Busy Work (3)

Newfoundland Hardwoods is a Crown Corporation established in 1950 to manufacture liquid asphalt and sell chemically treated poles and lumber to meet local needs.

The corporation was privatized in 1995  - that is the assets were sold off - but a board of directors was retained to deal with issues arising from the sale of its assets. The directors are all senior public servants in the innovation department.

Those issues have all been addressed save for one storage tank which has been sealed since there is no means of disposing of the contents within the province. The tank is inspected regularly.

In 2008, the directors issued a six page activity plan for the corporation for the period 2008-2011.

Newfoundland Hardwoods – the corporation with nothing else to do but keep an eye on a lone tank of chemical sludge somewhere in the province – is committed to supporting the innovation department’s mission to “foster regional  and provincial prosperity.”

It will do that by - you guessed it – keeping an eye on the sludge tank.

You could not make this stuff up if you tried.

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Busy work (2)

Newfoundland and Labrador Farm Products Corporation is the Crown agency that used to run the chicken processing plant at Pleasantville.

The plant was sold in the late 1990s and Farm Products Corp has had nothing to do since then.

The corporation still exists, however, and cabinet appointed a board of directors for the corporation. 

In March 2008, those directors - all public servants - dutifully filed an activity plan as required under the government’s accountability and transparency legislation.

The activity plan reported that the corporation was inactive.

The plan also reported the inactivity would continue.

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