The Looking Glass News #nlpoli

“The Lower Churchill hydro project has passed the environmental review process,”  CBC news tells us, and as a result the project has cleared “… another hurdle to the Labrador power generation plant becoming a reality.

VOCM used the same word in its headline.

Hurdle.

It means an obstacle, a hindrance or a barrier that something or someone must be overcome on the way to a goal.

Now there’s a curious word for the CBC news writer to use.

Since the final decision on the environmental assessment process for the Lower Churchill rested with the very people who are behind the project in the first place, only the most naive person in Canada would have believed the review was anything but an exercise in filling out the paperwork.

So “hurdle” is such a wrong word that it is comical.

And indeed the fuss about this little event today was entirely comical.  It came complete with news releases, scrums and all manner of breathless comments about how wonderful a thing this was that the project passed the review.

Like there was some doubt ever that the provincial government wouldn’t approve the project.

Still, as odd a choice of a word as “hurdle” might be in this context, it makes perfect sense down here in the rabbit hole into which we all slipped in 2003.

- srbp -

Demanding what is just #nlpoli

For if it is to establish an order that citizens will agree to support, the state must go further than merely investigating their needs;  it must also encourage them to demand what they consider just.  In this way democracy becomes a system in which all citizens participate in government…

Pierre Trudeau,  Approaches to politics, p. 78

- srbp -

Nova Scotia would get Churchill Falls power for free #nlpoli

If you’ve been following the ongoing Muskrat Falls saga, you will recall that energy analyst Tom Adams raised some questions a couple of months ago about whether or not Muskrat Falls could actually produce the power Nalcor and the provincial government claimed.

The problem basically came down to this: 

• January through to March is when Muskrat Falls needs to produce the most power.
• That’s when Holyrood would be cranking at full tilt to meet demand on the island for lights and heat in the winter months.
• At the same time, the Nova Scotians will need to get their guaranteed block.
• Upstream, Churchill Falls will be cranking at full tilt to feed Quebec under the 1969 contract and the 1998 Guaranteed Winter Availability Contract
• But the water flows in those three months are the lowest for the year.
• And at that point, Muskrat Falls would have a problem generating much more electricity than Holyrood did, despite the fact that Muskrat is – on paper – considerably larger.

Nalcor’s official line is that the water management agreement imposed by the public utilities board gives Nalcor access to the Churchill Falls reservoir. 

With production at Muskrat Falls completely integrated with Churchill Falls, this means that during May and June Muskrat Falls will be producing at full output, and the resulting production not required on the island will be displacing production at Churchill Falls. This energy will be drawn down when rivers flows are lower, and during peak winter periods when electricity demand is higher on the island.

Problem solved.

Yeah, well not really, as you will see in a little bit.

The Ides of March, 2012 #nlpoli

Twitter is a wonderful thing except that sometimes you can’t use the whole of a great quote.

The following is a larger bit of one quote that turned up in a minor flurry on the Ides of March.  It was hardly a Shakespeare smack down but it was fun for a moment.

The quote below is part of a speech from Julius Caesar in which Cassius – he of the lean and hungry look – talks to Brutus about fate and destiny and the power that individuals have to change the course of events.

Here’s a bit more of it:

Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus, and we petty men
Walk under his huge legs and peep about
To find ourselves dishonorable graves.
Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.

- srbp -

To Encourage the Others #nlpoli

Lots of people look to leaders in a crisis to see what lessons they can learn.

Well, Kathy Dunderdale is special.

She is an excellent  example for any leader – political or not – who wants to know how not to handle a major financial problem.

The Telegram editorial on Wednesday does an excellent job of summarising the convoluted, contradictory and confused way Kathy Dunderdale has talked about job losses and budget cuts in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Think about Kathy Dunderdale’s comments in a slightly different way and you can get a sense of the magnitude of her problems.  Instead of lay-offs, imagine she was announcing another life-altering decision. You can summarise her statements this way:  we will have to kill some people, maybe.  If we do kill them, there won’t be a lot of bodies, so they should all relax until we figure out how many. And even if we do wind up killing a few people they all knew they would only be here temporarily anyway so this is pretty much what they should have expected anyway.  It’s in their contract.

