Self-reliance versus Dependence #nlpoli

In both Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador, the local media will report when a town gets a new fire truck.

The difference between the two ends there.

Much media ado about not very much #nlpoli

On the face of it, anyone even passingly familiar with political events in Newfoundland and Labrador for the past decade would look with some justifiable scepticism on an announcement from justice minister Darin King on Monday that the provincial government was going to have another look at building a new provincial prison to replace one built in 1859.

After all,  this project has been on the go for a lot longer than 2008, the year mentioned in the news release. The current crowd running the place have been trying to get the federal government to pay for the prison pretty much since they took office.

The favoured location for the new prison for most of past decade has been Harbour Grace.  That’s in the district recently vacated by Jerome Kennedy.

There’s another reason to be on your guard with this announcement.

The real Liberal Renewal #nlpoli

Cathy Bennett launched a 48-day tour of the province last week as part of her bid for the Liberal leadership.

The local media dutifully attended but the story didn’t make the news in any major way.  That’s partly because Bennett and the other Liberal candidates have been traveling around the province pretty much since Day One of the campaign.  That’s also partly because Bennett launched the same day the story broke of Jerome Kennedy’s imminent resignation.

All the same, the launch event was news not in itself, necessarily, but for what it means in a wider context.

Collins on Muskrat Falls #nlpoli

In Quebec, Jacques Parizeau has turned on the Parti Quebecois’ values charter.  It made national news.

In Newfoundland and Labrador last week, former Conservative finance minister John Collins took another swipe at Muskrat Falls in a letter to the editor of the Telegram.  Not many likely read it and no other media reported on it.

But they should have. 

Truth and Fiction #nlpoli

If you take Jerome Kennedy at his word on Wednesday, here’s what is going on.

Since he wasn’t planning to run in 2015, he decided that he would leave politics on Thursday, go back to practicing law in November and then start a master’s degree in law in January.

Nothing going on.  No other story.  Nothing pressing.

Just good bye.

Now watch the video of the scrum.

Look at his body language.

And then realise how utterly preposterous Wednesday’s news conference really was.\

The Elizabeth Towers Fire Inquiry #nlpoli

Enough of you have found the introduction to the Elizabeth Towers fire investigation report to drive it into the Top 10 list.

To make it easier to find, here is a post that links all the bits of the report serialized here back in 2010.

Some of you might be searching for more details since this fascinating tale now that Bill Rowe has printed his volume of reminiscences and anecdotes titled The Premiers:  Frank and Joey – Greed,  Power, and Lust.

Jerome leaves at last #nlpoli

For anyone even halfway clued in to local politics, the rumours have been thick for months that Jerome Kennedy was about to bail from provincial politics.

Now it seems the time has come.  The latest media reports have him going as early as today (Wednesday) while the versions reported Monday had the departure coming next week.

There are three things about Kennedy’s resignation that stand out.

Politics and car mirrors #nlpoli

So not the same thing.

If the party releases the numbers, we’ll know the actual number of people who have signed up to vote in the Liberal leadership once the party has gone through all the forms and deleted the duplicates, triplicates, and the various fakes.  We’ll also know how many signed up as supporters – with no financial or other real ties to the party – and how many signed on as members.

In the meantime, a couple of the campaigns released their own numbers on how many people they signed up.  The Paul Antle camp is claiming around 10,500, while presumptive front-runner Dwight Ball’s team is claiming 15,000. 

At a staged media event, Cathy Bennett didn’t offer reporters any numbers of her own to reporters.  Bennett just said she wasn’t worried about 10,000 or more supposedly signed by her rivals.  Ok.  She’s focused on launching a tour that was in no way just more of the same travelling around thing she’s been doing since July but this time dolled up for a staged media event.  Fair enough.

Values and Ideas #nlpoli

“Don’t question my values,” Cathy Bennett warned one her fellow candidates in the Liberal leadership, “and I won’t question yours.”

The other candidate in that part of the debate wasn’t questioning her values.  He just asked, as many have wondered, about the time over the past decade when she was giving money to the ruling Conservatives and holding an appointment only given to the most trusted associates of the current Premier and her predecessor.

On the face of it, that record doesn’t jive with Bennett’s talking point that she has always been a Liberal.  So the other candidates kept bringing the issue up.  Bennett’s usual response has been to recite the obviously suspect claim  - I have always been a Liberal, even when I was a Tory - that brings you back to the perpetually unanswered question. 

When she isn;t doing that, Bennett has tossed out the sort of aggressive reply like the one about values that doesn’t fit either.  Not only was the question about facts not values, but you’d think that as a rule a political leadership candidate would welcome the chance to talk about her values.  It’s a soft pitch to knock out of the park. Yet Bennett clearly didn’t want to get into any discussion about facts or values.

Ban corporate political donations: Dumaresque #nlpoli

Liberal leadership candidate Danny Dumaresque wants to reform the provincial election laws to ban corporate donations, as the Telegram reported on Thursday.

“I think in Newfoundland and Labrador, we’ve got to update the program,” he said. “(We’re) not living up to the expectations of the voting public, and it’s time for us to go forward and get current and have the respect for the voting public that they deserve.”

He said he wants to see a system in which the law would prevent “any possibility that big business can have access to elected officials — especially people in the government.”

So far Dumaresque is the only Liberal candidate to offer this kind of progressive reform ideas.

-srbp-

Touch Yourself #nlpoli #nsfw

-srbp-

Jack Ford and his war #nlpoli

Jack Ford spent three years as a prisoner of war in a Japanese camp during the Second World War. He died on September 24, aged 94.

The Japanese used jack and many of his fellow prisoners as forced labour at the Mitsubishi shipyard in Nagasaki.  Jack was in the camp  in August 1945 when Bockscar incinerated the city with the second – and hopefully the last -  atomic bomb ever used in war.

In 2002,  Ford went back to Japan with CBC journalist Reg Sherren. It was the first time he’d been in Japan since 1945.

CBC has posted the complete documentary Reg made of that trip.  Ford’s story is as moving a piece of television as you will ever see crafted by an experienced, thoughtful journalist.

If you do nothing else today, take an hour and watch it here:  Remembering John Ford.

-srbp-

Employment Insurance Claims in Newfoundland and Labrador, 2003 - 2013 #nlpoli

Every day, in every way, things are better and better.

No, that wasn’t Inspector Dreyfus from the Pink Panther movies.  That was one of the key messages Premier Kathy Dunderdale brought to her fellow Conservatives at their earlier-than-usual annual meeting this past weekend.

With any politician, it is always a good idea to do a veracity check on any claims he or she makes.  One of the ways we could measure that claim of “better” is to look at the number of employment insurance claims filed each month.  Statistics Canada keeps records.

Newfoundland and Labrador still has one of the highest unemployment rates in the country after a decade of the Conservative government.  So how are the number of EI claims doing?

The Beast #nlpoli

This week, people across Canada who are interested in the public right to access government information mark a thing called Right to Know Week.

It’s a time to “raise awareness of an individual’s right to access government information, while promoting freedom of information as essential to both democracy and good governance.”

People who are genuinely interested in a healthy democracy and in the effective operation of our federal, provincial, and municipal governments support freedom of information. 

It’s that simple.

Like we told you: no money rules for Liberal Leadership #nlpoli

SRBP told you on July 18 and this past Saturday, the Telegram had a front page story telling us that the Liberal leadership campaign has no financial rules.

