Steve Kent decided around Christmas to run for the House of Assembly.
He didn't formally declare until yesterday.
A week after he spoke at the Rally for Danny.
In the meantime, he had a few things, including a boundary dispute, to keep his profile up there as a fighting Mount Pearler.
Follow so far?
Good.
Mayor Andy Wells.
Being his usual annoying, abrasive - and uninformed - self.
Behaving at the offshore regulatory board the same way he used to carry on at the public utilities border 20 years ago. Insulting people with terms that could be better used to describe himself.
Same boring stuff.
Someone leaked a letter to CBC Radio from the chair of the offshore board complaining about Wells. Wasn't the federal minister. Likely wasn't the provincial minister. Definitely wasn't the offshore board.
Who's left?
The same guy who leaked the story of his failed nomination for the top job at the board in the first place?
Good guess.
You see the same letter wound up in the hands of the Independent along with a marvelous, long-winded interview full of quotes.
But here's the thing.
The whole issue didn't need to pop up in the public domain right now. After all the letter was written almost a month ago and the incident involved goes back months before that.
So it gets the thoughts flowing.
If one mayor in the region is running for Danny, maybe the other big mayor will be running for him as well. Maybe this is just another one of those cheesy little stunts to keep Andy Wells' name in the news. Lord knows fixing the streets wouldn't be quite as newsworthy as Wells calling someone a hack, a word incidentally which describes the mayor to a tee.
So where would he run?
In Kent's case, both his intentions and his seat choice were wrapped up in a neat little bow, right next to the "it's all about leadership" crap that he would use to explain away what appears to many to be a track record of political opportunism.
In Well's case - if he were to run - there are actually a couple of options.
St. John's East is a safe Tory seat. It's currently held by intergovernmental affairs minister John Ottenheimer. Now Ottenheimer - surely one of the finest cabinet ministers in a while in this province - is not expected to run again.
But Andy doesn't quite fit the St. John's east profile.
That's a seat better suited to say, Dean MacDonald.
(Now there's an announcement that wouldn't surprise anyone. All that would be left to complete the set after that is a seat for Ken and job for Mel. Call it Cable Newfoundland and Labrador. An unregulated political monopoly. But I digress.)
Anyway, the seat most likely to suit any ambitions Andy might have would be the one currently held by the New Democrat leader, Lorraine Michael.
So there you have it. Speculation of the week. Andy Wells will be running for Danny in Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi.
And some smart bunny out there will undoubtedly connect up the rest of the political dots federally and provincially on his or her own.
19 May 2007
The follies continue: yet another two week delay in the spending scandal report
The report by Chief Justice Derek Green into pay and benefits for members of the House of Assembly has been delayed three times so far.
It has always been promised within two weeks.
It's delayed again.
And yes, you guessed it.
It should be delivered within two weeks.
At the same time, the Premier's Office is not committing to implementing the report before the next election.
You see this is what happens when people get involved who pay no attention to the existing law and past practice.
Chief Justice Green's little investigation is a completely bizarre - and unconstitutional? - effort to circumvent the established process and place control of pay for the legislature in the hands of the executive branch of government.
It is a dodgy constitutional proposition even if it isn't outright unconstitutional.
There was already a mechanism established and used for decades to handle pay and benefits. The same process was used in 1989 to set up the Morgan commission, It worked. There were tight rules and definitions that were followed.
Immediately after a general election, the House of Assembly would appoint a commission with the powers of a public inquiry to establish pay and other forms of remuneration for legislators. The commissioner would report within 90 days.
As set out by law, in black and white for all to read and understand.
That system worked until 1996, when the current Premier's stylistic predecessor and his colleagues tossed it out the window.
They decided to make the rules up as they go along.
And basically, that's what the current Premier is doing.
Making the rules up as he goes along.
And that is wrong.
There was never any legitimate reason to appoint Chief Justice Green to this little project.
That is, unless there was some reason to be concerned what would turn up if someone had the powers of a public inquiry.
Chief Justice Green was deliberately denied those powers by the Premier and the rest of cabinet.
And so we wait yet again with no commitments to act on the highly improper report even when it is received.
because there are no rules.
And that's been problem in the House of Assembly since 1996.
Everyone thinks the rules apply to everyone else.
But him.
Background: The Internal Economy Commission Act.
Inquiry re salaries, etc.
13. (1) The House of Assembly may by resolution appoint, upon those terms and conditions that are set out in the resolution, an independent commission of not more than 3 persons to conduct an inquiry and prepare a report respecting the indemnities, allowances and salaries to be paid to members of the House of Assembly.
(2) The persons appointed under subsection (1) shall have all and may exercise all the powers, privileges and immunities of persons appointed as commissioners under the Public Inquiries Act.
(3) The persons appointed under subsection (1) shall complete their inquiry and deliver their report containing recommendations to the speaker within 90 days of the commission's appointment.
(4) The speaker, upon receipt of the report containing the recommendations of the persons appointed under subsection (1), shall refer the recommendations to the commission as soon as possible following the receipt of them and the commission shall implement the recommendations with or without the changes the commission considers appropriate.
(5) [Rep. by 1999 c14 s2]
It has always been promised within two weeks.
It's delayed again.
And yes, you guessed it.
It should be delivered within two weeks.
At the same time, the Premier's Office is not committing to implementing the report before the next election.
You see this is what happens when people get involved who pay no attention to the existing law and past practice.
Chief Justice Green's little investigation is a completely bizarre - and unconstitutional? - effort to circumvent the established process and place control of pay for the legislature in the hands of the executive branch of government.
It is a dodgy constitutional proposition even if it isn't outright unconstitutional.
There was already a mechanism established and used for decades to handle pay and benefits. The same process was used in 1989 to set up the Morgan commission, It worked. There were tight rules and definitions that were followed.
Immediately after a general election, the House of Assembly would appoint a commission with the powers of a public inquiry to establish pay and other forms of remuneration for legislators. The commissioner would report within 90 days.
As set out by law, in black and white for all to read and understand.
That system worked until 1996, when the current Premier's stylistic predecessor and his colleagues tossed it out the window.
They decided to make the rules up as they go along.
And basically, that's what the current Premier is doing.
Making the rules up as he goes along.
And that is wrong.
There was never any legitimate reason to appoint Chief Justice Green to this little project.
That is, unless there was some reason to be concerned what would turn up if someone had the powers of a public inquiry.
Chief Justice Green was deliberately denied those powers by the Premier and the rest of cabinet.
And so we wait yet again with no commitments to act on the highly improper report even when it is received.
because there are no rules.
And that's been problem in the House of Assembly since 1996.
Everyone thinks the rules apply to everyone else.
But him.
-srbp-
Background: The Internal Economy Commission Act.
Inquiry re salaries, etc.
13. (1) The House of Assembly may by resolution appoint, upon those terms and conditions that are set out in the resolution, an independent commission of not more than 3 persons to conduct an inquiry and prepare a report respecting the indemnities, allowances and salaries to be paid to members of the House of Assembly.
(2) The persons appointed under subsection (1) shall have all and may exercise all the powers, privileges and immunities of persons appointed as commissioners under the Public Inquiries Act.
(3) The persons appointed under subsection (1) shall complete their inquiry and deliver their report containing recommendations to the speaker within 90 days of the commission's appointment.
(4) The speaker, upon receipt of the report containing the recommendations of the persons appointed under subsection (1), shall refer the recommendations to the commission as soon as possible following the receipt of them and the commission shall implement the recommendations with or without the changes the commission considers appropriate.
(5) [Rep. by 1999 c14 s2]
18 May 2007
Wells to offshore board chair: "He can get stuffed on that."
In a situation that is likely no surprise to anyone, St. John's mayor Andy Wells is in hot water with the chairman of the offshore regulatory board.
CBC News is reporting that Max Ruelokke, chairman and chief executive officer of the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Board complaining about comments made by Wells in a recent oil magazine article. Wells, who is a provincial appointee to the board, reportedly called the board "incompetent" in its recent handling of a development application.
The provincial government vetoed the board's approval claiming a lack of information, even though the provincial government did nothing while the application was in process to obtain the information it claimed it needed.
In January, the board took the unprecedented step of releasing its decision and associated correspondence, although the documents have been removed from the board's website.
Wells didn't get the job, even after a second process as established under the Atlantic Accord (1985).
Wells has commented publicly on the decision previously.
CBC News is reporting that Max Ruelokke, chairman and chief executive officer of the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Board complaining about comments made by Wells in a recent oil magazine article. Wells, who is a provincial appointee to the board, reportedly called the board "incompetent" in its recent handling of a development application.
The provincial government vetoed the board's approval claiming a lack of information, even though the provincial government did nothing while the application was in process to obtain the information it claimed it needed.
In January, the board took the unprecedented step of releasing its decision and associated correspondence, although the documents have been removed from the board's website.
"He can get stuffed on that," Wells said.Wells was Premier Danny Williams surprise choice in 2005 to head the board, coming as it did despite the fact that the selection process agreed to by both the federal and provincial governments was well under way.
"He's not going to be telling me how I'm going to respond to any issues that come before this board. I'm not going to stand by and allow some bureaucratic hack to tell me what I can and cannot say on matters of public interest," he said.
Wells didn't get the job, even after a second process as established under the Atlantic Accord (1985).
Wells has commented publicly on the decision previously.
-srbp-
Punt O'Connor now
If anyone needs to see a perfect excuse as to why the country needs a new defence minister, consider his testimony to the House of Commons committee reviewing defence estimates.
Most of Gordon O'Connor's answers to questions are meaningless talking points. In fact for significant chunks of the questioning, O'Connor repeats the same lines over and over and over again.
No substance.
No content.
It is astonishing the number of responses that are merely four or five short sentences in length.
The most typical answer in Gordo's exchange with Labrador member of parliament Todd Russell?
"Mr. Chair, when the government makes the decision on precise commitments, the announcements will be made."
This is a minister who can in no way be accused of being in control of his portfolio. He clearly cannot command a brief, and one would venture that his course report in minister training school likely would have said: "people will follow this minister if only out of idle curiosity."
