Abitibi Consolidated is looking for cost-savings at one of its most expensive mills in North America.
Problem is - as in the past - no one will want to save any cash. in the story above, the union head doesn't want lay-offs.
In this news release from Danny Williams' natural resources mouthpiece, we get the threat that if Abitibi closes one of its two paper machines at Grand Falls, they can expect to shut the whole mill.
Roger Grimes originally made that threat and amended the legislation to allow the provincial government to revoke access to timber.
No fibre.
No mill.
No one took Grimes seriously because of the jobs lost, cash to the economy and...well, the prospect of the company suing the government for taking it out of business for no good reason. Roger Grimes was many things but he wasn't given to thinking and acting irrationally.
The difference in this case is that Danny Williams has shown his willingness to kill more than one project - and all the jobs - if he is in the mood at the moment. We are all too familiar with the routine, right down to the trips to Alberta to talk about the homing pigeons and embracing that province's economic miracle.
So we might just be saying goodbye to a second paper mill in the province in a little over a year, not because the mill can't run but because nobody wants to deal with the problem at hand in a sensible, rational manner.
Or, if the current Premier lives up to his brand, because the company took a difficult but necessary business decision - close No. 7 machine - and Danny pulled the trigger on the whole mill just because he could.
Let's hope people start talking sense soon, the provincial government included, for a change.
Otherwise, Gordon Pinsent's home town could become yet another ghost town, and there'd be no one to blame but...well, you know.
