The strategy will establish a waste diversion program, establish waste management regions, develop modern standards and technology, maximize economic and employment opportunities, and assist with a public education program.Bravo.
On April 10, 2002, then-environment minister Kevin Aylward announced a waste management strategy for the province.
The Provincial Waste Management Strategy is premised on five primary actions: increase waste diversion, establish waste management regions, develop modern standards and technology, maximize the economic and employment opportunities associated with waste management, and public education. The ultimate goal is to have full province-wide modern waste management by 2010, with some components of the strategy to be implemented this year.Nice to see the provincial government is practicing what it preaches by recycling old news.
Now stop and think about this for a second.
This is exactly the same strategy that was announced over five years ago. In those 60-odd months, the implementation of the plan went from nine years to 13 years.
Rather than implement the plan by 2010, the same plan will now be completely implemented a full decade later.
Stay tuned. Next week, the minister of agriculture will be announcing an innovative plan to grow cucumbers in a large plastic-covered warehouse in Mount Pearl.
To return to a serious note, though, one has to wonder why it took three years for this plan to be completely re-announced. If the former crowd had merely shagged around and done nothing with a perfectly good idea, there's no reason why the new guys taking office in 2003 just didn't get on with it.
They could have spent the last three years hammering the old crowd for their laziness and ineptitude.
Instead, we get this bumpf.
Compare the two releases and look at the amount of material that appears to be cut and pasted. Recycled communications staff from the former administration must be happy they can dig into their old files and breathe new life into stuff they got paid for years ago, only to get paid for it yet again.
It really makes you wonder if that cucumber joke might wind up being closer to reality than we'd dare to believe.
Has Tom Rideout been hunting for Greg Stamp?
-SRBP-