James McLeod’s piece added the views from the individual candidates.  Only Danny Dumaresque plans to release any details on who gave him money and how much they gave.  The best the others will do is tell us how much they raised in total or list the individual amounts, but without indicating who gave the money.

Frankly, the campaigns and the candidates can claim anything they want.  In the absence of an independently verified set of financial statements, their claims, promises, and commitments are meaningless.

Debt, Demand, and Delusions #nlpoli

The Conservatives running the province got together with their staff and key supporters this weekend to reaffirm their conviction that they alone ought to be running the province.

Some people seem to think it’s remarkable that they stand together behind Kathy Dunderdale and her supposed wonderful charm, despite what the polls says.

There’s nothing remarkable in it at all.  People in power have a hard time understanding it when the voters turn on them. They carry on with their schemes, convinced in their own rightness.  It’s a form of self-delusion.  It’s what the mind does to help people cope when what they believe and what is true are two radically different things.

poopourri - Friday Funny #nlpoli #nsfw

Forget all the heavy talk about pension liabilities, debt, Fairity O'Brien and the Liberal leadership.

Let’s talk about crap, or specifically one of the most hysterically funny commercial in a long time.

The product is called poopourri.  It’s a type of bathroom deodorizer.

-srbp-

Politics and the Ethnic Vote #nlpoli

A few people people in Newfoundland and Labrador are getting agitated about the fact there’s a street in Nova Scotia called Newfie Lane.

For those who may not know, the word “newfie” causes huge problems among Newfoundlanders.  Some – like your humble e-scribbler  - have never heard it used except with some measure of insult attached to it.  It’s the other N-word.

Others don’t mind it so much. The key thing to note here is that being from Newfoundland and all things associated with that are powerful symbols. Place is a big thing here.   Identity is a big thing.  The two go together.

Veracity #nlpoli

Not so long ago one of the frequent claims people in the conventional media used to make about “blogsters” was that you couldn’t trust what they wrote because it might not be true.

You don’t hear that sort of thing as much as you used to.  But  whenever the idea comes up, you have to wonder why some people believe that the Internet is uniquely vulnerable to harbouring untrue things.

After all, just this past weekend the Globe and Mail had a story by Jane Taber that was just nonsense.

Lots of people believed it.  People in the provincial government circulated it widely.

But it was false.

Unfairity but sadly all too true #nlpoli

Last week, municipal affairs minister Kevin “Fairity” O’Brien denied having anything to do with having a couple of New Democratic Party politicians “uninvited” from a community breakfast organized by the Gander Chamber of Commerce at the annual Festival of Flight.

O’Brien told reporters:

I don't hold any power over them as the MHA. I don't fund them. I can't pull their funding or anything like that. So the NDP nor anybody can say that.

This week, we learned that nothing could be further from the truth.

Negotiating from Weakness #nlpoli

Markets in northeastern North America are already awash in cheap electricity, thanks in large part of the discovery of massive amounts of natural gas in the United States. They’ll be that way for decades to come.

Current forecasts New England’s regional electricity transmission organization hold that improvements in energy efficiency will allow New England states to expand their economy without increasing energy consumption proportionately.  That means that eight years from now, New England will be using as much electricity as it is today. 

There’s no shortage of supply, either.  As a result, current wholesale electricity prices in New England are about one tenth of what Newfoundlanders and Labradorians will pay for Muskrat Falls.

And it is with that context the people of Newfoundland and Labrador are only now learning that a team from the provincial government  has been in Quebec for the past two weeks as part of talks with the Quebec government about the 1969 Churchill Falls power contract, according to one news outlet, and development the Gull Island power plant according to another.

Moments from the Liberal Debate #nlpoli

Here are some quick observations from the Thursday night Liberal leadership debate on VOCM:

The facts should speak for themselves #nlpoli

The very best thing that may be said about the idea of a law school at Memorial University is that the proponents of the idea have failed to make their case.

The very worst is that the university is currently wasting everyone’s time by talking about something with no shape, no form, and hence no substance.

After all, the committee that held its last public meeting the other night  has the task – according to Memorial – of looking at “the demographics of existing Canadian law schools, current and future needs for more lawyers, and benefits to Memorial, among other goals.”

They needed to do this before they started “consulting”. 

Skinner and the useless provincial lobby law #nlpoli

Shawn Skinner used to be a provincial cabinet minister.

Now he works for a construction company trying to get a major contract at Muskrat Falls. Skinner is the senior director of business development with Aecon.

Presumably that job involves him meeting with or arranging meetings with people at Nalcor and the provincial government in an effort to land the Big Contract.

So why isn’t Shawn  - or anyone else connected to his company – registered as a lobbyist as required by the lobbyist registration law Shawn and his Conservative colleagues introduced in 2004?

Good question.

Nano UAVs #nlpoli

Let’s take a break from politics and have a look at the amazing way that technology has developed in the past decade.

All those small radio controlled helicopters you see in the stores these days?  Yeah well, they  - or ones very similar  - are already in use for  keeping an eye on things in the military.

Here’s a brief video about one such very small remotely piloted vehicle in use by the British Army in Afghanistan.  Tough out the fusilier’s thick Geordie accent.  What he is says is that he and a section of a soldiers (about eight) can use these tiny Black Hornet cameras to scout just a few metres around their location to spot any problems. 

The Bunker Door is Welded Shut #nlpoli

Kathy Dunderdale cannot quit as leader of the provincial Conservative Party,  says Fairity O’Brien in an interview with NTV.

He stresses it over and over.  The caucus is solidly behind her.

He stresses it so much – right down to telling you that he wants to stress the message in this interview – that where you’d start to believe that what he is saying is the literal truth:  Kathy wants to go but the caucus won’t let her.

The Importance of Appearing Earnest #nlpoli

Once upon a time, not so very long ago,  your humble e-scribbler noted the importance the provincial Conservatives placed on the appearance of things.

The idea came together neatly in a celebrity interview not by someone in the private sector media but by a representative of the state-run broadcaster.  “Government by Fernando” it’s called and it is worth going to read even if you read it back in 2006.

It will be worth your while since a front page column by Telegram editor Russell Wangersky this Saturday is likely to have the local chattering class chattering up a storm for the next few days.  You see Russell uses the column to tell Kathy Dunderdale that it is time she resigned. 

Stalwart Tories won’t care about Wangersky’s opinion anyway.  After all he is not one of “us” in whatever way they want to define “us”.  While everyone else in the province is likely to be taken up with the fact he called for her resignation, it’s far more revealing to look at why Russell thinks she ought to go and go now.

Libs up. Tories and Dippers steady. #nlpoli

By now you have all heard about the latest CRA August quarterly marketing poll.

Fascinating stuff.

Supposedly the Liberals grew at the expense of the New Democrats.  You’d believe that too, unless you looked at CRA party choice numbers without the “decideds-only” skew.  For your amusement, here is a convenient chart showing the numbers as SRBP has unscrewed them

The Impact of the Tuition Freeze #nlpoli

As students head back to Memorial University, you can see the impact the ongoing tuition freeze is having on the university’s budget.

You can see it in the policy to pass credit card handling fees on to students.  In the official university organ – the Gazette – the university claimed it eliminated the fee.  That’s not true.  The fees still get paid.  The university just transferred responsibility for paying them directly to students who want to pay fees using a credit card.  According to a November 2012 story in the Telegram, the university expected to recover about $550,000 by making students pay the extra fees.