An exaggeration to be sure, but for the thousands of people in this province across the province, that’s not far off the chilling effect Dunderdale’s words have had. 

The provincial government budget covers about 20% or more of the provincial labour force.  That’s a heck of a lot more than 2100 people who Dunderdale has said are going to be randomly thrown out of work – possibly – in a few weeks time.

All those people have families, mortgages and other bills and all sorts of plans they’ve been making on the expectation they’ll have a job in a few weeks time.

All of them know that when any Premier starts talking about layoffs, program reviews and spending cuts, they aren’t likely to be just limited to this year and a couple of people.  Things must be bad. Lots of them have been through it before. 

And even if things don’t turn out as badly as those public servants might fear, prudence will likely dictate what experience might not.  They are going to change their plans for the next year or so.  New home?  New car?  Renovations?  Trip? Maybe not.  Those who get laid off will have to cut their spending, find a new job and start again.  And those who don’t will scale back just to be on the safe side.

That’s the practical economic impact Kathy Dunderdale will have on tens of thousands of people across the province.

Then there’s the impact on her bottom line.  Provincial sales tax is the second largest source of money for the provincial government, after oil royalties.  We already know oil royalties will drop this year.  Now factor in a drop in sales taxes due to the Dunderdale-induced chill. 

Drop sales tax revenue by 10%  - for argument’s sake - and you have about the same amount of money the Premier says she wants to save, that is, less than $100 million.  It would actually be around $82 million.

So the Premier and her colleagues cut $82 million from the budget – theoretically – with their job cuts.  And in addition they have induced another $82 million revenue loss as a result of the chill in the economy.  Dunderdale’s cocked-up communications have effectively She’s actually doubled the effect of her cut.

At this point, though, we don’t know how much the provincial government will chop.  Anything more than a small handful of jobs lost, coupled with reassurance that those few are all, and the Premier can guarantee the lost revenue and the economic contraction will be much larger. 

Now factor in cuts to federal spending and a loss of federal jobs that will come on March 29. Incidentally, that’s the real reason the provincial government is delayed until April.  All this talk of internal reviews and such is just fluff and nonsense. 

The provincial government will introduce its budget likely around the end of the first week of April.  They are waiting  - and the only thing they are waiting for – is to see what the feds do.  Provincial finance officials likely have some ideas of what will come.  They should have gotten them from their federal counterparts and their colleagues in other provinces. That’s what happens every year. 

The provincial officials have contingency budgets with adjustments here and there in the figures, based on what the feds do.  They can make any last minute adjustments and get the provincial budget out quite quickly afterward. For the most part, the whole thing is done.

The cuts Kathy Dunderdale is talking about may appear to be new to the Telegram editorialist’s reckoning but they aren’t. Dunderdale and her cabinet have apparently settled on them some time ago. How big the cuts will be may depend on the federal budget. 

What the telly-editorialist and others might wonder about more profitably, though, is how a government with billions in cash laying about is thinking about laying off a single solitary employee based on the size of the hand-outs the provincial government will get from Ottawa.

Now that is something to marvel at.

- srbp -

Government hiring process revealed #nlpoli

From your humble e-scribbler’s e-mail this week came a copy of what is purported by an anonymous e-mail to be a sooper sekrit document.

It appears to be the rules set down for hiring people in temporary jobs with the provincial government.

- srbp -

It’s all about export, eh #nlpoli

On Tuesday, natural resources minister Jerome Kennedy told the House of Assembly:

Essentially, what Muskrat Falls does, it allows 40 per cent of the power for the Island to meet the Island needs, 20 per cent for the export - 170 megawatts which allows us to then gain access to the markets in the United States, in the Maritimes, but also to develop other hydro and wind sources on the Island, and 40 per cent of the power for Labrador.

Of course there are no chances of exporting the extremely expensive electricity from Muskrat Falls into any other province, let alone export it and make money.

But hey, let’s humour Jerome! for a bit.