O'Connor has likely bogged his office and it will take more than a couple of strong hands and an armoured recovery vehicle to get the former tank driver out of his current mess.
O'Connor's performance is evidence of a minister incapable of coping with the management of one of the largest and most important departments in the Government of Canada.
Memo to PMO: Punt O'Connor now.
That action alone will do more to rebuild the Canadian Forces than any cash ever spent.
Most of Gordon O'Connor's answers to questions are meaningless talking points. In fact for significant chunks of the questioning, O'Connor repeats the same lines over and over and over again.
No substance.
No content.
It is astonishing the number of responses that are merely four or five short sentences in length.
The most typical answer in Gordo's exchange with Labrador member of parliament Todd Russell?
"Mr. Chair, when the government makes the decision on precise commitments, the announcements will be made."
This is a minister who can in no way be accused of being in control of his portfolio. He clearly cannot command a brief, and one would venture that his course report in minister training school likely would have said: "people will follow this minister if only out of idle curiosity."
O'Connor has likely bogged his office and it will take more than a couple of strong hands and an armoured recovery vehicle to get the former tank driver out of his current mess.O'Connor's performance is evidence of a minister incapable of coping with the management of one of the largest and most important departments in the Government of Canada.
Memo to PMO: Punt O'Connor now.
That action alone will do more to rebuild the Canadian Forces than any cash ever spent.
-sbrp-
Sanford looking at disappointing first quarter results
From the New Zealand Herald:
Fish exporter Sanford warned of a disappointing first half result, after a high New Zealand dollar ate into profit and weaker United States markets dampened sales.
Revenue was down 2 per cent for the six months ended March 31, as disappointing sales in the second quarter reversed a 15 per cent rise in the first three months.
...
Profit would be boosted by a one-off gain of over $6m on the sale of Sanford's Argentine investment.
Proposals to sell the major assets in its 15-per cent owned Fishery Products in Canada were under consideration. If concluded, the sales could result in a one-off gain of about $20m, [Sanford managing director Eric] Barratt said.
-srbp-
Exxon returns to Timor Sea
Oil giant ExxonMobil is farming in on a prospect in the Timor Sea, marking a return to the region for the company after a decade's absence.
The well will be drilled beginning in September by the new Wilcraft jackup rig.
An Exxon spokesman yesterday described Marina as an exciting prospect. The farm-in with a junior was a clear sign of the company's enthusiasm. In recent years Exxon has spent hundreds of millions of dollars in exploration and development in Australia, mostly associated with the Bass Strait oilfields but also in re-establishing an exploration position in northern and western Australian waters in partnership with Chevron and Shell.
-srbp-
Rio Tinto mans barricades
The Australian reports that, faced with increasing speculation that the company will be the subject of a takeover bid or takeover bids, Rio Tinto has instructed its financial advisor, Morgan Stanley, to prepare a defense strategy.
Rio has "refreshed" Morgan Stanley's existing mandate in order to be prepared for any possible bid, an industry source told The Australian. The company refused to comment. Morgan Stanley's global mining industry adviser in London is Peter Bacchus, who spearheaded WMC's takeover defence against Xstrata in 2005 when he was based in Australia with Citigroup.
-srbp-
Chevron to spend US$4.0 billion in Asia in '07
From the International Herald Tribune:
BANGKOK, Thailand: Chevron Corp. will invest about US$4 billion in Asia this year for petroleum exploration and production, a company executive said Friday.
"The company sees Asia as a very attractive place for investment for future growth," Steve Green, managing director of Chevron Asia South Ltd., told Dow Jones Newswires in an interview.
-srbp-
Post columnist slags Pipeline Canada
From Terence Corcoran's column in the Friday Post:
The plan will likely call for the same high level of government intervention in energy projects Corcoran criticises in the Mackenzie pipeline story.
Even though there is no reason to believe it, some people will argue that the Post is part of a national plot to denounce and degrade the Newfoundland nation.
Other people will roll their eyes up in their heads at the foolishness of the conspiracy conclusion.
Prediction: The National Post won't like the Newfoundland and Labrador energy plan whenever it is released, for many of the same reasons given in Corcoran's column.Having just sold off Petro-Canada, ending that particularly disastrous episode in national energy history, the Harper Conservatives are floating the idea of taking control of a new national project, Pipeline-Canada. As a Crown corporation, Pipeline- Canada would contract out construction of the $16.2-billion project to Trans-Canada Pipeline.
If this were to happen, rest assured that it would not really be an energy policy. It would be, above all, a native buy-off policy, a job-creation policy, a make-work program and a political strategy to secure votes and seats in Parliament.
But as an energy policy, the benefits are far from obvious. A government-funded pipeline megaproject would do nothing to help establish Canada as an "Energy Superpower." But it could set Canada up as an Energy Superloser. With a $16-billion construction cost, the latest estimate, it poses a monumental risk to the government.
The plan will likely call for the same high level of government intervention in energy projects Corcoran criticises in the Mackenzie pipeline story.
Even though there is no reason to believe it, some people will argue that the Post is part of a national plot to denounce and degrade the Newfoundland nation.
Other people will roll their eyes up in their heads at the foolishness of the conspiracy conclusion.
-srbp-
Leo 2s to cost $1.3 billion
New Leopard 2 tanks will cost the Government of Canada $1.3 billion for acquisition and lifecycle costs over 20 years according to defence minister Gordon O'Connor.
O'Connor revealed the new cost - double the amount previously announced - in testimony before a House of Commons committee on Thursday evening.
No reason has been given by the minister or his department for breaking with past practice and not announcing the total cost for the new acquisition. In previous purchases, purchase costs as well as lifecycle costs were provided at the same time.
O'Connor revealed the new cost - double the amount previously announced - in testimony before a House of Commons committee on Thursday evening.
No reason has been given by the minister or his department for breaking with past practice and not announcing the total cost for the new acquisition. In previous purchases, purchase costs as well as lifecycle costs were provided at the same time.
-srbp-
Feds to buy into Mackenzie pipeline
The Government of Canada may buy an interest in the stalled Mackenzie Valley pipeline project in an effort to restart the venture, the National Post is reporting.
Oil companies backing the project said in March that the 1,222-kilometre pipeline linking gas fields in the Mackenzie Delta to Alberta's natural gas pipeline grid would cost $16.2-billion, up from $7.5-billion only two years ago, thanks to inflationary pressures that have beset energy projects around the world.As Bond Papers noted last October in an article on a possible Lower Churchill loan guarantee, the federal government favours taking equity in projects rather than providing loan guarantees. Specifically, the October article linked to a Globe and Mail story on the possibility of the feds taking equity in the pipeline project.
The consortium then asked Ottawa for huge tax concessions, but at a May 2 meeting in Calgary [Indian affairs and northern development minister Jim] Prentice slammed the door on the idea of subsidizing the oil companies. Imperial then said it would shut down the project, sources said.
Since then, Ottawa has not only resurrected a proposal to be a partner in the project, but is exploring taking control away from Imperial. The massive venture would provide a new source of natural gas for North America and be a springboard for development of the North. It would also open the prospective frontier to gas exploration.
Under the plan under consideration, Ottawa would buy out Imperial and its partners, Houston-based ConocoPhillips and international conglomerate Royal Dutch Shell PLC, by reimbursing them for costs already incurred on the project plus interest.
Imperial, Conoco and Shell are now formulating a plan to let the government into the project. A deal is expected to take several months to be finalized, sources said.
-srbp-
Another view of Alberta
Greg Locke has an interesting post on the experience of moving to Alberta especially when it comes to Medicare coverage and worker's comp.
This looks like just the snippet of a bigger piece, or at least the start of something that should be bigger.
This looks like just the snippet of a bigger piece, or at least the start of something that should be bigger.
Here is something Newfoundland's migrant workers are not told about in the glowing upbeat presentations in hotel ballrooms used to sell them on going to work in Alberta. Particularly on industrial job sites where risk of injury is higher than other jobs and just which health care system covers you in case of illness or injury.
First you had better figure out if Newfoundland’s MCP covers you while working in Alberta or if Alberta resident’s provincial health care plan is in play for your particular situation. If you are not an Alberta resident, you may not be covered. Also, when and does your employers additional health care benefits kick in after you start work. A lot of the answers to these questions will depend on whether you are an Alberta resident or a “commuter” flying in to work in Alberta but still a resident of Newfoundland.
-srbp-
17 May 2007
Government promises accounting in cancer scandal
Premier Danny Williams said Thursday his administration had a "moral responsibility" to investigate whether patient health was compromised in the way a regional health authority in the province responded to news that certain breast cancer screening tests had produced incorrect results.
Upwards of 300 women were steered away from access to the drug Temoxafen, based on the results of faulty hormone receptor tests.
Former health minister Tom Osborne, now the province's justice minister, admitted he was briefed on the scope of the problem in December 2006.
At the time, health authorities only publicly disclosed changes in treatment to over a hundred women. Information that tests were incorrect for almost three times that number of women was not made public until this week, as a result of inquires for lawyers representing some of the women.
CBC reported Thursday that:
There was no explanation for the delays in briefing the health minister in 2006 or why the provincial health department concurred with legal advice that appears to have recommended partial disclosure of information.
The premier told the legislature today that his administration would conduct a thorough review of the matter bearing in mind the issues of liability and confidentiality.
Upwards of 300 women were steered away from access to the drug Temoxafen, based on the results of faulty hormone receptor tests.
Former health minister Tom Osborne, now the province's justice minister, admitted he was briefed on the scope of the problem in December 2006.
At the time, health authorities only publicly disclosed changes in treatment to over a hundred women. Information that tests were incorrect for almost three times that number of women was not made public until this week, as a result of inquires for lawyers representing some of the women.
CBC reported Thursday that:
...Health Minister Ross Wiseman told the legislature Thursday that Eastern Health — which is largely funded by government, but operates at arm's length — was aware of the inaccurate test results more than a year ago.In the House of Assembly, Wiseman said that the health authority became away of a problem with testing in May 2005 and began a review of tests and procedures.
