It’s an unknown amendment to the Hydro Corporation Act.
Natural resources minister Derrick Dalley gave official notice he’d be introducing the bill at the start of the current sitting of the House of Assembly and then… nothing.
So where is it?
What is it?
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For anyone who thinks it is unusual for the provincial Conservatives to backtrack or apologise, recall, the massive deployment of cabinet ministers to the Straits-White Bay North by-election in the fall of 2009.
Then there’s the who transparency thing.
The sorry tale of the Summer of Discontent in Gander turns out to be a much sorrier tale than first appeared.
At the end of a story entitled “One Judge Short” from last February (not online), The Beacon reported that then-provincial Court Chief Judge Reg Reid had “requested the minister fill the position [in Gander] as quickly as possible.”
It seems that justice minister Tom Marshall could have used the same list of candidates from which he picked Don Singleton for a round of musical judicial chairs to also find a name to fill the vacancy in Gander.
When the Singleton appointment went sour, though, Marshall did nothing with either of the two vacancies. Nor did he do anything with the list of candidates in front of him either – except flick it to one side - even though there were other names on it of people who not only met the bare minimums set out in the legislation but exceeded them.
And that was six months ago.
In the meantime, not only are there still vacancies in Gander and St. John’s yet to be filled but two more have turned up.
Chief Judge Reg Reid retired in April. That leaves newbie Judge Mark Pike in the role of assistant chief judge, a position that appears to have been created for him to fill but there is still a new vacancy in St. John’s.
On top of that, Judge Joe Woodrow – familiar to visitors to Courtroom Number Seven - opted to retire in February and now sits on a per diem basis (as required).
There you have it: three judges’ seats in St. John’s empty and one in Gander, all of which need to be filled. Plus – and for some equally unfathomable reason – cabinet has not gotten around to appointing a replacement for Reid even though he’s been gone since April. The chief judge’s job is a cabinet appointment, you see.
As a sign of how serious the problem is in Gander, consider that The Beacon reported last February the issue came up at a Gander town council meeting that month.
The chair of the town’s economic development committee wanted someone to have a chat with Hander member of the House of Assembly Kevin O’Brien. The prospect of having cases directed to other towns caused some furrowed brows, it seems, since the people attending trials in Gander bring with them a certain benefit to the local innkeepers and restauranteurs. The slowdown in the courthouse meant a slowdown in the local economy.
Now this sort of dithering and delay is nothing new either for the justice department or the current administration as a whole.
Retired justice Bill Marshall (no relation) has been working on not one but two separate “reviews” one of which appears to have been underway since 2004. Not a thing has come of either review and the government is also refusing to release any information about the status of either review.
Since 2003, a surprising number of senior public service positions have gone without a permanent appointment for periods of up to two years. Some are appointed on an acting basis for extraordinarily long times and for no apparent reason. In other instances, legislation is passed but not put into effect and in other instances, reports and promised policies have sat untended for two or three years. It’s all part of the “missing in action” syndrome that befalls chunks of government these days.
Now part of the cause of all this might be that the appointments to the bench are supposed to be made - ultimately - by the Lieutenant Governor-in-Council. That’s legalese ease for cabinet. And, if the practice with deputy ministers is any indication, “cabinet appointment” now means the picks are made by the Premier Himself and only the Premier.
And if he is pre-occupied with other things, no matter what those other things are, … well, that’s been pretty much the old, old story of this administration since Day One.
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In 2006, Danny Williams decided he needed to take a second look at the economic development plans he was following.
"Over the past two years we have undertaken strategic initiatives that are significant planks in our economic development agenda," Premier Danny Williams said. "Now, halfway through our mandate, it is time to take stock of what has been initiated to date, and move to the next phase to ensure our development strategies are being carried out in an integrated, co-ordinated fashion, in line with our original goals."
He appointed Doug House to “lead the process”.
The process was supposed to lead to some called an “integrated provincial development plan”.
So where the heck is it?
Missing in action, apparently.
In April 2008, House quietly slipped back to his real job as a sociology professor at Memorial University. There’s absolutely no reference in his resume to what he did after the 2006 news release other than to mention he was a deputy minister.
There’s a mention in his biographical sketch of the work he did but no title for the final report or indeed any sign that there was a final plan produced after two years of work. In fact the only thing House mentions in his bio is being a “key contributor” to the 2003 Tory party platform, although he doesn’t call it that. Likely that was the chapter that paraphrased the 1992 Strategic Economic Plan.
Now maybe there’s a good reason for all that. Maybe the plan doesn’t exist. Maybe it doesn’t exist because of a fundamental difference of opinion between Doug House and some others - or maybe just one big other - in the current administration.
You see, going back to the 1986 report of the Royal Commission on Employment and Unemployment, House has been one of those who has rejected the megaproject model for local economic development. You know megaprojects: things like Hebron, Hibernia South and the Lower Churchill.
You can find a good description of the report – titled Building on our strengths – in House’s memoir of his time at the Economic Recovery Commission in the 1990s. House defined what he viewed as the attitude of the Old Guard within the bureaucracy. They combined the industrialization policy of the Smallwood era with the resource-management focus of the Peckford years. The result was a focus on big projects Hibernia, Voisey’s Bay and the Lower Churchill which were – and are – often described as the “last chance” for the province. This same Old Guard view rejected or was suspicious of the potential for small scale industrial development, agrifoods, and aquaculture.
The Old Guard - the attitudes that House fought against from 1989 to 1996 - also believes in an expanded federal presence in the province comprising things like a federal penitentiary and defence bases.
Now it shouldn’t take too much energy for someone to realise that the economic development policies of the current administration heavily favour large scale industrial development projects. Other stuff like forestry and agriculture and the list House mentioned don’t get nearly as much attention. There is a bit of cash thrown at them in the budget but when it comes to capturing the attention of the real decision maker(s) in the current administration, if it isn’t really big it just doesn’t exist.
With all that as background, it’s really no wonder House left government. What’s really amazing is that he stayed as long as he did.
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