Don’t forget to notice the part that is about the link to Nova Scotia:

170 megawatts which allows us to then gain access to the markets in the United States, in the Maritimes, but also to develop other hydro and wind sources on the Island

Export.

That goes with Jerome’s comments over the past few months about all the revenue that will come from Muskrat Falls.

So what did Jerome say on Wednesday, a mere 24 hours later?

… we see the Maritime Link as a great opportunity to gain a billion-dollar asset for our children and grandchildren, Mr. Speaker, an asset that will continue to produce revenue, which opens up the ability to move power when needed, Mr. Speaker, to the Maritime Provinces, but also it allows us to bring power back…

There’s that revenue thing again, even though Nalcor has no customers for any Muskrat Falls power outside this province.  Basically, if they can’t force people to pay for Muskrat Falls, no one will.

But look at the words at the end.

…it allows us to bring power back…

The energy warehouse will be importing electricity now, according to Jerome Kennedy.  All those people who will be making money from Muskrat falls – if you believe Jerome – will also be able to live the dream he has and buy electricity from somewhere else.

Why would our children and grandchildren and their children and grandchildren do that if  - according to the provincial Tories - we have more than we need and want to export it all forever and a day especially after 2041 when we “repatriate” Churchill Falls?

Sometimes you really get the sense that Jerome and his friends just make stuff up as they go.

- srbp -

If the people are silent… #nlpoli

…if the people are silent, you call them content;  if they protest, you say that they are given to disorder; and in the one case as in the other, they can look to you for nothing…

William Ewart Gladstone,  (29 December 1809 - 19 May 1898) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister four times (1868-1874, 1880-1885, 1886 and 1892-1894).  Gladstone was a notable political reformer, known for his populist speeches. 

- srbp -

Unions oppose energy conservation device #nlpoli

Unions representing Hydro-Quebec employees are oppose to a plan to install so-called smart meters in Quebec homes.  According to the Montreal Gazette:

One week before the Régie de l’énergie is to begin hearings on the controversial venture, the Syndicate des employés de techniques professionnels et de bureau d’Hydro-Québec denounced the move at a media conference.

The union has submitted an economic analysis of the project to the energy board that contends Hydro-Québec would lose $104 million over 20 years, while the new network would wipe out about 1,000 direct and indirect jobs.

 

- srbp -

When you suddenly become the enemy… #nlpoli

For those of us in Newfoundland and Labrador who  - from the outset - opposed the political style that settled on this province after 2003, it’s been a fascinating exercise to watch others suddenly take up the same issues.

Danny Williams’ Conservatives imported the style and applied it ruthlessly to anyone the Old Man felt was not sufficiently compliant with his wishes.

The pattern of behaviour is very well documented.

Until lately the province’s New Democrats and the labour unions that back them enjoyed a very special relationship with the Conservatives.  Generally, they backed the Tories on major projects and issues.  They could find lots of common ground on all sorts of issues.

And as for things like free speech, well, those things were nothing to get bothered about.

Well, those days are gone.

Federation of labour president Lana Payne isn’t signing provincial Tory praises any more now that the Tories have turned on her friends.

And so it is that Lana wrote in her Telegram column this past Saturday that the “divisive smear politics” from other places “has found its way” to this province.

It is disheartening.  No good can come from this.

Well,  of course, it was disheartening.

No good did come of it.

What was most truly disheartening in this province after 2003, though, was the way that people and organizations you would expect to fight for basic rights and for progressive causes couldn’t be bothered to do so as long as the Tories kept the public purse strings loose.  

Maybe Lana could write a column about that some time.  If she did, then maybe she might have an ounce of credibility in her sudden love of fundamental rights and freedoms.

- srbp -

Discussion is healthy, indeed #nlpoli

From the Telegram a former chief of staff in the Premier’s Office puts it as eloquently as only he could:

If public discussion, questions and debate on any issue should be dropped because “the people who have the political and corporate power to make it happen want it to happen,”  then logically there should be no talk of improving search and rescue operations, fisheries mismanagement, deficiencies in health care, industrial safety, workers’ rights, robocalls or any government or corporate action.