That seems like such a measly sum compared to the university budget, but when the administration has very few ways of raising capital, they have to squeeze every penny until the Old Girl  screams.

-srbp-

Related:

• The price of subsidy – MUN Tuition
• Tuition fees and university participation
• Some inconvenient truths – goring some educational sacred cows
• Free tuition at NL university for Nova Scotia students
• Accessible post-secondary education
• Learn Now.  Pay Later.
• Autonomy for Memorial University

The Boom and the Un-Boom #nlpoli

Ask people in the St. John’s business community about the economy and they are likely to have trouble holding back the grin long enough to get a few words out.

Look around Capital City and you’ll see plenty of job vacancies in the restaurants and small shops.

Meanwhile,  some locals found it newsworthy this Labour Day weekend to note that the companies building the Long Harbour nickel smelter/refinery have had to bring in skilled workers from overseas to fill jobs the local labour pool can’t supply.

All sounds wonderful, until you start to look a little closer.

Province chops tax breaks for two companies #nlpoli

On August 1, the provincial cabinet revoked tax breaks granted to two companies in the province under the Economic Development and Growth Enterprises (EDGE) program.

Order-in-Council 2013-218 states that cabinet took the decision “due to the companies not meeting a term or condition to which the incentives are subject.”  The two companies are:

• Newlab Clinical Research Inc., and,
• Gander Aerospace Manufacturing.

The order in council doesn’t indicate what term or condition the companies failed to meet.

Osborne joins the Liberals #nlpoli

Not surprisingly, long-serving St. John’s South MHA Tom Osborne has joined the Liberals.

Forget all the stuff about what party he fits with.  Forget all the foolishness coming from the New Democrats.  Osborne’s choice reflects a canny political assessment of the political landscape not as it is now, but as he expects it will be over the next couple of years. 

The Stunnel Reborn #nlpoli

There’s a story about Danny Williams before he became the Old Man.  It was either in 2001 during the by-elections on the Great Northern Peninsula or later during the 2003 general election.

As the convoy of Winnebago and media drives down the highway, Williams suddenly pulls over and points across to Labrador.  Then he says something to the effect that there is no reason why we couldn’t build a tunnel across to the mainland.

Some ideas never die, no matter how implausible they might be or no matter how many sensible arguments there are not to do them.

One of them is the idea of building a tunnel from Newfoundland to Labrador.  Technically, it’s possible.  But, as SRBP pointed out in 2005,  a pretty simple look at the economics of the project make it as loopy an idea as Muskrat Falls.

That’s why people call it the Stunnel:  a stunned tunnel.

-srbp-

Stay the Course, Choose Change, and the Liberal Alternative #nlpoli

Identifying supporters is only part of the challenge in a political campaign.  That’s basically what the five candidates in the Liberal leadership contest are doing when they sign people up to vote in November. It’s a lot tougher a job than some people apparently thought.

One of the big factors in any political campaign is the candidate’s stump speech.  The name comes from the days when a candidate would go from town to town and stand on the nearest raised platform – including a tree stump – to tell whatever crowd gathered why they should vote for him. 

These days you might call it the vote proposition or the strategic message. The simpler the statement the better.  People remember short, clear ideas like Nike’s “Just do it” or Coke’s “It’s the real thing.”  Former Conservative cabinet minister Shawn Skinner used a variation on that second term when he labelled leadership candidate Cathy Bennett’s message – choose change – “strategic” during a recent discussion with the On Point political panel.

What Bennett’s campaign really shows is something else.

JM’s assessment of the UARB Decision #nlpoli

According to the commentator JM, the implementation of the Utility and Review Board conditional approval will mean that “Nova Scotia will receive 60% of the power, for what amounts to about 30% of the cost” of the Muskrat Falls project.

Using information provided by Nalcor to the Public Utilities Board, JM concludes that “there is a potential 37% increase in the incremental rates charged to Newfoundland and Labrador ratepayers for Muskrat Falls Energy” if Nalcor meets the UARB condition.

This would be reduced to a 10% increase if all export revenue in the early years of the project were used to offset the burden on the Newfoundland and Labrador ratepayers. This is assuming that the Holyrood thermal plant can be decommissioned as per the original plan. If the allocation of additional power to Nova Scotia results in Holyrood’s life being extended beyond 2021, then these rates will potentially further increase.

Getting out the Vote #nlpoli

Older people are more likely to vote.

In the 2011 federal election, about 50% of the eligible voters aged 18 to 24 years actually voted.  That compares to 25 to 34s turned out at about the same rate.  People in the 35 to 44 bracket turned out at around the national average of 61%.

Compare that to 70% turn-out for 45- to 54-year-olds and 82% among eligible voters aged 65 to 74, according to figures from Statistics Canada.

Other factors influenced turn-out as well.

The Problem Described #nlpoli

One of the major factors affecting economic development in Newfoundland and Labrador is the literacy level of the population.

If you want to see the extent of the problem in one area, consider the case of Bell Island.  According to a May 2008 briefing note released as part of a recent Access to Information request:

“…50% of the population age 20 years and older has less than a high school graduation certificate or equivalent diploma.  Less than 30% of the population possesses a diploma in skills or trades….”

-srbp-

The Blue Slide #nlpoli

Just flip over to labradore for a look at his latest pretty chart.  It shows the compilation of poll results from various sources going back to early 2010 for the Conservatives, the New Democrats, and the Liberals in the province.

On average, labradore tells us,  the Conservatives have dropped five percentage points each quarter since early 2011. 

Note the corresponding changes for the other two parties.

-srbp-

Liberal Party Fact Check: Search and Rescue #nlpoli

What is it about politicians in Newfoundland and Labrador and search and rescue?

Seriously.

Newly minted Liberal MHA Lisa Dempster issued a news release on Thursday about rumoured changes at SERCO in Goose Bay.

And that’s where the problems start.

The Value of Controversy and Colleagues

Over the past few days,  one American political science blog has been at the centre of a pretty hot controversy about a post on the value of networking for younger political scientists.  Follow the links below and you’ll find further

Brian Rathbun, the author of the post quit the collective blog called The Duck of Minerva, with a short note that included this comment:

Through poorly chosen and ill-considered language and images, I made light of women’s challenges both in their academic and in their daily lives, for which I am deeply sorry.

Thankfully, someone reposted the original Rathbun piece that some found offensive. Take a moment and read it before going on with the rest of this.  Be warned the title is crude and some may find it distasteful: “Intellectual Jailbait: Hunting for Underage Ideas at APSA”.  That’s the American Political Science Association conference he’s talking about.

Cod, cod everywhere #nlpoli

John Furlong left some big shoes to fill over at CBC’s Fisheries Broadcast.

As it turn out, the Mother Corp’s head shed found a replacement who is guaranteed to make them hire a cobbler pretty damn quick to make the shoes a few sizes bigger.

Jamie Baker will be familiar to any of you who followed his early career at the old Independent, then the Telegram, or his more recent work at The Navigator. 

He’s also been doing as blog over at the Telegram.  Jamie’s last effort at the Tely was a post about how there’s basically no market for cod any more.  Some of you will likely find that bizarre but it is true.

Another job and a business case #nlpoli

One Conservative Kathy gave Ross Reid a new job recently. 

