec transmit electricity to markets in the U.S. and Canada.
One of the reasons CBC got the story right is because they have the actual decision. They weren’t relying on the opinions - legal or otherwise – of the same rocket scientists who delivered the Abitibi FUBAR Follies.
The Lower Churchill project has no markets and it has no money, other than what is coming from provincial taxpayers. As such, it is a project that exists on paper; it’s an imaginary project.
There is also absolutely nothing stopping NALCOR from doing what Danny Williams has committed to doing all along; running power through Quebec and, if need be, paying for new transmission facilities to carry the power. Therefore, there is no reason to believe this decision by the Quebec energy regulator affects the Lower Churchill project at all; therefore it is an imaginary news story, at least as presented by the people who got it wrong.
And by the way, in the got-it-wrong, imaginary news category, the new CBC story that the Premier is thinking of taking his campaign against Hydro-Quebec to the Untied States is way off:
The Régie de l'énergie dismissed a complaint of fair dealing from Nalcor, Newfoundland and Labrador's Crown-owned energy corporation.
NALCOR’s three applications to the Regie included in the decision on May 12 were about technical questions in the way certain calculations were made in preparing an assessment of the costs and implications of Hydro’s plan to wheel power from the imaginary Lower Churchill project to five destinations.
This wasn’t a “fair dealing” issue either directly in the sense of the other lawsuit NALCOR is pursuing, nor was it a decision against fair dealing, as implied by the sentence.
But for all that, there is a huge Lower Churchill story the mainstream media continue to ignore. What a time to bring it up, as Danny Williams is ranting once again about the evil Hydro-Quebec:
Despite five years of secret efforts, Danny Williams could not persuade Hydro-Quebec to take an ownership stake in the Lower Churchill without having to pay any compensation for the 1969 deal. That’s the story natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale - inadvertently - revealed last fall.
-srbp-
4 comments:
Once again it is probaly just my view..but here they are:
1: You seem quite smug and even happy that the Quebec regulator rejected NL application. Almost like I told you so. That's not the case is it?
2. You also contend that the main reason that DW made nice with the CBC is because it is polling season...not because this story needs as much coverage as possible.
Once again I am probaly out to lunch Ed...must be my inabilty to read and comphrehend previous posts and graphs from the humble scribe. Sigh!!
On the question of political schadenfreude concerning the potential failure of real and prospective deals to develop the province's natural resources, a bit of history might help here.
Just to take one example, on 11 December 2002 there was an exchange in the House of Assembly that's worth quoting at length:
"MR. WILLIAMS: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
My questions this afternoon are for the Premier.
Mr. Speaker, in light of the fact that the Premier has decided not to play Santa Claus for Quebec this Christmas I thought we would move from the Lower Churchill to another gift, another giveaway, Voisey’s Bay.
Mr. Speaker, the headlines in the national newspapers, The Globe and Mail and the Financial Post, last week read as follows: Inco’s Goro project in limbo. Inco shares tarnished over Goro, and higher costs threaten Inco’s Goro Mine. In fact, analyst David Charles said, "The major casualty of all these changes... is the credibility of Inco’s current management team and the uncertainty created by the review."
In light of the fact that the national investment community is very concerned about the credibility of the same Inco management team that negotiated Voisey’s Bay and the uncertainty created in Goro, will the Premier inform the people of Newfoundland and Labrador if he has any concerns about our project which will see nickel from Voisey’s Bay leave our Province for Manitoba and Ontario?
PREMIER GRIMES: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
I do understand that the Leader of the Opposition spends days and nights and sleepless nights hoping that things like Voisey’s Bay would fail. I do understand that that is his basic premise in life.
Mr. Speaker, we did speak to the Inco officials right to the highest level, just prior to and after the Goro announcement, to find out whether or not there were any possible adverse or negative impacts in Newfoundland and Labrador. We have been assured that the answer to that is no. In fact, they have legally binding - which the Leader of the Opposition would know because he has poured through them for months and months looking for the loopholes that are not there. We have legally binding commitments that have to be met or nothing - here is the point, if the legally binding commitments are not met, nothing leaves Labrador, Mr. Speaker."
@Jerry:
The current economic climate in the province is a direct result of Williams' policies. After the attack on Big Oil, expropriation and all the rest, they are now at the point where they can't even pay people to come here and start up businesses.
They cannot even get someone to come here so they can give away public money out of the free cash programs in the business department. Who'd have thought that 'no more give-aways" meant that they wouldn't be able to give anything away from sheer lack of investor interest?
WRT HQ and the Lower Churchill they have basically gotten to the point where they are spending untold sums of public money to fuel all sorts of stalling tactics, legal manoeuvres etc. It has become the ultimate Potempkin Village.
Of course we know they can't build the project because they have no markets and hence have no money to build it. The whole thing is a giant sham and, as we have seen in the past 24 hours they cannot even tell the people of the province in plain English what just happened.
Ed Hollett the traitor is cheering for the Montreal Canadians instead of one of the Newfoundland hockey teams and Labrador. It's obvious whose side he's on.
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