Indeed, why would we need public opinion vehicles like letters to the editor and open-line shows?

Why indeed?

Edsel Bonnell gives the answer:

It may be a tiresome process to some, especially those who deal with it every day in government and media, but it’s the price we pay for democracy. The pragmatic alternative is unacceptable.

Amen, brother. 

Amen.

- srbp -

Lay-offs, Noseworthy and other things the Premier talked about #nlpoli

Listen closely and you can hear the beep-beep-beep of the garbage truck of government comms as it backs up on the idea of laying off public sectors workers as a result of government’s “review” of programs and spending.

Premier Kathy Dunderdale scrummed [link to CBC’s raw video]outside the House of Assembly on Monday and CBC’s David Cochrane - the guy who on Friday got her to accept the premise that she might lay people – led off the questioning.  He repeated comments by public sector union boss Carol Furlong.

Notice that Dunderdale doesn’t talk about layoffs in her first answer except to start out by saying that people need to relax.  That isn’t a direct retraction of her comments from Friday, but take a look at the rest of it and you can see where she is going.

Dunderdale claimed that she has said time and again that this is about “good fiscal management” and nothing more.  Of course, the truth is that Dunderdale said a great many things, some of them contradictory.  Her comment to the media is one of her stock approaches whenever she frigs up.  Dunderdale claims she has said the correct thing all along, with the clear implication the rest of us are just not grasping her brilliance.  For one of the earliest examples see Dunderdale and the Joan Cleary mess in December 2006.

Dunderdale also said that government needs to “constantly” review programs to make sure they are efficient and effective.  Then she  referred to some unspecified programs in Joan Burke’s department that are upwards of two or three decades old.

Fair enough.

Except that the government got into its current mess because they didn’t review anything ever.  Instead, they just piled on the hiring and piled on the spending with no goals.  They had no idea where things were going. 

To give you a sense of out far out-to-lunch Dunderdale and her colleagues took things, consider this table from a post back in September 2010.

The Government of Newfoundland and Labrador spends more per person to deliver programs than any other government in Canada, bar none.

In fact, Kathy Dunderdale and her colleagues in cabinet spend more than $3,000 per person more than Alberta does.  That’s not good.  That’s how grossly inefficient and ineffective they are.

The reason is simple.  As with anything in life, if you have no idea where you want to go, you can never tell when you get there or if you get there. So it is that a government that has more money coming through the doors than any of its predecessors has to talk about cuts to spending and layoffs.

In the scrum, Dunderdale said that might be related to the people administering the programs but that permanent employees are safe.

Cochrane comes at the layoffs issue again and this time Dunderdale doesn’t duck.  She accepts the potential there might be layoffs. She emphasises that the review is not about what she terms “gutting” the public service   She puts the review down to effective management of the public service itself. 

Of course, that rings hollow in light of the facts of the matter.

Dunderdale swings to the old line about permanent employees being protected.  Then she adds a twist:

… and others can be redeployed

By 2:53 of the scrum though, Dunderdale is back to acknowledging that cabinet has a number of potential cuts in mind.  She goes on about how “temporary” means only around for a short time.

By 3:36 in the scrum Dunderdale says she “is not going to lie” about it.  Who said anything about lies?

Cochrane then comes back at her to ask what the number is.

So having successfully cooled everyone’s jets in the first couple of minutes, Dunderdale then says she and her cabinet colleagues are considering lay-offs for 800 employees or, “far less than” 800.

And at that point, with a suck of air, someone else takes up the questioning.

Time into the scrum:  four minutes.

And in those four minutes, Kathy Dunderdale has changed directions in her messaging twice in completely contradictory directions.

She started by backing the truck up.

And then by four minutes she is in forward gear again and driving right over the same issue she tried to back off of a couple of minutes earlier.

Dunderdale gets a respite from the layoffs for a second as she answers a question about John Noseworthy and his pork-barrel job.  Dunderdale does what Joan Burke didn’t do in the House.  Dunderdale ties the hire with Noseworthy’s supposed unique skill set.