Last January, your humble e-scribbler had another job in mind for Reid.

Kathy came really close.

Right floor.  Wrong office.

And then there’s the other Cathy who told us a few months ago that there were multiple, interlocking business cases for Muskrat Falls.  A couple of weeks ago, she’d whittled it down to just one business case.

She still hasn’t been willing to tell us what they are or it is.

In any event, there is just one business case for Muskrat Falls, as your humble e-scribbler explained in 2012.

-srbp-

Do they get free roller blades? #nlpoli

Premier Kathy Dunderdale made a few more appointments on Friday to boost her chances of setting a phenomenal record for shifting people around in the senior ranks of the provincial public service.

She made three appointments following hot on the heels of the quickie switcheroo made necessary by Robert Thompson’s apparently unexpected resignation last month.

August is Money Month #nlpoli

August is polling month for Corporate Research Associates.

In the first 15 days of the month,  the provincial government announcement machinery has been running in overdrive.  Realistically, though, there have only been 10 working days if you pluck out weekends and Regatta Day,when the provincial government head office in St. John’s shuts down.

Time to re-think dam costs #nlpoli #nspoli

They call it Site C.

No, it isn’t a sequel to Jurassic Park or The Lost World.

Site C is a 900 megawatt hydroelectric dam project in British Columbia that BC Hydro originally estimated would cost $6.0 billion. The provincial government shielded the project from scrutiny by the provincial utilities regulator.

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

Summer Reading List

A compendium of 100 biases in the way we all think, described in easy-to-understand language, The Art of Thinking Clearly should be required reading in the provincial government these days.

Keep a pad of paper and a pencil beside you as you read this book. 

Jot down the biases you can relate to Muskrat Falls.

Try not to cry.

____________

Jamie McWhirter served with the Canadian Army in Afghanistan in 2006. A soldier’s tale is his own account of the time he spent there.

This is a touching, highly personal account that doesn’t take you anywhere except inside the author’s head. 

That’s all you’ll need to understand what he experienced, his psychological injuries, and how far McWhirter has come to be able to tell the parts of his story that are in this book.

-srbp-

Nalcor’s Complaints to the Regie #nlpoli

Last week, the Quebec Superior Court dismissed a motion to hear an appeal from Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro over decisions taken by the Quebec’s energy regulator in 2010.

As NTV reported on Friday, “Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro asked for transmission access from Hydro-Québec TransÉnergie in January 2006. But Nalcor says it was met with delays, so it appealed to Quebec’s version of the Public Utilities Board, the Régie de l’énergie.”

That’s a fair, if very general,  account of the dispute.  You can see the same thing in the other media, such as the CBC’s online account.   The Telegram editorial on Monday described the dispute this way – “the Régie de l'énergie rejected all requested corridors for transmitting power through Québec” -  although that isn’t even close to what actually happened. 

Access denied: CFLCo and Hydro-Quebec version #nlpoli

Churchill Falls (Labrador) Corporation tried but failed in 2012 in an effort to see hundreds of thousands of pages of confidential Hydro-Quebec documents on the 1969 Power Contract between CFLCo and Hydro-Quebec.

A decision by the Quebec access to information commissioner in November 2012 denied CF(L)Co access to the documents under a section of the provincial access to information law that excludes requests that are so large that answering them would interfere with  the normal operations of the public body.

Curiously enough that’s exactly the same ruling the Newfoundland and Labrador access commissioner made on a 2008 case involving a request for access to e-mails in the Premier’s Office. In his decision, filed in January 2009, the provincial access commissioner determined that:

the number of e-mails encompassed by the request was over 119,000. At a rate of 500 e-mails per day, it would take about 8 [sic] months to process the request. The Commissioner found that this was an unreasonable interference with the operations of Executive Council.

 

Churn, churn, churn #nlpoli

For your consideration:  a conspicuously large number of changes in the senior levels of the provincial public service over the past four years or so.

The most recent person to hold the most senior position in the public service - Clerk of the Executive Council  - has held seven different positions in seven years. At the assistant deputy minister and deputy minister rank, she has averaged a little less than one and a half years in each position.

So how does that stack up with her immediate predecessors?

The Poster Child for the Churn #nlpoli

On Tuesday, Premier Kathy Dunderdale appointed Julia Mullaley to the top job in the provincial public service - Clerk of the Executive Council  - to replace Robert Thompson, who is retiring.

The news release announcing Mullaley’s appointment rattles off the jobs that she has held, but you really have to do a little sleuthing to see just how often she has moved around in her 20 years of public service.

Mullaley is the poster child for the incredible churn in the senior public service these days.

Newfoundland and the start of the Great War #nlpoli

Next year marks the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of World War One. 

There’s no sign of any commemorations or other events to mark the occasion, but undoubtedly there will be plenty.  Your humble e-scribbler is working to finish off a major paper that’s been in the works for far too long.  It builds on some original research into Newfoundland’s involvement and pre-war defence policy.

August 7th is the anniversary of the decision by the Newfoundland cabinet on what shape the country’s participation would take.  What follows is a revamped version of a post from 2007 on the same occasion.

Darkness on the Edge of Town #nlpoli

Here’s what St. John’s mayor Dennis O’Keefe told city council on Monday, according to the Telegram on Wednesday:

O’Keefe proceeded to talk about the fact the city lost the opportunity to hold a Springsteen concert this summer because it and the promoter couldn’t come up with a suitable venue.

This summer.

2013.

Bruce toured North America last year, 2012.

This year all his gigs have been in Europe.

What gives?

The Smartest Move She Ever Made #nlpoli

Appointing Ross Reid as her chief of staff is probably the smartest thing Premier Kathy Dunderdale has ever done and will ever do.

Reid is an experienced political operator with extensive connections and reputation for bringing people together successfully.

Given all the other decisions Dunderdale has made in her political career,  especially since the Williams brothers made her Premier, that’s why this one just does not fit.

The Q2 2013 Churn Appointments #nlpoli

Cabinet made 12 appointments at the deputy minister and assistant deputy minister rank in the second quarter of the  2013 calendar year (01 April  to 30 June).

The information comes from cabinet orders (orders-in-council) needed to make these appointments and released by the provincial government via its website.

That’s consistent with the 15 appointments made between 01 January and 31 March.

If the pattern continues, the provincial government will make a record 60 such appointments by the end of the calendar year, bettering the previous record of 49 set in 2012.

This does not include recent changes in the Premier’s Office or cabinet secretariat.

-srbp-

On bigotry and prejudice #nlpoli

The Telegram editorial last Friday offered a few comments on some recent examples of nasty words tossed at people not from one place or another.

One was a letter that turned up in the Calgary Sun complaining about all the Newfs in western Canada.  Another was the number of people telling local political gadfly Brad Cabana that he should frig back off to western Canada where he came from, or words to that effect.

The editorial noted that these expressions of what the editorialist called bigotry, are different when they come from prominent people compared to “ordinary” people because the “ordinary”  idiots are everywhere.

Every now and then, writes the editorialist, it is useful to “out” the bigots and the racists and give them the “scorn and derision” they deserve.  Otherwise, the editorialist wrote with a tip of the hat to none other than Bill “pimple on the arse” Rowe, we shouldn’t pay any attention to that stuff.