However, he said, government officials were not notified until last August, and that the then health minister was not personally briefed until three months after that, in late November.
Health Minister Ross Wiseman said Eastern Health has known for more than a year about the error rate of hormone receptor testing.Health Minister Ross Wiseman said Eastern Health has known for more than a year about the error rate of hormone receptor testing.
(CBC)
Court documents reported earlier this week by CBC News showed an error rate of 42 per cent in a large set of samples, several times higher than a public estimates.
Wiseman said Eastern Health still may not know what went wrong with hormone receptor tests done between 1997 and 2005.
There was no explanation for the delays in briefing the health minister in 2006 or why the provincial health department concurred with legal advice that appears to have recommended partial disclosure of information.
The premier told the legislature today that his administration would conduct a thorough review of the matter bearing in mind the issues of liability and confidentiality.
-srbp-
Ahhh, but what if...
Funny how everyone is in a high dudgeon over Equalization.
Well, not e-v-e-r-y-o-n-e, as was painfully obvious at the Rally for Danny.
Despite the claims of the rally organizers, it looks like about 1500 people showed up on a fine and glorious Friday. None too impressive.
[Photo removed by request] For those who don't know, that was the non-partisan rally organized by DW's political supporters and attended by...well, ...his political supporters, like this gaggle of political staffers (left). That's the Premier's parliamentary assistant standing there in shades, likely keeping an eye on his promotion to cabinet.
Paul Oram's boss worked the crowd like it was a Tory rally and at an appropriate moment took a spot behind the podium to deliver what was likely seen by most to be the keynote. They even chanted "Danny! Danny! Danny"!
The whole thing featured a bunch of speakers, culminating in a few politicos, but the high point was surely DW himself, as would be fitting at a Rally for Danny.
There was Steve Kent, on behalf of municipalities in the province, but oddly enough an aspiring DW candidate, as Bond revealed last January. He'll formally announce tomorrow but Bond isn't expecting a thank you for saving everyone the six months of suspense.
There was Kevin Noble, a fine local actor who has lately taken to calling every VOCM talk show on the go to attack anyone saying anything about DW that might look like criticism. No small irony Noble spent a chunk of his professional time playing Joe Smallwood.
Noble could parlay the whole thing into a kind of eerie one man show in which he plays both premiers simultaneously. Challenge people to guess which one said what.
But I digress.
Then there was a police officer speaking on behalf of police officers.
Yes, at a political rally.
Odd that no one bothered to read RNC Act and regulations.
And there was The-Only-Locally-Owned-Newspaper editor who tried to out-speechify the best political speechifiers. He was evidently taking a break from fearlessly tracking down all the stuff that conforms to his political biases, at least when it comes to the crowd Up-a-long, to give speech which confirmed once again that he is a master at saying one thing and doing another:
"I'm here to say it's time for Newfoundland and Labrador to grow up."
Speak for yourself, there buddy. The rest of us are wondering why the nationalists seem to project personal shortcomings, like immaturity or a lack of self-esteem, onto an entire population.
They all shared the view of the guy singing a song in praise of the Fearless Leader and encouraging him to keep up the fight against the evil enemy of the moment.
Anyway...
All of that is just a way of reminding regular Bond Papers readers that the problems with Harper Equalization problems were well known.
And they were known some time ago.
Well known to everyone, it would seem except Fearless Leader who, during the last federal election, was supporting the guy he has now turned on. The year before that he was trashing Harper - carrying an even better version of the later promise - and sucking on to Paul Martin.
But by 2006, there was this piece for example, that noted the vagueness of the 2005/06 version of Harper's commitment.
Then there was this one that predicted a nasty Equalization fight was on the way.
In March, 2006 - a mere two months after Canada's New Crowd took office - the rest of the world knew what Danny Williams apparently still didn't realize in October. [or did he?]
Then there was the little piece on bullshit, which is the main fuel for most of the Canadian political system apparently.
And even in this seemingly unrelated piece, there is evidence of what Stephen Harper was proposing and how it would benefit the provincial government, at least in comparison to the system the Premier himself proposed originally.
As yes, if only more people read Bond Papers.
or just grew up.
Well, not e-v-e-r-y-o-n-e, as was painfully obvious at the Rally for Danny.
Despite the claims of the rally organizers, it looks like about 1500 people showed up on a fine and glorious Friday. None too impressive.
[Photo removed by request] For those who don't know, that was the non-partisan rally organized by DW's political supporters and attended by...well, ...his political supporters, like this gaggle of political staffers (left). That's the Premier's parliamentary assistant standing there in shades, likely keeping an eye on his promotion to cabinet.
Paul Oram's boss worked the crowd like it was a Tory rally and at an appropriate moment took a spot behind the podium to deliver what was likely seen by most to be the keynote. They even chanted "Danny! Danny! Danny"!
The whole thing featured a bunch of speakers, culminating in a few politicos, but the high point was surely DW himself, as would be fitting at a Rally for Danny.
There was Steve Kent, on behalf of municipalities in the province, but oddly enough an aspiring DW candidate, as Bond revealed last January. He'll formally announce tomorrow but Bond isn't expecting a thank you for saving everyone the six months of suspense.
There was Kevin Noble, a fine local actor who has lately taken to calling every VOCM talk show on the go to attack anyone saying anything about DW that might look like criticism. No small irony Noble spent a chunk of his professional time playing Joe Smallwood.
Noble could parlay the whole thing into a kind of eerie one man show in which he plays both premiers simultaneously. Challenge people to guess which one said what.
But I digress.
Then there was a police officer speaking on behalf of police officers.
Yes, at a political rally.
Odd that no one bothered to read RNC Act and regulations.
And there was The-Only-Locally-Owned-Newspaper editor who tried to out-speechify the best political speechifiers. He was evidently taking a break from fearlessly tracking down all the stuff that conforms to his political biases, at least when it comes to the crowd Up-a-long, to give speech which confirmed once again that he is a master at saying one thing and doing another:
"I'm here to say it's time for Newfoundland and Labrador to grow up."
Speak for yourself, there buddy. The rest of us are wondering why the nationalists seem to project personal shortcomings, like immaturity or a lack of self-esteem, onto an entire population.
They all shared the view of the guy singing a song in praise of the Fearless Leader and encouraging him to keep up the fight against the evil enemy of the moment.
Anyway...
All of that is just a way of reminding regular Bond Papers readers that the problems with Harper Equalization problems were well known.
And they were known some time ago.
Well known to everyone, it would seem except Fearless Leader who, during the last federal election, was supporting the guy he has now turned on. The year before that he was trashing Harper - carrying an even better version of the later promise - and sucking on to Paul Martin.
But by 2006, there was this piece for example, that noted the vagueness of the 2005/06 version of Harper's commitment.
Then there was this one that predicted a nasty Equalization fight was on the way.
In March, 2006 - a mere two months after Canada's New Crowd took office - the rest of the world knew what Danny Williams apparently still didn't realize in October. [or did he?]
Then there was the little piece on bullshit, which is the main fuel for most of the Canadian political system apparently.
And even in this seemingly unrelated piece, there is evidence of what Stephen Harper was proposing and how it would benefit the provincial government, at least in comparison to the system the Premier himself proposed originally.
As yes, if only more people read Bond Papers.
or just grew up.
-srbp-
But seriously, folks
This is a very good announcement.
The dairy industry is one of the real bright spots in our provincial agricultral industry and it goes largely unnoticed by most of us.
Somehow, though, I just couldn't help thinking of this old Monty Python sketch every time I heard the news story today.
The dairy industry is one of the real bright spots in our provincial agricultral industry and it goes largely unnoticed by most of us.
Somehow, though, I just couldn't help thinking of this old Monty Python sketch every time I heard the news story today.
Real grassroots versus astroturf
Doesn't matter where you stand on the Equalization issue, this petition is in the spirit of the Fair Deal campaign mounted in 2004/05.
It looks like a genuine grassroots campaign and there's no sign it isn't genuine. The thing already has the better part of 250 signatures.
That's what sets it apart from astroturf.
It looks like a genuine grassroots campaign and there's no sign it isn't genuine. The thing already has the better part of 250 signatures.
That's what sets it apart from astroturf.
-srbp-
16 May 2007
CVRD eyes IOC parent
From Australia, comes a report that Brazillian miner CVRD is sizing up Rio Tinto as a possible acquisition.
CVRD operates Voisey's Bay through it's Inco subsidiary.
Rio Tinto operates an iron ore mine in western Labrador through it's subsidiary, Iron Ore Company of Canada.
A Reuters account can be found here .
CVRD operates Voisey's Bay through it's Inco subsidiary.
Rio Tinto operates an iron ore mine in western Labrador through it's subsidiary, Iron Ore Company of Canada.
A Reuters account can be found here .
-srbp-
Cat Fight, the new series
Conservative member of parliament Fabian Manning, left, and Paul Oram, parliamentary assistant to Premier Danny Williams, spent a few minutes on Tuesday night bashing each other in public, courtesy of VOCM's Night Line talk show.
Oram, right, started the row by calling the show to slag Manning for supporting the federal government's budget. Oram claimed that, by way of a gigantic contrast, Oram had voted for a controversial fisheries measure because he was told it was in the best interests of the province. [Now the wording he used was curious enough in itself, but that's another story.]While claiming purest motives for himself, Oram could not grant the same courtesy to Manning; after all, the guy who holds the keys to Oram's future as a cabinet minister had already declared Manning an un-person. A senior member of Williams' staff reputedly attended the caucus meeting that punted Manning to the opposition benches.
Manning would not be outdone by the likes of Oram. So he called the show from Ottawa to give a spirited defense of himself and his reasons for supporting the budget measure. Not surprisingly it had something to do with best interests of the province.
At some point, Manning also noted that he and Oram had discussed said controversial fisheries initiative back in the days before Manning's image was airbrushed out of every photo of provincial Tories.
Da byes were apparently gnoshing at a local eatery ironically called "My brother's place" when Oram allegedly declared he would cross the floor before he would support the fisheries package.