Then Cochrane goes back to the lay-offs.

“We will look at all of the temporary employees,” said Dunderdale, “the same way we will look at all of the permanent employees.”  Of course since permanent employees aren’t being looked at,l this sounds very confused and confusing.  And indeed it is.

But there’s that beep-beep-beep again.

However, by 6:00 minutes into the scrum, Dunderdale has said that there will be lay-offs but  that the number will be less than 800.

Look at Dunderdale’s face at this point in the scrum as she gets another question about Noseworthy.  She’s clearly pissed off. She doesn’t know anybody better qualified to do the job, Dunderdale insists.  That is actually part of the problem, of course:  hiring people with connections as opposed to qualifications. 

In response to another question, Dunderdale does the pre-emptive denial, saying that no one made any promises to Noseworthy when he decided to run in the last election.  She puts responsibility for Noseworthy’s job on Joan Burke, saying that Burke brought the name to Dunderdale.

At that point, the scrum switches to other topics.  It’s a wonder everyone wasn’t dizzy what with all the shifts of position.  Expect more shifting to come. 

- srbp -

Kremlinology 39: What Burke didn’t say #nlpoli

In defending the $140,000 –a-year patronage job she gave to former Tory candidate John Noseworthy, advanced skills minister Joan Burke told the House of Assembly:

Mr. Speaker, no one can argue that Mr. Noseworthy has a unique set of skills.

Indeed no one can make such an argument.

Former auditor general John Noseworthy doesn’t have any special skills at least, in this case.

He is an accountant with lots of experience as a provincial auditor.  In that role, he has been known to make a few serious fumbles.

Everything that Burke said her department needed to help the department sort itself out could be had from a great many people out there.  Some would be former provincial public servants here or from other provinces.  Some would be former federal public servants and some would come from the private sector. What’s more, all of those people would know more about the core mandate of Burke’s department than than John Noseworthy.

Joan Burke is right.

No one can argue Noseworthy has a unique skill set.

He doesn’t.

And to her credit, at no point in her response to questions in the House did Burke actually say he did. 

Looks like someone foisted the guy on Burke and she got stuck trying to defend someone else’s pork-barrel decision.

The clue is in what Joan didn’t say.

- srbp -

Government cash give-aways #nlpoli

CBC’s Rob Antle has updated work done over the past couple of years on government give-aways to private sector businesses in the name of economic development:

The Newfoundland and Labrador government has funnelled more than $20 million into grants, loans and the direct costs of business-attraction initiatives that have provided a net benefit of fewer than 100 new jobs — a quarter of them seasonal.

Faithful readers will notice some familiar names in the story and the associated documents posted with the online version of it.

Kodiak got $8 million to expand its operations at Harbour Grace.  They laid off workers instead.That isn’t the only example of that sort of thing happening.

Then, there’s Dynamic Air Shelters,which has more government cash in it than many Crown corporations

None of this is surprising since Newfoundland and Labrador is the only province in Canada where the private sector prefers to be publicly funded.

It’s another way in which the provincial economy has grown increasingly fragile over the past eight years.

- srbp -

Poll Math #nlpoli

Just for the heck of it, here’s the most recent CRA marketing poll adjusted to take out the misleading way CRA reports its clients poll numbers.

Here are the Conservative Party voter choice results from the fall of 2010 when Kathy Dunderdale took over the Tory leadership until the most recent poll in February.

The solid blue line is the percentage of respondents who picked Conservative.  It’s the real percentage, not the share of “decideds”.

The light blue dashed line is the actual percentage of eligible votes the Tories got in 2003 and 2007.  Yes, friends, 43% of those eligible to vote picked Tory.

The bottom line is the share of eligible votes the Dunderdale Tories got last October.  If you can’t quite pick it out, the number is 32%. It’s the lowest share of eligible vote any Tory government received and won re-election to government.  The previous record low was 33% in 1975

So while there’s nothing in these numbers that would send the Tories into a panic, the fact is that the Tories don’t have the kind of overwhelming electoral support that would allow them to do things like…say… slash public spending without risking a pretty significant turn around in popular support. 