Now if one  read only that editorial, one might cluck approvingly on it and then go on contended that one was with the righteous among us.  But if you knew some context for all this, you would quickly recognise the editorial for the tripe it is.

Don’t tell the Newfoundlanders – Uncle Gnarley version #nlpoli

If you want some really sharp insight into the latest developments in the Muskrat Falls saga, check out the Thursday post at Uncle Gnarley titled “Don’t tell the Newfoundlanders”.

Don’t stop when you get to the end.

Read the comments.  There are 10 more from different people who add even more insight. Here’s a sample:

Des:

The Emera application  was issued on January 28, 2013.

As soon as the carrot of Figure 4-4 was put in front of the UARB, Nalcor should have realised they were going to grab it, and refuse to give the carrot back. The process was de-railed as soon as this Figure 4-4 was shown to the people of Nova Scotia.

Newfoundlanders should read through the UARB hearings. There was a great deal of dialogue between Nalcor and Emera about surplus power availability. Yet during the June 2013 AGM, Ed Martin responded to questioning from Jim Morgan that he was not approached by Emera about surplus power. Something does not correlate. Something does not add up.

But if you want to see what benefits an open and transparent process brings, then read the economics that were presented to the UARB [Excel file at the bottom of the link above]  A clear summary of the costs, the returns, and when the equity will be repaid. This is a level of detail and clarity that Newfoundlanders are yet to see, on a project which we will pay for.

Here in Newfoundland we have a premier who is now saying that the link does not require UARB approval. But if the cost are not recovered in the rate base (15 cents/kwhr) how will it be paid for on the open Market (5 cents)? Who pays?\

Our premier should also understand that in accordance with the National Energy Board, before any power is sold in the US it must first be offered to Canadian utilities at commercially competitive terms. So if they build a link with the intent to sell it to New England at 4 cents, then the terms of their NEB report license dictate that Nalcor will first must offer it to Nova Scotians at 4 cents.

Premier Dunderdale may get Premier Dexter re-elected yet.

-srbp-

Whatever happened to Ryan Cleary? #nlpoli

The story is the kind of thing that used to set the arch-nationalist Ryan Cleary screaming about the ignorance of mainlanders and tearing at his clothes over the latest proof of the evils of Confederation.

These days,  New Democrat member of parliament Ryan Cleary is apparently not interested in rending the Harry Rosen threads his hefty MPs salary puts on his back.

For those who haven’t seen the news, Cleary’s boss – Thomas Mulcair – is set to travel across the country this August.  Across the country  - to New Democrats - means from [as the Globe reported it] "Halifax to Vancouver [Island]."

Media Facilitation 101 #nlpoli

The Thursday morning post of Liberal leadership campaign videos included a technical note that explained why the videos in it didn’t fit with the formatting here at SRBP.

The reason for the problem – as the post noted – is that the people who posted the videos at youtube put some limitations on the embedding code.  This simple point apparently escaped a couple of readers who spent some time lecturing about how your humble e-scribbler could scale the youtube videos or edit the code.

*sigh*

Liberal Leadership Videos #nlpoli

Two Liberal leadership candidates are using youtube videos as a way of getting their message out.

Paul Antle has a professionally produced introductory video that is also the basis for the first television spot of the campaign.  It turned up on Wednesday during the supper hour news.

Danny Dumaresque is at it as well, although his are short, home-made videos. The longer of the bunch appears to be a speech at Dumaresque's launch event. 

  -srbp-

Tech Note:  Some of you will likely notice that these videos are atretching into the right hand side of the SRBP layout.  There's a simple reason for this.  Both campaigns uploaded the videos with limitations on the way that they appear.  

There's no technical reason for this, that is, they are not designed to be shown at fixed diemsnions.  it just appears that someone involved with the campaign missed a couple of details in the upload such that you can only embed them with these fixed dimensions.

*sigh*  

Unless this sort of thing gets fixed, these are the last campaign vids readers will see embedded here.  

Relative Costs #nlpoli

Leave entirely to one side the spectacle of the guy who gets paid as the consumer advocate sitting there on the CBC flailing his arms around explaining Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro’s latest rate request.

Tom Johnson sounded like a Hydro spokesperson as he went on about things called “puts” and how this sort of cost was up, and this was offset by something else.  Prices on the island would go down, therefore, while in Labrador, where the issues are different, costs would go up.

Johnson did a better job of defending Nalcor than he did during Muskrat Falls.

Leave that to one side.

The Cabana Cases #nlpoli

For those who want to read them, here are two decisions related to Brad Cabana’s recent Muskrat Falls case.

The first is the decision on his application to have the judge remove herself from the case:

Voids and Spatter #nlpoli

Watch too many crime shows and after a while a few of the ideas start to sing into your skull.

Take blood spatter for example.  In some kinds of violent death, lots of blood will fly around.  The drops leave a distinctive spray pattern that can tell you lots about what went on. 

And then there is sometimes the bits of the pattern that are missing.  There is sometimes a void, a gap where something that the blood spattered on is missing.

The void – the missing stuff  - sometimes tells much more than what is there.

Yakabuski nails it… again. #nlpoli

Konrad Yakabuski warned in 2006 that Newfoundland and Labrador would probably get a huge financial shock  trying to develop the Lower Churchill on its own.

Now, the knowledgeable Globe and Mail correspondent is back again with the observation that revenge motive behind Muskrat Falls is not a very successful business strategy… for Newfoundland and Labrador.

Consider this a public service for all those people who tweeted his commentary over the weekend thinking that he was chastising Hydro-Quebec.

Guess again.

-srbp-

More Gil Bennett nuttiness #nlpoli

Gill Bennett is a smart guy.  That’s why he is in charge of a project as large as Muskrat Falls.

So when Gil Bennett says something that obviously is not true, it looks a lot more suspicious than when he dodges the important question and answers the question no one asked.

Look to Quebec courts, not prov gov for disclosure: Marshall #nlpoli

The people of Newfoundland and Labrador won;t get information on Muskrat falls water management from the provincial government or its energy corporation.

They should wait to hear about things in Quebec courts, according to Tom Marshall, the Newfoundland and Labrador energy minister.

Marshall was responding to a call by former Premier Brian Peckford for the provincial government to release information about the province’s position on a recent Hydro-Quebec lawsuit against Churchill Falls (Labrador) Corporation.

Here’s a bit of the Telegram story:

Marshall said that citizens of Newfoundland and Labrador can absolutely know what the government’s case is, as long as they pay close attention to the Quebec court system.

“They will know in court,” he said. “They’re going to hear the whole thing. They’ll see it. They’ll follow it all.”

In other news, the provincial Conservatives are still wondering why their popularity is at record low levels for an incumbent government in Newfoundland and Labrador…

-srbp-

Dunder-Dex offside with Emera #nlpoli #nspoli #cdnpoli

Premiers Kathy Dunderdale and Darrell Dexter may be telling everyone that the Maritime Link can;t be stopped but the private sector company involved in the project said in June there is no plan on what to do if the Nova Scotia utilities regulatory ultimate turns thumbs down on the Link proposal.

The price of a dam #nlpoli

If crap was electricity,  Nalcor would have the market cornered.

Da byes running the Muskrat falls project are very good at spewing words but very bad at saying things that have meaning.

Case in point: last fall in the controversy over the water management agreement, chief Muskrat Falls guy Gil Bennett was always ready to insist Nalcor was lily white and had no bad intentions. 