[Photo removed by request] Of course, Oram didn't cross the floor. He backed the deal to the hilt. By-the-by, in the photo at left that's Oram in the shades and sans 'stache along with a bunch of what appears to be Tory political staffers.
The event was the the supposedly non-partisan Rally for Danny last week in which the rhetoric flowed thick and heavy even if the crowd was thin and the results were light to non-existent.
While Manning was on the air, Oram called to refute Manning's version of events. Smart producer and host put the two together and let them hammer away much to the delight of their audience.
It was a truly spectacular bout of "You did. I din't."
Now the real point isn't what Oram or Manning did back then, although frankly, Manning has nothing to gain by telling a whopper of a fib.
Neither side can likely prove his version of events.
But that isn't the point.
People should notice that the current crusade against the federal Conservatives has opened up deep divisions in the local Connie/PC camp. There are plenty of close friends caught up in the divide, just as two years ago there were some deep divisions among Liberals.
The Tory and Connie cleavages might be bigger though since at no point in the Liberal case did one crowd call for the public lynching of the other. Premier Danny Williams wants to see every Conservative in the province defeated at the next election. Heck, in the process, DW's even turned on a guy he once supported to be provincial Tory leader and Premier.
Oram and Manning's pissing match could be just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. More blood may well flow yet before the whole thing is settled.
Meanwhile, the federal Grits are quietly going about their business.
And the Dippers?
Likely they are doing a very fine impression of Jon Lovitz from The Wedding Singer.
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Protecting domestic T & A
From Canadian Press:
The Conservative government is set to unveil new legislation aimed at keeping foreign strippers out of Canada.Talk about a government that has already exhausted its agenda.
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Just say no
It's not on line but this story appeared in today's Telegram.
It appears here thanks to someone with better typing skills than your humble e-scribbler.
It appears here thanks to someone with better typing skills than your humble e-scribbler.
Analyses remain secret; Province won't release examination of system
by Rob Antle
It's been an argument fought largely without the help of any hard numbers or firm facts. And the provincial government is doing its part to ensure the situation stays that way.
The Williams administration confirmed this week it won't make public any of its analyses of changes to the federal equalization system.
Requested data
The Telegram requested the data a month ago under provincial access-to-information laws.
The province says doing so would violate both cabinet confidences, and a portion of the law dealing with the financial and economic interests of a public body.
A spokeswoman for Premier Danny Williams steered questions to the provincial Department of Finance, which denied the request.
Williams has been at war with Ottawa since the federal budget was tabled March 19.
The Harper government sidestepped a key election promise on equalization, instituting a cap on benefits.
Williams was apoplectic, commissioning a nationwide advertising campaign condemning the prime minister.
The feds, meanwhile, insist the province can stay in the old equalization system and retain the uncapped Atlantic Accord.
No hard numbers
Neither side has tabled any hard numbers to back up their respective opinions about the benefits of the new system versus the old.
Earlier this month, Ottawa told The Telegram it would require 1,056.67 hours just to prepare to release 31,700 pages of documents analysing the potential impact of the new system on Newfoundland and Labrador.
The federal Finance Department said it would take another 69 hours just to find the information. Total bill: $17,500.
Province just said no
The province, meanwhile, shut the door entirely.
Last month, Williams skated around three separate questions from reporters about whether he would release provincial analyses.
"It depends on how far we can go," he said April 18.
Equalization is fiendishly complicated, with factors as diverse as the price of oil, the value of the Canadian dollar and the economic performance of every province potentially shifting benefit levels.
Projections released
To date, the only person who has publicly released any projections of the new system's impact is Memorial University economist Wade Locke.
Locke first calculated that the new system could provide a boon of $5.6 billion to the province.
But a new set of parameters - based on changes in federal budget implementation laws - turned that boon into a bust. Locke's revised analysis showed the new system would provide $1 billion less than the status quo over 12 years.
The MUN economist has urged the feds and the province to make public their own projections.
Neither side has expressed much interest in doing so.
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Fun and games with the Premiers
The Prime Minister is finally getting around to meeting with the Premiers.
With the recent federal budget, it should be an interesting affair.
Maybe that's why the Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador has been absent from the House of Assembly so much.
He's getting ready for the big showdown, expected on June 2.
With the recent federal budget, it should be an interesting affair.
Maybe that's why the Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador has been absent from the House of Assembly so much.
He's getting ready for the big showdown, expected on June 2.
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15 May 2007
Back to the future: an overview of Equalization
Lost in most of the current kerfuffle on Equalization is any understanding of what the federal transfer program does or how it evolved.
Thomas Courchene contributed a simple historical summary of the program to Policy Options in March. The following extract suggests that the current Equalization approach is very similar to the one introduced in 1962:
Thomas Courchene contributed a simple historical summary of the program to Policy Options in March. The following extract suggests that the current Equalization approach is very similar to the one introduced in 1962:
At this juncture, it is important to recognize that equalization has played another key role in the evolution of our federation. Over the years the federal government transferred progressively larger shares of the PIT [federal personal income tax] and CIT [federal corporate income tax] to the provinces, which made Canada one of the most tax-decentralized federations in the world. Arguably this tax decentralization would not have been politically acceptable to the "have-not" provinces were it not for the existence of equalization. In this sense, equalization also benefits the rich
provinces, since it allows them to reap the benefits of their superior tax bases.
In the 1962 quinquennial revision of the tax arrangements, the share of PIT entering the equalization formula was increased to 16 percent (with an interim increase to 13 percent in 1958). For present purposes, however, the importance of the 1962 revisions is that natural resources entered the formula for the first time, thereby beginning a complex and volatile relationship that has influenced the evolution of Canadian federalism well beyond the fiscal arena. The concern at issue in this time frame was that resource-rich Alberta was receiving equalization.
To prevent this, the formula was expanded to include resource revenues — 50 percent of the three-year average of provincial resource revenues would now be eligible for equalization. While this would exclude Alberta from receiving equalization, it would have substantially increased the total level of equalization. To temper this expansion the equalization standard was reduced from the TTPS [top-two-province standard] to a national-average standard (NAS).
This modification was short-lived. Following up on its 1963 election platform, the new Pearson government restored the TTPS standard and removed resource revenues from the formula, replacing them with the "resource-revenue override"; henceforth, 50 percent of the resource revenues accruing to a province would be deducted from that province’s equalization entitlement. The return to the top-two-province standard meant that Ontario was again the only "have" province, but the resource revenue override precluded Alberta and BC from receiving equalization.
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Polling in public policy
From David Herle, a provocative discussion of the role played by public opinion research in modern politics and government.
As the blurb from this month's Policy Options puts it:
As the blurb from this month's Policy Options puts it:
"The role public opinion research plays in guiding governmental communications is often dismissed as partisan and not necessarily in the public interest," writes David Herle, who begs to differ. As the former pollster to the federal finance ministry in the 1990s, Herle’s polls and focus groups shaped support for balancing the budget and creating the fiscal dividend. Other policies, he writes, "can be sacrificed because (Ottawa) couldn’t talk about them to Canadians in a way that made sense to them." He also identifies five rules of current Canadian public opinion: Canadian social values, transparent governance, activism rather than retrenchment in government, and the enduring regionalism and evolving views of the Canadian federation.Herle has a striking observation on how Canadians view the separation of powers between federal and provincial governments. In light of recent musings by local nationalists, Herle's assessment might give a clue as to why the tone of the provincial government's most recent battle with the federal government is going over like a lead balloon:
Rule 5 — Views of the federation are evolving. The fight between "a strong central government," on one side, and "a community of communities," on the other side, is over, and both sides won.
Most Canadians have settled on a division of labour between levels of government that is based on what they see as the appropriate roles and competencies.
Program delivery is seen as being best done by provincial or even local governments. They are seen as being better able to manage programs and are thought to have a better sense of what the actual needs are, province by province, community by community.
The cities agenda is coming up into the national agenda for a reason. However, that does not mean that people want or will accept a balkanized Canada. They see it as completely appropriate for the federal government to fund programs in areas of provincial jurisdiction — in fact, most of the things people really care about, such as health care, education, early childhood education and the environment, are outside federal jurisdiction. They would not stand for a federal government that refused to help in those areas. In addition, they want the federal government to demand national principles and consistent approaches and applications.
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SK should pick friends carefully: Hirsch
Todd Hirsch, a former chief economist with the Canada West Foundation warns Saskatchewan is sending the wrong message by siding with Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador over Equalization. His column appears in the current issue of Policy Options.
But the danger of Saskatchewan joining as brothers-in-arms with Newfoundland and Nova Scotia is that it conveys the message that Saskatchewan’s economy is in trouble. Nothing could be farther from the truth.
The unemployment rate in Newfoundland is above 14 percent. In Saskatchewan, it is under 4 percent — behind only Alberta’s as the lowest unemployment rate in the country. Saskatchewan’s economy has grown consistently at or above the national rate of real growth, and is likely to be the second- or third-fastest-growing province in 2007. Strong energy prices, rising real estate values, a burgeoning mining sector and a world-class hightech research sector are restoring business confidence. Even agriculture is doing reasonably well this spring.
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Budget accuracy: NL consistently strong results
One of the great unfacts that has crept into political dialogue in Newfoundland and Labrador is that fiscal accountability and sound management suddenly arrived in October 2003.
This report by the CD How Institute shows that over the past 10 years, the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador has been consistently accurate in its budget forecasting. The province showed a mean variation in spending changes off just 0.99%, ranking second in accuracy to Quebec.
Some of the biggest variation in forecasting revenues has been in the past two years - FY2005 and FY 2006 - with variations of 5.8% and 15% respectively.
Prior to that the largest variation was 1997-98 when the provincial budget underestimated revenues by slightly more than 10%, and 1998-99 when the provincial governments revenue actually declined. The difference between forecast and actual was -6.32%.
According to the Howe study, the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador is forecasting a 10% growth in spending in FY 2007. That's double the growth in the federal budget and five times the growth in the Ontario government.