Keep that in mind over the next few weeks.

You see while the Tories might be 20 points ahead of their nearest rival according to CRA, that really means that only an 11 percentage point swing puts the Tories in second place, behind the New Democrats.  Even a five point swing to the NDP would send shock waves through provincial politics.

Heck, if the Tories drop down in the public polling to numbers below 50% in the misleading way CRA reports them and you’d see people raise their eyebrows.

Slow down government spending to any great degree, chill economy with talk of lay-offs or – to be really daring – actually lay people off and you can bet there’ll be a change in the polling numbers.

It’s important to keep these things in perspective.

- srbp -

Dundernomics 101: Public Sector Employment Numbers #nlpoli

In an interview with CBC’s David Cochrane, Premier Kathy Dunderdale said that the public service has grown by more than 2,100 jobs in the past eight years and that total employment in the public service is about 9,000.

Well, not exactly.  That depends on what you consider to be public sector and “public service”.

As labradore noted last July, the entire public service sector in this province – federal, provincial, municipal and Crown corporations accounts for was more than that.

The growth in public sector employment alone 11,500 between 2006 and 2011.

If you look at figures for 2010, the totals are way more than what the Premier talked about:

In the first quarter of 2010, approximately 53,780 people in Newfoundland and Labrador worked in some portion of the provincial public sector: 11,550 in the provincial civil service, 20,400 in public health-care and social services establishments, 10,900 at Memorial University and the public colleges, and 10,930 employed by the various public school boards.*

Even if we allow that the Premier defined “public service” pretty narrowly in 2012,  you can see that in early 2010 there were 2,500 more people working in the public service,  that is, just working directly for the provincial government than the Premier currently claims work for government in total.

And yes, that is way more than the 2,100 jobs the Premier claims she and her colleagues added – in total – since 2003.

Confused?

Well, obviously the Premier is.

And if she doesn’t understand what is going on now and what has gone on in the recent past – stuff she actually lived through and decided already – then it is going to be very hard for her to understand whatever the current review comes up with.

Confusion about the basics also explains why the Premier could claim that 3% of what she herself has called almost $8.0 billion in public sector spending is about $100 million.

Three percent would be $240 million.

Two percent would be $160 million.

One point two five percent (that is 1.25%) comes out to $100 million.  And for anyone who is still unsure, 1.25% is closer to one percent than it is to two percent.

All those jobs come at a price.  Here’s another pretty chart from labradore to give you a sense of what those payroll costs are:

The figures are for early 2011 and the total bill hits about $2.65 billion.

None of that is about whether the jobs are needed or not, whether the people do good work, what the impact of any cuts would be or anything else related to it. 

This is just to establish so everyone can plainly see that what the Premier said everywhere last week on several occasions and what is actually going on are two completely different things.

To her credit, the Premier acknowledged in one interview that she had frigged up her explanations of things last week.

But that was before she told David Cochrane that temporary employees could be getting the heave-ho in order to meet her  targets.

That likely isn’t correct either, by the way.

So as we start the week, expect that the most common noise you will hear will be the gigantic garbage truck of government communications beep-beep-beeping as it backs up  - yet again - and tries to move forward  - yet again - again without turning the same information into road kill for the third or fourth time in the past seven days.

– srbp -

The truth is an absolute defence #nlpoli

Seems that the goings-on in the provincial legislature are weighing heavy on many brows at the end of the first week the place is back in session since this time last year.

Telegram editor Russell Wangersky has a column on it as does Bob Wakeham in the Saturday paper.

Wangersky writes about the way the House was recently.

Part of the blame is the failure of not reining in these Type-A bad boys and bad girls soon enough; I know that criticizing past Speakers of the House is frowned upon in the parliamentary system, but when Speakers are either too lax or too one-sided in dealing with abuses of House procedure, you can guarantee that frustration will build and tempers will boil.

Let’s be clear:  Harvey Hodder and Roger Fitzgerald were both incompetent and nakedly biased during their time as Speaker of the legislature.