The lawyers in the 2041 Group suggested it would be prudent to confirm the Nalcor interpretation with a legal reference.   After all, there was always the possibility Hydro-Quebec had another view and might take action. Bennett the engineer blew off any thoughts of any legal problem with everything but a contemptuous pfft.

The thing is that Bennett kept avoiding the simple question and answering the irrelevant one. The post in which your humble e-scribbler pointed out this problem has been the most popular post here – bar none – since last November.

And now we can see how much the engineer knew about the law.

Like water for muskrats #nlpoli

Wednesday it was Kathy Dunderdale.

Thursday, they sent Tom Marshall to chat with Bill Rowe on Open Line to do damage control in the wake of two huge setbacks for the Muskrat Falls project.

Some people think Tom is a good spokesperson because he talks in soft tones.  But truth be told, Tom’s really a bit of a train wreck.

Bubbles and the Politics of Neener-Neener-Neener #nlpoli

Kathy Dunderdale called Bill Rowe on Wednesday [via daveadey] to have one of her periodic core dumps on what is going on in the universe.

When the talk turns to Muskrat Falls, there’s this truly bizarre moment. She told Rowe about having a chat at some provincial premiers’ gathering with Dalton McGuinty and Jean Charest about how they might work together to bring Gull Island power to Ontario, through Quebec. 

According to Dunderdale, Charest lamented the cost of the 1969 power contract on the relationship between Quebec and its neighbour Newfoundland and Labrador.  Charest warned their fellow premiers against the sort of bickering that had gone on for decades.  Given that Charest died a horrible political death shortly after, the story has eerie echoes of Yul Brynner after he’d died of lung cancer coming back to life in a film clip to warn people against the evils of smoking.

As freaky as that story is,  that’s not the weird thing.

The Hydro-Quebec Statement of Claim #nlpoli

Via labradore, the statement of claim filed on behalf of Hydro-Quebec earlier this week.

You can search it and read it in English.  Those of you using Chrome will find the translation very simple.

If the text here is too small, then click on the title - Hydro-Quebec Statement of Claim by labradore – and go straight to Scribd.

-srbp-

A party like the others #nlpoli

Among the oldest of old Canadian political jokes is that you went to the Tory conventions to drink, the Liberal conventions to get laid, and the NDP ones to pick up pamphlets.

Well, as it turns out the NDP have now joined the ranks of the old parties.  The Ottawa Citizen reported last Thursday that the NDP national director and deputy director have written a formal apology to a young staffer after she was – allegedly – on the receiving end of of unwanted attention from a donor at a fundraising event, whom the paper identifies as subjected to Jack Layton’s former communications director.

The Citizen also reported that junior staffers helping to run the were left to fend for themselves after the people in charge left the venue without notice.  The paper describes the unnamed individuals as “sloppy drunk”.

There’s desperate and then there’s Dunderdale #nlpoli

Take away the bluster:  “The agenda won’t be set by Quebec in terms of how we do our work, how we develop our resources, and how we access markets.”

Take away the old fairy tales :  “I would characterize this as a desperate move by a company that’s been trying one way or the other to thwart development on the lower Churchill for a number of years, unless it was clearly in the best interests of the people of Quebec.”

Dispose of all the crap and what’s left of Premier Kathy Dunderdale’s comments on the Hydro-Quebec legal challenge about the 1969 is very few words that reveal much.

UARB: “substantial uncertainty” about Nalcor supply of market-priced energy #nlpoli

You can read the full decision by the UARB (pdf) but here are some points to note.

Right off the bat, you will see in the full report that Nova Scotia consumers had the benefit of reviews by several consultants all of which are included in the UARB report.  This stands in stark contrast to the rigged reviews conducted in Newfoundland and Labrador before the final approval by the provincial government. 

Right off that the bat, that means that the public interest was far better served in Nova Scotia than it was at any point during the past decade in dealing with the Lower Churchill.

Pride goeth, more undisclosed risk, and all that #nlpoli

There are so many ways that Ed Martin, his crew at Nalcor, and the provincial Conservatives and all their supporters have screwed themselves and local ratepayers it is getting harder to tell which one is worse.

On Monday, the Nova Scotia regulator approved the Maritime Link but only condition that Emera secure enough extra electricity at market rates to make the project the lowest cost option.  Meanwhile in Quebec, Hydro-Quebec announced it was seeking a court opinion on its right to access virtually all the output from Churchill Falls.

The interplay of the two things could work together to deliver a horrible result for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Hydro-Quebec to seek clarity on contract rights #nlpoli

From Hydro-Quebec:

MONTREAL, July 22, 2013 /CNW Telbec/ - Hydro-Québec is filing a motion today with the Québec Superior Court to obtain a declaratory judgment. The company is asking the Court to confirm that two recent positions taken by CF(L)Co with respect to the Churchill Falls Contract (the Contract) are ill-founded. The Québec Superior Court has exclusive jurisdiction to rule on any dispute arising out of the Contract. It should be noted that the Contract will be automatically renewed in 2016, for a 25-year period ending in 2041.

1 - Energy deliveries to which Hydro-Québec is entitled
Under the terms of the Contract which Hydro-Québec and CF(L)Co concluded in 1969, Hydro-Québec has certain essential rights, including:

• The exclusive right to purchase virtually all of the power and energy produced by Churchill Falls Generating Station until August 31, 2041;

• The right to benefit from operational flexibility.
According to the recent positions taken by CF(L)Co, Hydro-Québec would, for the entire Contract renewal period (2016 to 2041), be entitled only to fixed monthly blocks of energy. This position would deprive Hydro-Québec of the operational flexibility to determine the quantities of energy it can request from CF(L)Co. This operational flexibility enables Hydro-Québec to coordinate the operation of Churchill Falls with its entire generating fleet, and to do so both on a seasonal and a multi-year basis.

In Hydro-Québec's opinion, CF(L)Co's position is incompatible with several provisions of the Contract. Hydro-Québec wishes to have the Court confirm that it will not be obliged to limit its requests for energy deliveries to fixed monthly blocks from 2016 to 2041.

2 - Sale of quantities exceeding 300 MW by CF(L)Co
Under the Contract, until 2041, CF(L)Co has the right to recapture a 300-MW block of power and energy and sell it to a third party. However, this right has limitations: CF(L)Co may not, under any circumstances, sell quantities exceeding 300 MW to a third party, until expiry of the Contract. Yet, since June of 2012, CF(L)Co has sold quantities of more than 300 MW to Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro (NLH), a related provincial Crown corporation, causing the interruption of deliveries scheduled by Hydro-Québec under the Contract.

Hydro-Québec therefore wishes to confirm that, as long as the Contract is in effect, namely until August 31, 2041, CF(L)Co may not sell quantities of power and energy exceeding 300 MW to a third party, including NLH.

For further information:
Gary Sutherland,   Hydro-Québec,  514 289-4418,

-srbp-

sutherland.gary@hydro.qc.ca

So what’s Kathy’s problem? #nlpoli

So if Stephen Harper’s staffing problem is that “all the good ones quit”,  what is the story on the staffing problems in Kathy Dunderdale’s office?

-srbp-

The Imaginary Nation #nlpoli

Look at the shelves in any bookstore around town these days and you will likely see endless copies of Greg Malone’s book Don’t tell the Newfoundlanders. 