Spending growth of 10% is also more than two and a half times the projected real growth in gross domestic product, according to a recent report by Scotia Economics.
This report by the CD How Institute shows that over the past 10 years, the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador has been consistently accurate in its budget forecasting. The province showed a mean variation in spending changes off just 0.99%, ranking second in accuracy to Quebec.
Some of the biggest variation in forecasting revenues has been in the past two years - FY2005 and FY 2006 - with variations of 5.8% and 15% respectively.
Prior to that the largest variation was 1997-98 when the provincial budget underestimated revenues by slightly more than 10%, and 1998-99 when the provincial governments revenue actually declined. The difference between forecast and actual was -6.32%.
According to the Howe study, the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador is forecasting a 10% growth in spending in FY 2007. That's double the growth in the federal budget and five times the growth in the Ontario government.
Spending growth of 10% is also more than two and a half times the projected real growth in gross domestic product, according to a recent report by Scotia Economics.
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There is a conspiracy
Expect the local nationalists to be up-in-arms about these two announcements, both of which are surely evidence of the great conspiracy to favour Nova Scotia over Newfoundland and Labrador.
The first is ecclesiastical, but they are all mainlanders under their vestments, obviously.
The second is yet more federal pork for Halifax.
Never mind that the Port of Halifax has a major problem with smuggling.
That anti-smuggling job should be in Buchans.
The first is ecclesiastical, but they are all mainlanders under their vestments, obviously.
The second is yet more federal pork for Halifax.
Never mind that the Port of Halifax has a major problem with smuggling.
That anti-smuggling job should be in Buchans.
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Scotia Economics projects top to bottom of pack for NL
Scotia Economics joins all the other forecasters in projecting that Newfoundland and Labrador will lead the country in economic growth in 2007.
Like everyone else, Scotia also projects the province's economy will trail the country in2008.
The update report - released on May 3 - turned up on vocm.com today.
The original report, released in March, was covered by Bond Papers at the time.
Like everyone else, Scotia also projects the province's economy will trail the country in2008.
The update report - released on May 3 - turned up on vocm.com today.
The original report, released in March, was covered by Bond Papers at the time.
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14 May 2007
Oil companies oppose Alberta royalty hikes
From Oilweek:
In a written submission to a provincial royalty review panel, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers says oilsands projects have a lot of major obstacles to overcome before producing even a barrel of crude. This includes multi-billion dollar up-front cash layouts, long lead times and swirling cost pressures for both material and labour.The complete CAPP presentation can be found at capp.ca. It describes the oilsands resource, the existing royalty regime and some details of how the oilsands have been performing financially:
"Looking at royalties per barrel in the early years of a project is like looking at a child from age three to six and then saying, 'they will never amount to anything important over their lifetime,' " CAPP said in its submission.
The oilpatch lobby group said oilsands developments are among the most expensive energy projects in the world to build.
Years of unprecedented high commodity prices and a string of record profits from Canada‘s big energy companies has triggered an undercurrent in Alberta that the oilpatch is not paying the province enough.
Under the current structure, companies pay just one per cent of gross revenues until all construction costs are recouped.
The rate then climbs to 25 per cent of net royalties.
There is also a general public perception that royalties have not kept pace with increased commodity prices. But, as noted above, oil sands royalties and lease payments have increased 16 fold in the past five years — from $250 million to $4 billion — to become a major contributor to the provincial surplus.
As of December 2006, 34 of 66 projects covered by the Generic Regime are now in post-payout phases and more are reaching payout quickly. But just looking at the number of projects does not show that just 10 projects make up 88 per cent of the oil sands production. Th is means that about 75 per cent of oil sands projects by volume are paying the 25 per cent post-payout royalty.
In many cases, these projects have achieved full royalty payments ahead of schedule, precisely because the regime is instantly responsive to commodity prices. As prices have risen, so too have gross revenues, thus increasing both the amount of the gross royalty and increasing the fl ow of funds to pay down capital costs and move the project to post-payout royalty payments. In a high-commodity-price environment, projects pay out faster — and then pay higher royalties sooner. If prices decline, royalties automatically adjust to support project economics.
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One for Chuck
Apparently Russian strongman Vladimir Putin is one of the "leading lights" of our time.
Who'd a thought Putin could make such an impression on a former politician in this province? Check out "20 Questions" from yesterday's Sunday Telegram if you think anybody is making this stuff up.
Anyway, here's a suggestion to the guys looking ahead to the Tory ad campaign this fall.
Forget the "Morning in America" thing you might be kicking around. It's so 20th century.
Go for this one: a local version of Takogo kak Putin.
That whole local strongman thing really rocks some people in the province. Take on the oil companies. Battle anyone. The only one to fight for the Motherland.
Sure, it's Euro-dance crap, but so what?
A bit corny, a bit patronizing to women but hey, if it works for the crowd that call Bill and Randy to sing the glories of your guy, then this would work too.
Just look at that last paragraph.
It screams "Rowdy Revolution", maitres chez nous and every other hoary cliche you can think of it.
My boyfriend got into trouble again,
Got into fights, got drunk on something.
He made me so mad that I chased him away,
And now I want someone Putin.
Someone like Putin - full of strength,
Someone like Putin - who wouldn't drink,
Someone like Putin - who wouldn't insult me,
Someone like Putin - who wouldn't run off.
I saw him on the news yesterday,
He was saying that the world is at the crossroads,
With someone like him it's easy at home or when visiting,
And now I want someone like Putin.
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How rigged was my rally?
Was the non-partisan rally really a non-partisan rally after all?
Was Danny Williams appearance a coincidence, as most assumed?
Not if you take some of the implications from Craig Westcott's commentary on CBC Radio's St. John's Morning Show.
The audio will be posted later on Monday.
Food for thought.
Was Danny Williams appearance a coincidence, as most assumed?
Not if you take some of the implications from Craig Westcott's commentary on CBC Radio's St. John's Morning Show.
The audio will be posted later on Monday.
Food for thought.
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Update: For those who can't access the facebook shots, there are some others here, at Kim Goodyear's photography site.
13 May 2007
How big was my rally?
Geoff Meeker asks the question: how big was the rally?
He notes the widely varying reports in local media on the size of the crowd attending the Friday Rally for Danny.
It's a good question. Initial reports were several hundred. Then the number 1500 was tossed around. The organizers claimed 3000 and one of the organizers subsequently claimed between 3500 and 4000 people showed up.
Well, the only photos that have turned up so far are these. There's no way of knowing exactly when they were taken but given the various shoots in this group, the number of people looks more like 1500 or less rather than double that.
Estimating groups like this is a bit of a mugs game.
Unless someone did a head count or had a means of tallying people as they showed up there's no way of knowing.
But here's a simple question: does the size of the crowd matter?
He notes the widely varying reports in local media on the size of the crowd attending the Friday Rally for Danny.
It's a good question. Initial reports were several hundred. Then the number 1500 was tossed around. The organizers claimed 3000 and one of the organizers subsequently claimed between 3500 and 4000 people showed up.
Well, the only photos that have turned up so far are these. There's no way of knowing exactly when they were taken but given the various shoots in this group, the number of people looks more like 1500 or less rather than double that.
Estimating groups like this is a bit of a mugs game.
Unless someone did a head count or had a means of tallying people as they showed up there's no way of knowing.
But here's a simple question: does the size of the crowd matter?
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Adding seats to Commons, feds should reform senate too
Proposed changes to representation in the House of Commons will more fairly represent Canadians across the country, irrespective of where they live.
The move is designed to avert regional tensions in the country, according to the Globe's Brian Laghi.
Well, senate reform is long overdue. Creating a senate comprising representatives elected in equal numbers from each of the provinces would restore a balance to the national parliament as a whole. represent the population fairly in the Commons. Represent the provinces - i.e the regions where Canadians live - in a new senate.
The move is designed to avert regional tensions in the country, according to the Globe's Brian Laghi.
Well, senate reform is long overdue. Creating a senate comprising representatives elected in equal numbers from each of the provinces would restore a balance to the national parliament as a whole. represent the population fairly in the Commons. Represent the provinces - i.e the regions where Canadians live - in a new senate.
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12 May 2007
A tightening labour market
A recent Syncrude job fair in St. John's didn't turn out very many prospects, according to the National Post.
As the Post notes, many workers have become trans-continental commuters, leaving family in Newfoundland to work for weeks at a time and flying home for brief rest periods.
Skilled workers from Abitibi's Stephenville operation are doing that, for example. Many, though, are near retirement age and once they hit the magic age, they'll be shutting down and retiring in Stephenville. Many in the formerly bustling mill town on Newfoundland's west coast are contented for now. Others wonder what happens when the retirees come flooding home if there is no new employer to replace Abitibi.
The labour crunch was one of the major considerations in trying to move Hebron forward last year. Oil industry insiders were acutely aware of the challenges in finding workers for a major industrial project as Alberta continues to draw more and more from all parts of the country.
A smelter/refinery complex being built by Inco at Long Harbour and the prospect of Lower Churchill construction beginning in 2009 will stretch the local labour market to the point where the province will have no choice but permit companies to import skilled trades workers from anywhere they can find them. Many may well be Newfoundlanders and Labradorians who have moved to Alberta but who will commute in the opposite direction for the sporadic work on major construction jobs likely to occur in Newfoundland and Labrador over the next decade and a half.
The provincial government is moving ahead with new programs designed to produce skilled workers. The province has already announced a reciprocal agreement with Alberta that would recognize work experience in Alberta for skills certification in Newfoundland and Labrador. The catch is that workers need to maintain permanent residence in this province.
But in the absence of local work on major projects, many may wind up heading to Alberta and elsewhere and staying there. Greg Locke is a Newfoundland photojournalist who recently left the province to take up a management position with a weekly newspaper chain in Alberta. Locke's already noted that among ex-pat Newfoundlanders and Labradorians he's met so far, he hasn't found one genuinely pining to return home. Once settled in Alberta, workers tend to stay.