In the ordinary course of things, in a properly functioning House, that is a contempt and one could be expected to be dragged in front of the members to answer for it.

But as with all defamation claims, the truth is an absolute defence.  That’s why your humble e-scribbler had no problem in writing and publicising the comment repeatedly.

Both were picked, one might readily surmise because they were biased and would comply with the wishes of the root cause of the problem in the House.

The current Speaker is another hand-picked one; Tommy Osborne was told to stand aside.  But we have yet to see him rule on a major issue.  Let’s give Ross Wiseman the chance to break the recent pattern and restore some dignity to the tattered Speaker’s robes.

Wangersky identifies the source of the problem as well:  it starts at the top..

But what neither he nor Wakeham get to is why the government uses the tactics they do or why the opposition members individually or collective engage in the buffoonery.

That’s where the real problem lies.

And suggesting that the party leaders need to sit their members down and give them a stern talking to?

Well, that just misses the point entirely. You have to get at the cause.  The goons and the buffoons – whether in the House or on Twitter or in the comments sections online– are just a symptom.

Still, the very fact that people are talking about the legislature and how it needs to improve is good.

That’s certainly a radical change from recent years.

- srbp -

CNLOPB announces 2012 call for bids on offshore parcels #nlpoli

From the offshore regulatory board:

The Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Petroleum Board (C-NLOPB) announced today the details of a Call for Bids in the Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Area. Call for Bids NL12-01 (Area "C" – Laurentian Sub-basin) will consist of six parcels, which comprise 1,589,738 hectares.

Interested parties will have until 4:00 p.m. on November 1, 2012 to submit sealed bids for parcels offered in Call for Bids NL12-01. The sole criterion for selecting winning bids will be the total amount of money the bidder commits to spend on exploration of the respective parcel during Period I (the first period of a nine-year licence). The
minimum bid for each parcel offered is $1,000,000.

The C-NLOPB hereby wishes to inform prospective bidders for parcels NL12-01-01, NL12-01-02 and NL12-01-04 (these parcels are adjacent to the French Exclusive Zone around the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon,
France) that it has been advised by the Government of Canada that on May 17, 2005, the Government of Canada and the Government of the French Republic signed the Agreement between the Government of Canada and the
Government of the French Republic relating to the Exploration and Exploitation of Transboundary Hydrocarbon Fields (the Agreement). 

The Agreement provides a framework for the conservation and management of hydrocarbon resources in fields straddling the maritime boundary between the two countries.  The Agreement will enter into force on the date on which the Government of Canada and the Government of the French Republic have informed each other that all necessary internal requirements have been fulfilled. While France has ratified the Agreement, Canada is putting in place the domestic arrangements to allow it to proceed with its ratification process.

As a result, the Government of Canada has advised the C-NLOPB that if the Agreement enters into force prior to or during the term of a licence covering any of the above parcels, this necessarily will result in the application of additional terms and conditions for those parcels,
through legislation, regulations, amendments to licences or otherwise, in order to ensure compliance with the Agreement.

The C-NLOPB recommends to prospective bidders that they consult the text of the Agreement, which is available from the C-NLOPB upon request to information@cnlopb.nl.ca.

This Call for Bids contains provisions for rentals during the term of an exploration licence and during the term of any resulting significant discovery licence. This Call for Bids contains a sample exploration licence which incorporates a sample significant discovery licence.

These areas have been previously assessed to identify any mitigative measures that may be required in relation to exploration activity on these parcels.

Subject to Ministerial approval, successful bidders will be issued an exploration licence for a term of nine years; however, during Period I a well must be spudded to validate the licence for the full nine-year term.

Notification of any changes made to this Call for Bids will be posted to the C-NLOPB's website.

For a complete copy of the text of the Call for Bids, visit the C-NLOPB website at www.cnlopb.nl.ca.

- srbp -

* paragraphing changed for online legibility.  SRBP added two links related to the Canada-France agreement on transboundary hydrocarbon resources

Kremlinology 38: what they left out #nlpoli

In a news release from the federal natural resources minister that heralded the future of Newfoundland and Labrador is energy, they didn’t mention the Lower Churchill once.