The piles of books show that few people are actually interested in Malone’s malarkey.   Well, very few people beyond the crowd who – like Malone and open line regular Agnes – already had swallowed the load already, without question.  Malone’s book contains the sort of crap Malone and others have been getting on with for years.  Back in 2009, for example, the Canadian Press gave their  fact checker a day off and asked Greg some stuff about Confederation in time for a piece for the 60th anniversary of the momentous event. 

Drew Brown, he of the recent paper and public talk on nationalism, has a piece in The Scope this month that has a go at the conspiracy theory.  Not surprisingly, he trashes the notion completely. 

History’s Bitch #nlpoli

A half century ago, a bunch of very smart fellows – some of the smartest fellows of any generation ever – wanted to build a massive  plant in the middle of Labrador to make electricity.

One of the problems the project faced was a combination of costs and markets.  As Philip Smith recounts in Brinco:  the story of Churchill Falls,  the very smart men were concerned right from the start that nuclear power offered an almost unbeatable alternative to hydroelectricity for generating large amounts of electricity at relatively low cost.  The markets needed power and nuclear could do it cheaper.

Nuclear power also had a huge advantage hydro couldn’t match:  you can turn the plant on and off when you wish.  With hydro, you can make power only when you have the water.  Even with a massive reservoir, the generating output of the plant will go up and down during the year depending on how much water is available.

You got cash? They’ve got a party. #nlpoli

The party that brought the province its first and only election finance law in 1991 is currently in the midst of a campaign to select its own leader, but the race has absolutely no rules of any kind on campaign financing.
The Liberal Party’s constitution and 2013 leadership rules are absolutely silent on campaign finances except for setting the $20,000 entrance fee every candidate had to offer up to enter the race.

Candidates are free to spend as much as they want in any way they want without any rules requiring disclosure to anyone. 

And any potential donor – individual or corporation – from anywhere on the planet can give as much as they want to the person who will lead the party after the election and who could well wind up running the province in 2015.

Nut up or shut up #nlpoli

The Liberal leadership is not even a couple of weeks old and already reporters are getting inundated with the suggestions from anonymous turd-mongers wondering why they are not covering this angle or that aspect of one candidate

The Telegram’s James McLeod wrote a blog post about it on Tuesday, rattling off some examples of the stuff he’s been getting.  McLeod offers a few simple explanations of why reporters don’t cover the sort of crap that these tidbits of excrement.

In the process, he actually gives publicity to the stuff he says wouldn’t be covered for journalistic so there is a bit of a contradiction in there.  For the most part, what you can see are the sort of small-minded points offered up by people who have nothing much to say and on top of that don;t even have the stones to identify themselves.  The world is full of those sorts of sorry specimens of humanity;  politics just makes it seems like there are more of them attached to political parties.

On change #nlpoli

One child, one teacher, one book, and one pen might change the world, as Malala Yousefzai says.

The pen and book are of no use, though,  if the student and the teacher are not interested in finding things out. The horror of the Taliban is the same horror one finds in religious fanatics of any sort, or political zealots for that matter.  They do not wish to know anything.  They believe they have already been handed the complete set of answers to everything.  They fancy the information comes from God or from some local manifestation of some god but the root of their brand of evil is their belief that they already know everything.

They lack inquisitiveness.

What holds us collectively from changing the world is not the absence of a pen or a book. 

We are held back by a lack of inquisitiveness.

"The only reason people do not know much is because they do not care to know,” wrote Stephen Fry in the second volume of his autobiography, titled The Fry Chronicles.  “They are incurious. Incuriosity is the oddest and most foolish failing there is."

-srbp-

Learn Now. Pay Later. #nlpoli

A college or university education has an undeniable value both to the student and to the society as a whole.

But should either party bear a disproportionate share of the cost of the education? 

Of course not.  The challenge for policy makers in the provincial government and at the university and the colleges in the province is how to strike a balance between the two. The one that’s been in place for the past decade works extremely well for students whose representatives  – not surprisingly – are pushing for an even sweeter and sweeter deal regardless of the financial implications to the university and the provincial government. 

Free tuition is fundamentally unworkable.  There’s no reason to believe that free tuition would improve participation rates,  successful completion rates, or any other desirable outcome for society.  By the same token, forcing students to bear the full cost of tuition up front would likely serve as a powerful deterrent since few individuals and families could afford the hundreds of thousands of dollars post-secondary education costs these days.

There might be an alternative.

Antle changes dynamics of Liberal leadership race #nlpoli

Last November, it was easy to dismiss Paul Antle as another potential Liberal leadership candidate who lots of people talked about but who sounded more like he had better things to do.

Two things in July changed that.

First, Antle raced around at the last minute and joined the leadership race.

Second, and more importantly, Antle delivered the best campaign kick-off of the lot.

Telly exclusive on SNC Lavalin???? #nlpoli

Screaming headline across the top of the front page of the Saturday Telly:

SNC-Lavalin shut out of Hydro-Quebec projects

And right underneath,  the claim that it is a Telegram exclusive.

That would be right except for the fact someone else reported it months ago.

The problems first surfaced in April, as reported by Radio-Canada.

And La presse had the specific Muskrat Falls angle in early May. The recent decision on the Romaine project reported on Saturday by the Telly is just the same as the La Presse story…only much later.

Where’s the exclusive?

-srbp-

Yvonne - math #nlpoli

Liberal member of parliament Yvonne Jones is pissed off.

She told VOCM that “there are 1,016 people that are payrolled  [sic]under the Muskrat Falls project. 201 of those are Labradorians. So we have less than 10 per cent of Labrador people employed as part of that project.”

She said that was unacceptable.

Someone forgot to point out to the mathematically challenged politician that 201 is a teensy bit shy of 20% of 1,016.

Not less than 10%.

But about double that.

19.7% to be super-accurate.

So if someone pointed out to Jones that there are twice as many Labradorians working at Muskrat Falls as she thought, would she be only half as pissed off?

-srbp-

Jerome Kennedy: ace hole digger #nlpoli

Score another one for the Telegram’s James McLeod.

He interviewed finance minister Jerome Kennedy and wrote a story that centred on Kennedy’s contention that his party’s 2011 election promises weren’t really promises at all but a general blueprint or platform intend to implement depending on the cash available.

The story caused Kennedy such problems that he took to the Thursday morning open line show to claim he was misquoted and that the comments were taken out of context.  Later on he issued a news release that claimed the Conservatives had actually delivered on 43% of their promises.  The short release include a long list that someone apparently cut and pasted from the original list of Conservative not-promises.

Kennedy just made a bad situation worse.

Highly Diffused Government #nlpoli

By now, plenty of people in Newfoundland and Labrador have likely heard finance minister Jerome Kennedy’s comments about his party’s last election platform.

“You used the word promise,”  Kennedy said to the Telegram’s James McLeod.  “I’m not sure that the Blue Book can be described as a promise.”  Kennedy said that the platform contained a bunch of what he called “initiatives” that his party planned to implement between 2011 and 2015.  Everyone had to bear in mind that “there’s always the caveat that the commitments will be made having regard to the fiscal situation of the province.”

Make out of that what you want.  Some people have already made fun or harrumpfed through the odd Tweet or two.  McLeod noted in an story on Wednesday that Kennedy’s new warning about calling them “promises” is at odds with the Conservative during the election.