Remittance work is nothing new in Newfoundland and Labrador. Offal News' Simon Lono discussed the idea in February of workers who ship cash back home from foreign countries. It's a well-established idea in the developing world and to some it may be shocking to appreciate that the idea thrives within Canada.
Locally, though, the remittance economy has been booming in recent years. The provincial government's work programs actually encourage the remittance economy in its commuting variety, especially since the migrant labourers taxes go to the provincial treasury and their heads count toward the federal government's Equalization income support program for provincial governments.
Neither Statistics Canada nor the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador have investigated the scope of the remittance economy.
The labour market reality in Newfoundland and Labrador is garnering some attention from government. Programs may help generate workers, but in the absence of major industrial development, there is little to keep workers in the province any more than there may have been in the heady days of independence.
Workers will look outside Newfoundland and Labrador to earn a living. So too will an increasing number of companies in the oil and gas sector, among other sectors.
Promises of a rowdy revolution or of a return to independence, built on little more than myth and superheated rhetoric seem to be little more than a fatuous diversion from a meaningful discussion of public policy.
After all, is more income support for the provincial government any replacement for local economic development?
They [the recruiters] are well aware of the challenge. Even in St. John's, where the unemployment rate, at about 15%, is the highest in the country and disposable income the lowest, the turnout is poor relative to what had been expected.The hollowing out of the local labour market is one result of both the Hebron failure and the pull of a booming economy in Alberta.
Only about 20 people trickle in for the Friday evening session. Another15 come for one on Saturday morning. Hundreds of expectant seats are empty. Organizers and others wonder if this market is tapped out. "Almost every week there is someone here," said Paul Barnes, Atlantic Canada manager for the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.
It's not just oil sands employers, he notes. Alberta's service sector, from Wal-Mart to Swiss Chalet, is also recruiting, offering transportation to Alberta and signing bonuses.
As the Post notes, many workers have become trans-continental commuters, leaving family in Newfoundland to work for weeks at a time and flying home for brief rest periods.
Skilled workers from Abitibi's Stephenville operation are doing that, for example. Many, though, are near retirement age and once they hit the magic age, they'll be shutting down and retiring in Stephenville. Many in the formerly bustling mill town on Newfoundland's west coast are contented for now. Others wonder what happens when the retirees come flooding home if there is no new employer to replace Abitibi.
The labour crunch was one of the major considerations in trying to move Hebron forward last year. Oil industry insiders were acutely aware of the challenges in finding workers for a major industrial project as Alberta continues to draw more and more from all parts of the country.
"If Hebron went ahead tomorrow, we'd have a hard time finding staff," said Tony Goobie, a former chairman of the Newfoundland Ocean Industries Association, and the general manager of Eastern Valve & Control Specialties.
A smelter/refinery complex being built by Inco at Long Harbour and the prospect of Lower Churchill construction beginning in 2009 will stretch the local labour market to the point where the province will have no choice but permit companies to import skilled trades workers from anywhere they can find them. Many may well be Newfoundlanders and Labradorians who have moved to Alberta but who will commute in the opposite direction for the sporadic work on major construction jobs likely to occur in Newfoundland and Labrador over the next decade and a half.
The provincial government is moving ahead with new programs designed to produce skilled workers. The province has already announced a reciprocal agreement with Alberta that would recognize work experience in Alberta for skills certification in Newfoundland and Labrador. The catch is that workers need to maintain permanent residence in this province.
But in the absence of local work on major projects, many may wind up heading to Alberta and elsewhere and staying there. Greg Locke is a Newfoundland photojournalist who recently left the province to take up a management position with a weekly newspaper chain in Alberta. Locke's already noted that among ex-pat Newfoundlanders and Labradorians he's met so far, he hasn't found one genuinely pining to return home. Once settled in Alberta, workers tend to stay.
Remittance work is nothing new in Newfoundland and Labrador. Offal News' Simon Lono discussed the idea in February of workers who ship cash back home from foreign countries. It's a well-established idea in the developing world and to some it may be shocking to appreciate that the idea thrives within Canada.
Locally, though, the remittance economy has been booming in recent years. The provincial government's work programs actually encourage the remittance economy in its commuting variety, especially since the migrant labourers taxes go to the provincial treasury and their heads count toward the federal government's Equalization income support program for provincial governments.
Remittances are inconvenient for this government because they represent a policy failure: people who have taken the initiative and have left the province for work rather than heed empty government assurances that something will be done for them and their communities.Before Confederation, remittances were a way of life. A 1931 book by Joe Smallwood, written to introduce Americans to the easternmost part of the continent - then an independent country - put it this way:
Back in the early part of this decade [Smallwood actually mean the 1920s], when the flow of emigration to the United States and Canada was at its height, somebody facetiously declared that our principal exports were "codfish and men". There was a tragic vein of truth in it. At all events, even away from Newfoundland, many of these natives sons are contributing importantly to-day [sic] to the upkeep of the country. The money orders paid within Newfoundland from the United States and Canada in the past three years for example, were as follows...Smallwood then listed a total of $2,081,232 from the United States between 1927 and 1929 and another $712, 054 from Canadian sources in the same period. [Source: J.R. Smallwood, The new Newfoundland, (New York: MacMillan, 1931), pp. 111-112].
Neither Statistics Canada nor the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador have investigated the scope of the remittance economy.
The labour market reality in Newfoundland and Labrador is garnering some attention from government. Programs may help generate workers, but in the absence of major industrial development, there is little to keep workers in the province any more than there may have been in the heady days of independence.
Workers will look outside Newfoundland and Labrador to earn a living. So too will an increasing number of companies in the oil and gas sector, among other sectors.
Promises of a rowdy revolution or of a return to independence, built on little more than myth and superheated rhetoric seem to be little more than a fatuous diversion from a meaningful discussion of public policy.
After all, is more income support for the provincial government any replacement for local economic development?
Quebec Cartier eyes Wabush Mines
No English-language reports yet, but here is the Quebec report, from lesaffaires.com:
Les Mines Wabush, situées à Sept-Îles, est dans la mire de Québec Cartier pour qui elle a accepté dernièrement d’ouvrir ses livres afin que cette dernière puisse examiner d’un peu plus près la santé de l’entreprise minière.Essentially, Quebec Cartier is conducting a financial assessment of Wabush Mines with an eye to making an offer on the company.
Québec Cartier pourra donc faire une étude comptable de Mines Wabush mais n’a pas encore donné de date en ce qui a trait au dépôt d’une offre officielle d’achat. Des échanges ont toutefois eu lieu entre les deux entreprises et des experts de Québec Cartier sont venus visiter les infrastructures de la mine.
Québec Cartier appartient maintenant au groupe européen Arcelor Mittal et ce rapprochement avec Mines Wabush pourrait très bien s’inscrire dans le cadre de son plan minier qui s’étend jusqu’en 2026.
Une autre grande compagnie minière, Consolidated Tompson, s’était montrée intéressée par la mine de Sept-Îles à l’automne dernier. Elle a toutefois choisi de se concentrer sur un projet d’usine pilote de réduction du manganèse, d’une valeur de 1M$, qui assurerait la survie de la mine Scully de Mines Wabush au moins jusqu’en 2021.
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Alaska gets tough on pipeline bill
From the Anchorage Daily News:
JUNEAU -- Gov. Sarah Palin's gas pipeline bill sailed through both houses of the Legislature on Friday as last-minute opposition pushed by the state's big oil producers melted away.
Passage of the bill kicks off a competitive bidding process for the right to build a multi-billion dollar North Slope gas line. Palin refused to compromise with opponents in the Legislature's closing weeks, saying her bill would get a pipeline built on terms favorable to the state.
Complaint a vendetta says Armoyan
Geroge Armoyan is calling it a vendetta.
That's the complaint by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador that Armoyan engaged in insider trading when he sold off shares in Fishery Products International.
Note to CanWest fact checkers:
Check facts.
This statement is completely false:
Further, the company was not restructured in 2005.
Note as well to Globe fact checkers: the complaint isn't with the Ontario Securities Commission. Fish minister Tom Rideout, seen at right at an anti-FPI rally held in February 2006, made the complaint to the Newfoundland and Labrador securities watchdog.
There is no indication Ontario regulatory authorities have taken any action nor is there any public indication Armoyan failed to abide by existing securities laws.
As reported, Rideout's accusation suggests criminal activity. There is no evidence of criminal activity.
As Rideout described it to reporters on Friday, his concerns focus on the possibility Armoyan violated an FPI board directive banning directors from trading in FPI shares during the sell-off talks.
There is no public record of such a directive.
Rideout is also concerned that some unnamed individual or company has acquired more than 15% of FPI's shares, the limit set in the FPI Act.
In that situation, Rideout's complaint would be with the purchaser, not the seller and the situation would not involve any form of insider activity.
Rideout is the province's attorney general.
That's the complaint by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador that Armoyan engaged in insider trading when he sold off shares in Fishery Products International.
"It's just ridiculous -- everything I did was within the law," Armoyan said in an interview. "There is no doubt this is a politically motivated strategy by the government. Anybody who says something negative about the government, they try to create problems for them. It's an abuse of power."
Note to CanWest fact checkers:
Check facts.
This statement is completely false:
The Newfoundland and Labrador government won the power to approve the sale of company assets when St. John's-based FPI was restructured two years ago.FPI is controlled through an act of the provincial legislature. In 2006 - not 2005 as this sentence suggests - the legislature amended the FPI Act to give cabinet the authority to approve any say of FPI assets. Prior to that any sale of assets would have required approval of the legislature.
Further, the company was not restructured in 2005.
Note as well to Globe fact checkers: the complaint isn't with the Ontario Securities Commission. Fish minister Tom Rideout, seen at right at an anti-FPI rally held in February 2006, made the complaint to the Newfoundland and Labrador securities watchdog.There is no indication Ontario regulatory authorities have taken any action nor is there any public indication Armoyan failed to abide by existing securities laws.
As reported, Rideout's accusation suggests criminal activity. There is no evidence of criminal activity.
As Rideout described it to reporters on Friday, his concerns focus on the possibility Armoyan violated an FPI board directive banning directors from trading in FPI shares during the sell-off talks.