- srbp -

Enough of the Political Day-Care #nlpoli

In some respects, it is a threat that would strike fear only into the hearts of Danny Williams’ Tories:

If this problem is not resolved today, you can expect me to absolutely vilify your minister on Monday morning on Open Line.

No broken limbs.

No financial ruin.

A call to Open Line.

That was enough for the ruling Tories to save the voice message containing the threat and to reveal it to the world as a question of privilege in the House of Assembly at the end of the first week  the legislature has been open since last spring.

The government house leader spoke of intimidation and threats and fear.  In a scrum with the media after , Joan Burke – to whom the threat was directed in early February – appeared shaken.  Premier Kathy Dunderdale, she of the haughty condescension and the cheap put down had a few words of derision for the Liberals and their bad words. The only thing the Tories didn’t do in all their melodramatic glory was stage a collective back-of-wrist-to-forehead swoon.

All wonderful play-acting on the part of the Tories. Former parole officer Joan Burke showed her unease with all the credibility  of Rob Ford after a visit from Mary Walsh in her Princess Warrior costume one morning.

All that was vintage Danny,too.  The aged drama queen  could hurl any sorts of petty, vicious. mean-spirited and contemptible invective at anyone any time.  Yet, a whisper of derision aimed vaguely in his direction would bring on the screams of self-righteous indignation.  The bully one minute, the victim the next in the fashion of the chickenshit hockey goon who specialises in taking the dive for the ref whenever someone stands up to him.

Playing acting, hysterics,  and, of course, the finest vintage hypocrisy on the planet.

Classic Danny-era politics.

But that really isn't the story here.

The story is that elected provincial politics remains the domain of the childish and immature eight years after the mean widdle kid and his allies took it there.

Danny made the House safe for buffoonery, contempt, accusation, insult and intimidation.  Jerome, Darin, Paul and Steve showed how well they learned their lessons with their performance on Twitter a couple of weeks ago. On Thursday, the whole gang on the government side joined in.

This week, though, the Tories proved the old saying that in politics you don’t have to be good, you just have to be better than the alternatives.

For their part, the New Democrats display in the House this week was less about childishness than inexperience combined with basic incompetence.  This is a caucus that has a long way to go and a lot to learn before they could ever be considered a political threat to anyone except themselves.

As for the Liberals, they confirmed this week that these are likely the last Liberals anyone will see sitting in a legislature in this province, at least with enough of them to occupy the official opposition benches.    A couple of them might survive the next election but the Liberal Party is more an historical artifact than a viable political force.

To make clear how politically inept they are, consider Jim Bennett’s asinine phone call.  Anyone who watched the Liberals in action this week would hardly be surprised by it. In making the call, Bennett showed he has no judgment. In defending the call as the enthusiastic defence of a constituent, Bennett shows he has no genuine understanding of just how ridiculous his behaviour was.

Yvonne Jones’ performance as opposition House leader on Thursday was equally cringe-worthy.  In her embarrassing defence of Jim Bennett, she showed no signs of understanding parliamentary procedure despite having sat in the House for the past 16 years.  During Question Period the rest of the week, she displayed little knowledge of anything else. How bad was Jones?  She made John Hickey look good.

The root of the problem for the Liberals remains the same as it has been for years:  no one is in charge. Generally, neither the leader, no one in the caucus, the senior caucus staff nor the party leadership has any idea of where to go or what to do to get there. They operate as a loose association of individuals lacking either a common purpose or the common sense to work together.

Dwight Ball is clearly the leader in name only.  His own performance over the past few months and in the House so far could be generously described as grossly ineffective. The only good thing for Ball is that he won’t face any challengers should he decide he wants to lead the party permanently.  The party is in such desperate shape that no one in his or her right mind would waste energy trying to bring the party back from the political dead.

For the rest of us, though, this week has been nothing more but a reminder that the provincial legislature and the provincial government have become little more than a very expensive day-care. 

That is not merely an uncomfortable thought.

It’s unacceptable.

- srbp -