There is no public record of such a directive.
Rideout is also concerned that some unnamed individual or company has acquired more than 15% of FPI's shares, the limit set in the FPI Act.
In that situation, Rideout's complaint would be with the purchaser, not the seller and the situation would not involve any form of insider activity.
Rideout is the province's attorney general.
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More than one use for a hakapik, apparently
From the Chronicle Herald, Stephen Maher's interview with Danny Williams:
DANNY WILLIAMS is offering Stephen Harper nothing but pain: scorched earth and poisoned wells, the flaming sword of the offshore petro-jihad.
This is something new. It is guerrilla [sic] politics, and what’s strange about it is that it does not leave any compromise open to Mr. Harper.
...
This time, the Nova Scotians are not sharing information, likely because that’s how Mr. Harper wants it.
After acting Nova Scotia Finance Minister Angus MacIsaac met with federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty at the Stanfield airport to discuss the accord, Mr. Williams called Mr. MacDonald and reminded him of how things used to work with Mr. Hamm.
"I phoned Premier MacDonald and said, you know, we stood together before, on the 2005 economic accord, and we expect you to stand shoulder to shoulder to us on this one," he said. "And I stated our position very clearly was we want a fulfilment of the promise, and he agrees."
But Mr. Williams is worried that Nova Scotia will accept something less than the accords — some compromise that isolates Newfoundland.
"Obviously, they’re treating both our provinces with disdain, trying to court Nova Scotia and see if they can draw them into some lesser agreement to embarrass us into accepting something less. That couldn’t happen and I don’t believe it will happen."
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Come again?
Wannabe federal Liberal candidate Peter Whittle and organizer of the Rally for Danny, quoted in the Telegram:
Speakers at the rally included union leaders, none of who apparently had to campaign for election to their posts.
"People realize you have to stand with your feet to get a message out there … and not always leave the politicians to do the talking."Presumably he said that before the politicians - including the Premier - spoke at the supposedly non-partisan rally.
Speakers at the rally included union leaders, none of who apparently had to campaign for election to their posts.
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How times change, Part 3
From January 6, 2006:
Doyle Pleased With Harper's Letter
Norman Doyle, Conservative incumbent in St. Johns East, is pleased that Stephen Harpers' letter to Premier Williams contains a number of significant commitments to this Province.
In his letter, said Doyle, Stephen Harper made commitments on federal financial support for the Trans Labrador Highway and the Military Base at Goose Bay. He also committed the federal government to providing financial guarantees with regard to the Lower Churchill Project.
Doyle noted that Harper also committed to setting up a Territorial Defence Battalion, composed of 100 regular and 400 reserve soldiers, in the St. Johns area.
Mr. Harper also reiterated his willingness to invoke fisheries custodial management out side the 200 mile limit, said Doyle, and to exempt all non-renewable resource revenues from the ravages of the Equalization clawback.
Doyle recalled that it was Stephen Harpers commitment on offshore revenues that forced Prime Minister Martins hand on the issue in the Federal Election of June, 2004.
Unlike the Liberals, said Doyle, we don't have to be forced to help build a stronger Newfoundland & Labrador.
The Conservative Party believes that a stronger Newfoundland & Labrador means a stronger Canada so many of our Partys policies are designed to give the provinces the tools to help build a stronger and more prosperous nation.
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Connie coalition on the rocks?
Some disgruntled federal Conservatives want to resurrect the Reform Party.
11 May 2007
The Other Point of View, 1984
Premier called 'seriously misguided'
Michael Harris
The Globe and Mail
June 4, 1984
P.9
ST. JOHN'S - The top job of the Newfoundland Liberal Party, once a ticket to oblivion, is attracting some powerful personalities and generating the strongest criticism to date of the five-year-old Conservative Government of Premier Brian Peckford.
''Look, people in other parts of the country don't know but we won't be taking out our swords next and lopping off their ears,'' Clyde Wells, a perennial if reluctant darling of Liberals here, said in an interview. ''Given the attitude of this Government, any business would have to be out of its mind to want to come here.'' Mr. Wells, the 46-year-old St. John's lawyer who argued the federal Government's case on offshore jurisdiction and who also successfully prosecuted federal Liberal MP Roger Simmons for tax evasion, confirmed he has been approached to enter the race for the provincial Liberal leadership slated for this October. ''I can tell you there has been a lot of pressure from a number of directions. I'm not working for it, but the door is open a crack.''
Mr. Wells earned his political spurs in the 1960s as one of the bright young men of the Liberal government of Joseph Smallwood. Appointed to the cabinet at 28, Mr. Wells was labor minister and then minister without portfolio until 1970. He quit the cabinet - along with fellow minister and now federal Tory MP John Crosbie - after refusing to approve $5-million in bridge financing to John Shaheen for the construction of the Come-By- Chance oil refinery. ''I'm not soured on politics because of those years," Mr. Wells said recently. "I still believe politics can be principled,
honest and straightforward.'' Describing Mr. Peckford as well-intentioned but ''seriously misguided,'' Mr. Wells said that Newfoundland has been economically devastated by the attitudes of the provincial Government.
Despite Newfoundland's failure to win control of offshore resources from Ottawa, "I don't think very much has been lost. . . . In the long run, Newfoundland will get the same as other provinces under the federal system we have - no more, no less." But Newfoundland's abortive effort to get out of an agreement under which Quebec gets Labrador electricity at bargain prices "has seriously impaired our ability to properly solve that problem. It has also made us look like a banana republic.'' Mr. Wells said the Peckford Government's Water Reversion Act, passed in 1980 and recently struck down by the Supreme Court of Canada, was an attempt to expropriate all the assets of the Upper Churchill power installation without compensating Hydro-Quebec, a partner in the megaproject which nets Quebec $800-million a year.
The Government is within its rights to use expropriation in the public interest, Mr. Wells said, "but you have to pay just compensation." The philosophy of the Peckford Government has created a serious rift between Newfoundlanders and other Canadians, he said. ''Peckford has set Confederation back 20 years in the attitudes he has tried to foster here. . . . He talks about being oppressed by Ottawa and then brands anyone who criticizes him in Newfoundland unpatriotic.''
Almost as coy as Mr. Wells about his leadership aspirations, but for different reasons, is Leo Barry, a former Conservative energy minister and now Liberal energy critic. ''I shall decide once riding executives have been elected and I have had a chance to determine my support. Many people have urged me to run and I am interested,'' the 41-year-old lawyer said in an interview.
Mr. Barry has been in and out of politics since 1972, when he was first elected to the Newfoundland House of Assembly. After a brief stint as deputy speaker, he became minister of mines and energy, where he took the lead in developing Newfoundland's oil and gas regulations.
Defeated in the 1975 provincial election, Mr. Barry served as chairman of the Newfoundland Labor Relations Board for two years before becoming a lecturer at Dalhousie University's law school in Halifax.
In 1979, Mr. Barry returned to Newfoundland to contest the Tory leadership left vacant by the resignation of then premier Frank Moores, finishing second in a tough, emotional battle with Mr. Peckford. After the 1979 election, Mr. Barry became energy minister and minister of industrial development in the Peckford Cabinet.
In the fall of 1981, Mr. Barry resigned over a disagreement with the Premier on how negotiations on offshore resources with Ottawa should be conducted. And on Feb. 21, 1984, he crossed the floor to join the Liberal Party.
Although his critics say he may have to pay the price for being seen as a political changeling (he began his political life at Memorial University as a Liberal), Mr. Barry disagrees. ''I believe the record will show that I have been very consistent in my criticism of the Government's performance and that my criticisms have stood the test of time. Neither the offshore nor the Upper Churchill should have ended up in court for reasons that should now be obvious.'' Mr. Barry says the next government of Newfoundland will have to show a different face to the rest of the country. ''We've got to stop blaming other people for all our troubles, stop acting like St. John's is a foreign capital, and convince companies that are coming east that Newfoundland is a good place to locate.'' The third formidable prospect for the Liberal leadership race is Richard Cashin, a former Liberal MP and one-time heir apparent to Mr. Smallwood who now leads the powerful Newfoundland Fishermen's Union.
While Mr. Wells carefully weighs personal considerations against the rigors of public life, and Mr. Barry steps gingerly in Liberal circles to avoid being seen as a Johnny-come-lately with more ambition than party commitment, Mr. Cashin is using the single most explosive issue in Newfoundland politics to offer a carefully reasoned indictment of the Peckford Government and Ottawa.
Despite the work of a federal task force to rescue the troubled East Coast fishery, the inshore sector appears to be at the knife's edge once more. Because of huge inventories of unsold fish, some companies in Newfoundland have announced that they won't be buying cod for the time being, a turn of events that could ruin the small-boat fishermen here.
With widespread predictions in Newfoundland of a crash in the inshore fishery this summer, Mr. Cashin argues that the Peckford Government has had an unhealthy preoccupation with offshore oil to the exclusion of every other issue, particularly the fishery.
An intellectual with a flair for the bombastic, the union leader is the only major prospect for the Liberal leadership who has openly connected what he sees as the narrow, legalistic approach of the Peckford Government on the offshore to an underlying we-they attitude that ''really questions the basic decision of 1949.'' Mr. Cashin is also critical of the federal role in the recent restructuring of the fishery in Newfoundland. He says that although banks and large companies were financially assisted there was nothing in the new federal fisheries policy for primary producers ''whose financial crisis has been greater than that of the so-called big four deep-sea companies.'' Although Mr. Cashin hasn't declared he is running for the leadership, high-ranking Liberals here say he has told them he will be a candidate.
Meanwhile, present leader Stephen Neary is mildly amused at the combative talent that appears to be lining up for his job. ''We've gone through some pretty lean times, and this is quite a change. I'm looking forward to a knock 'em down, drag 'em out convention, a real fight.'' Asked whether it's true that he's headed for the Senate, Mr. Neary smiles and winks: ''Don't count on that. I may even run myself.''
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Newfoundland's offshore objectives, 1984
An advertisement placed by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador in 1984 outlined the province's objectives in discussions on offshore oil and gas.
The 1985 Atlantic Accord exceeded Brian Peckford's goals as stated in the ad. Under the 1985 Atlantic Accord, the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador sets and collects all royalties from the offshore as if it were on land. The federal government receives no royalties.
That situation is not tied to income parity or any other similar measure. it exists without restriction or limitation.
As well, the provincial government collects Equalization and an Equalization offset until such time as the provincial government no longer qualifies for Equalization.
Click on the picture to enlarge:
The 1985 Atlantic Accord exceeded Brian Peckford's goals as stated in the ad. Under the 1985 Atlantic Accord, the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador sets and collects all royalties from the offshore as if it were on land. The federal government receives no royalties.
That situation is not tied to income parity or any other similar measure. it exists without restriction or limitation.
As well, the provincial government collects Equalization and an Equalization offset until such time as the provincial government no longer qualifies for Equalization.
Click on the picture to enlarge:
-srbp-
How times change, Part 1
From the Globe and Mail, after both the Supreme Court of Newfoundland and the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that the Government of Canada had jurisdiction over offshore oil and gas but before Brian Peckford and Brian Mulroney announced the 1984 agreement that led to the Atlantic Accord:
Peckford puts sweet reason up front in resource pitch
Ian Mulgrew
May 18, 1984
P.4
VANCOUVER - Brian Peckford, the Newfoundland Premier from Whitbourne, stabs an unlit cigar at a reporter and says he is just misunderstood, misrepresented and a victim of circumstances.
The national press maligns him, he laments, and Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, ''in his Machiavellian way," tries to distort his positions.
If only Canadians could hear, the former English teacher adds, the facts would speak for themselves. ''Newfoundlanders aren't greedy and selfish, wanting all of the offshore resource wealth for themselves," he says, throwing out once again the moderate, reasonable pitch he has recently added to his repertoire.
It is an approach he has assumed since he began a cross-country tour to plead his ''moral case" and arouse public sympathy for Canada's youngest province in its battles with Quebec, over hydroelectric power generated in Labrador, and with Ottawa, over the Hibernia oil fields.
Scratch the veneer and you will find the same irascible, tough-talking politician who burst on the national scene in 1979, publicly agreeing with Rene Levesque and vociferously attacking Mr. Trudeau.
Asked why different versions of the cause of the breakdown in talks on offshore resources have come from him and federal Energy Minister Jean Chretien, Mr. Peckford shakes his head and blames Ottawa. ''In one scenario, the guy (Mr. Chretien) was just lying to us. He was devious and getting us into a pressure cooker and getting us in so far that it would be impossible for us to get out and we would sign a bad deal.
The other scenario is that he earnestly and sincerely came to the table . . . and the rug was hauled out from under him." Defeated in both the Supreme Court of Newfoundland and the Supreme Court of Canada, Mr. Peckford says he has decided to take his case to the court of public opinion. He may have lost the legal right to claim the resources, but he remains committed to achieving de facto ownership -
control of the development. ''It's time for the rest of Canada to get exercised and force Quebec and the federal Government to treat us fairly," he says in a shirt-sleeved interview in his hotel room.
The federal Government has given control of resource development in the North to aboriginal peoples, and Mr. Peckford says there is no reason the nearly 600,000 people of Newfoundland should be treated differently.
And here in the other bookend of the country, as he calls it, where unemployment is also in double digits, where the resource industries are struggling and where a similar offshore oil boom is talked about, he is preaching to the converted.
Radio hot-line shows open their lines and the response is inevitable: ''Way to go Brian. We should tie a bloody big noose around Ontario and Quebec and string them up." Mr. Peckford says people misunderstood Newfoundland's aspirations because they were being articulated when the country was embroiled in a bitter debate over the Constitution and when central Canadian fears were most palpable about losing control of the country to resource-rich provinces such as Alberta.
He says the size of the bounty discovered under the ocean also exacerbated concerns over a power shift.
As the central provinces were given large tracts of land and resources in 1912, and as Alberta was given jurisdiction over its resources in 1930, so Newfoundland should be given the Hibernia oil, he says. ''It's a myth that they have agreed to share revenues with us. That's a factual inaccuracy." Under the pact offered Newfoundland, he
says, the province would have a veto that could delay up to six months a federal decision. But the revenue-sharing provisions, Mr. Peckford says, would leave the province no better off. ''Every time you create a dollar (in oil revenue) you lose one in equalization (payments from Ottawa)." The province, he says, wants the federal Government to phase out equalization payments over a period of many years rather than stop them immediately.
It wants a management board with three federal representatives, three provincial members and an independent chairman. National self-sufficiency and security of supply would give the federal Government's wishes more weight, but once such priorities had been achieved, Newfoundland's management decisions would prevail.
The province also wants the equalization payments - which total some $500-million to $600-million a year, he says - maintained in addition to the offshore revenue. ''We need to catch up. We have 23 per cent unemployment, the lowest level of public services, the highest taxes." More money would flow to the province until services and conditions reached the Canadian average.
Comparing the country to a family, he sketches an analogy. The federal Government gives one person $500 in welfare, he begins. Later, that person has a chance to earn $300, but the federal Government says that if he does, then he will receive only $200 in welfare. ''You're still only getting $500 a year; you're no better off. So you say to yourself, 'Why . . . am I going through all this working in my back garden to bring in this $300 a year if I am still going to get the $500 if I don't?' " Questioned about the aptness of the analogy, Mr. Peckford says that, the way the equalization system works, ''we don't have any chance to put our people meaningfully to work and to create wealth the way the other provinces have done since 1867. ''Isn't it
realistic for a province to have the opportunity with resources that are close to them and that they brought to the country . . . to develop those resources and (direct) some of that wealth into an industrial infrastructure that therefore makes Canada better off?
''We brought them into the country, legal interpretation notwithstanding," he says, ignoring the Supreme and Newfoundland court decisions. ''The Canadian Government just gave 16,000 square miles to the people of the Western Arctic because they live closest to the resources and they should have some say, and they don't have provincial status and (have) no legal grounds for that land. Alberta had no legal jurisdiction over resources . . . (and) neither did Quebec or Ontario. . . . If you do it for one province, you should do it for another, salt water notwithstanding." And in case you missed the point, he insists on making it clear: ''We owned the resources before we joined Confederation. The Supreme Court of Canada has no business saying who owned the mineral resources of the continental shelf before Confederation. That is an adjudication for the International Court at The Hague." If Ottawa followed his plan, the Newfoundland Premier says the day would come when Newfoundland would become a have province and would contribute to the rest of the country. ''That's the reason for the tour. It's a campaign of understanding. . . Surely that's all common sense?"
-sbrp-
How times change, Part 2
Brian Peckford's letter to the editor, Globe and Mail:
Newfoundland's position
A. Brian Peckford
May 29, 1984
pg. P.6
St. John's -- Re the article by Ian Mulgrew, concerning my cross-country tour and Newfoundland's position on the offshore (Peckford Puts Sweet Reason Up Front In Resource Pitch - May 18): I must congratulate Mr. Mulgrew as being the first national reporter to report on the substance of Newfoundland's offer to the federal Government for the development of offshore resources. However, the article creates some confusion as to Newfoundland's position on equalization payments once oil revenue starts flowing.
Newfoundland believes equalization payments to the province should be phased out over time, according to a predetermined formula which would help Newfoundland catch up to the rest of Canada in terms of living standards. Newfoundland looks forward to the day when the province will not receive any equalization, to the day when, because of the resources on and adjacent to our shores, we have dropped our "have not" status and are in a position to make a larger contribution to Canada.
That is our objective, and we would not want it confused. Newfoundland does not want both oil revenues and equalization.
A. Brian Peckford
Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador
St. John's
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Rally backs Danny
As CBC news reports, a crowd of several thousand (estimates vary between 1500 and 4000) rallied at the now ironically named Confederation Building to back Premier Danny Williams in his fight with the federal Conservatives and the nationalist rhetoric of the recent throne speech.
Included in the speakers at the rally today were Danny Williams and federal Liberal MP Scott Simms.
The rally was originally billed as a non-partisan event with a speakers list that did not include the Premier and his supporters from other parties.
Included in the speakers at the rally today were Danny Williams and federal Liberal MP Scott Simms.
The rally was originally billed as a non-partisan event with a speakers list that did not include the Premier and his supporters from other parties.
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Conference Board predicts big '07 for NL
But the year after?
Newfoundland and Labrador is forecast to post growth of 6.4 per cent this year, leading all provinces, the report said. This year's growth is fuelled primarily by increased mineral output, which is expected to fall off in 2008. As a result, real gross domestic product is forecast to grow by just 0.9 per cent next year, the report added.
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Iraq could double production
Iraq could double its current oil production if violence in the country ended and the country's oil facilities could be fully repaired and upgraded.
That's the view of a Colorado energy consulting company being reported by the International Herald Tribune.
The report places Iraqi reserves at 116 billion barrels, while the western area of the country may hold as much as 100 billion barrels more that has yet to be discovered or delineated.
This report is consistent with a consensus in the analyst community that current world oil prices contain a substantial security premium caused by unrest in Africa, Venezuela and the Middle East. Removing those tensions could see a drop in oil prices from the current level of around US$60 to US$45 or less.
Increased Iraqi oil production would certainly lower oil prices and further increase the competitive pressure on small oil areas like offshore Newfoundland and Labrador.
That's the view of a Colorado energy consulting company being reported by the International Herald Tribune.
The report places Iraqi reserves at 116 billion barrels, while the western area of the country may hold as much as 100 billion barrels more that has yet to be discovered or delineated.
This report is consistent with a consensus in the analyst community that current world oil prices contain a substantial security premium caused by unrest in Africa, Venezuela and the Middle East. Removing those tensions could see a drop in oil prices from the current level of around US$60 to US$45 or less.
Increased Iraqi oil production would certainly lower oil prices and further increase the competitive pressure on small oil areas like offshore Newfoundland and Labrador.
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