What’s more interesting thing to what McLeod might call a political uber-nerd is what the transcript reveals about how the Conservatives operate.

Autonomy for Memorial University #nlpoli

One of the things about writing SRBP is that posts sometimes show changes in thinking as your humble e-scribbler gains more information.

Over the last few posts and on Twitter, some of you may have seen a comment to the effect that you could replace the government subsidy to the university with a tuition hike and be cash to the good.  Well, that just is’;t the case.  As Tuesday’s post showed, the government grant covers about 71% of the university’s operating revenue every year.  Tuition covered about the same percentage (11%) as it did in 1977.

Taking a hard look at the current numbers showed that tuition and fees from the 18,700 graduate, undergraduate, and distance students  at the university, full- and part-time brings in slightly less than $60 million annually.

What hasn’t changed, though, is the starting point of this mini series from last Friday:  the university needs cash.  The question is how to get it.

Paul Antle’s Opening Shot #nlpoli

Here’s the e-mail that’s making the rounds:

I am running for Leader of the Liberal Party of Newfoundland and Labrador. I have no confidence in the current government. We've come too far to go backwards. I love this place and I understand its DNA. Our province has no leadership. That's about to change.

Please join me for the launch of my Liberal Leadership Campaign on Thursday, July 11th, 12:00 noon.

Manuels River Hibernia Interpretation Centre//7 Conception Bay Highway//Conception Bay South, Newfoundland [sic]//A1W 3A2

Paul

-srbp-

“China is already so yesterday” #nlpoli

Memorial University’s dean of graduate studies wasn’t so keen on China as a source of students in February 2011.  In a post on her blog Postcards from the edge, Noreen Golfman wrote;

The point is that Memorial, if it is to play seriously in the realm of international recruitment, cannot afford merely to be part of the bandwagon. It has to get ahead of it. China is already so yesterday.

The academics even invented a word for the trend – surprise, surprise  - at universities to seek more and more of their student population from other countries.  They call it “internationalization”.

The motivation is simple:  money.  Golfman acknowledged that point up front in the same blog post.  The available pool of young people is getting smaller, thanks to the fact that birthrates are dropping off in the developed world.  As a result, universities have to go on a hunt for students to keep everything operating:

And, so, yes, the motivation has been, in the first instance, largely economic.

None of that is a surprise.  Nor would anyone be surprised to find that by November 2011, Golfman was in China on a student-hunting safari. She was back there again in 2012.

Some inconvenient truths: goring some educational sacred cows #nlpoli

Friday turned out to be Post-Secondary Education Day with a post here on the impact of the freeze on tuition fees and a fascinating Telegram article on the Conservatives’ 2011 campaign pledge to replace student loans with needs-based grants.

Tuition was a bit of an issue in the 2011 provincial general election.  The Tory pledge is basically a variation on the New Democrat campaign platform plank in the same election to make wipe out tuition altogether. 

Supporters of the low or free tuition argument claim that by charging a tuition fee at all, “we are basically discriminating against poor people and the middle class.”  The Canadian Federation of Students likes the current tuition freeze and is loving up the idea of grants that would make tuition even cheaper or free.

The local rep commented in the Friday story in the Telegram that the current system “is the envy of people across the country.”

Really? 

VOCM more like Fox and Sun #nlpoli

VOCM’s newsroom is taking a massive step downward with a headline on the Liberal leadership.  On Friday, Dwight Ball stepped down as interim leader.  The caucus will decide his replace – officially – at a meeting they’ll hold in a couple of weeks.

The entire VO story consists of these few sentences under the headline “Liberal Party Leaderless”:

Dwight Ball has submitted his resignation as lnterim Leader of the Liberal Party.  Ball is joining business leaders Paul Antle and Cathy Bennett, MHA Jim Bennett, and former MHA Danny Dumaresque in the race. Party president Judy Morrow says the process should ensure a strong, united party in the next general election.  Voting will take place in November.

So either VO is now openly employing the Sun and Fox News stylebook in the newsroom or someone at VOCM is applying for a job as a government communications director. 

-srbp-

Great Political Quotes: Tax Shelter edition #nlpoli

“We lost, but that passion for fighting the injustice of a retroactive law change — that passion I will bring to the Liberal Party of Newfoundland and Labrador, and to the people of Newfoundland and Labrador…”

Liberal leadership hopeful Paul Antle

CBC reported on Friday that a “Federal Court of Appeal judge ruled in 2010 that a trust set up in the Caribbean by the wife of Liberal leadership candidate Paul Antle was a ‘sham’ used to incorrectly shield [sic] more than $1 million from capital gains taxes.”

That sounds like a great campaign slogan:

Paul Antle:  fighting for tax shelters

His team has their work cut out for them.

-srbp-

The price of subsidy – MUN Tuition

In early June, a CBC investigation revealed that Memorial University is charging special fees for some international graduates students. That was just one of a series of problems with the international student programs noted in the report. 

Some of the students were Chinese.  As it turns out, 36% of [all] Memorial’s grad [international] students are from China.*  That’s a figure that turned up in a news release on June 27 that came out of the recent junket by the Premier, a couple of her retiring ministers, Ed Martin from Nalcor and Memorial president Gary Kachinowski.

One agreement signed on the trip set up “the China Scholarship Council and Memorial University of Newfoundland Joint Funding Program, which will support up to 20 qualified doctoral students who will be jointly funded by Memorial University and the CSC to pursue doctoral studies.”

A long way from best in class #nlpoli

Cathy Bennett’s leadership launch event was organized as one would expect.  Her speech was scripted and, hand gestures and all, well rehearsed.

From the start there was the flush of jargon that one expects these days from business people getting into politics.  A “decision process’ had led her to this spot.  The province must be “best in class”.  Things must be “actioned”.  We must “start a conversation.”  Energy, passion and fire -  especially passion – occurred in the speech with  as much frequency as “strong voice” used to turn up with others.

She pledged to be “open and accountable” as well as honest and persuasive.”

Bennett didn’t offer much beyond stock phrases on anything, though,  except on three points:  increased immigration,  full-day kindergarten, and Muskrat Falls.

The Campaign Starts… #nlpoli

Okay anyone who believed Cathy Bennett was “thinking about it” over the weekend know that she was already getting her Liberal leadership campaign in gear.  She’ll be launching later on Wednesday morning.

You see, as much as some people might fancy that her media line was true, you just can’t get a campaign website organized and a leadership launch event with all the bells and whistles done in two days.  Well, you can.  The problem is that it would look like Jim Bennett’s announcement in Corner Brook on the Friday before the Canada Day long weekend: not a serious or well financed contender.

Cathy Bennett is the opposite.  She’s serious and she’ll have money. Most likely, Cathy will wind up sparring directly with Dwight Ball for the job. Danny Dumaresque  - who launched on Tuesday - will give a brave show but both he and Jim will drop off after the first ballot come November.

For all that, at the start of the campaign, each one of the contenders will face some common issues, problems, or challenges. Here are a few.

The Politics of Fashion #nlpoli

As it turns out, Corporate Research Associates president Don Mills had lots to say to the St. John’s Board of Trade besides a few guesses.

Newfoundland and Labrador can’t create economic booms in every nook and cranny.  Instead, we should focus on growth centres where people are moving anyway.

Such radical - dare one say revolutionary  - ideas. How blessed the Board of Trade members were to hear these comments the likes of which they have never heard before.

Surely.

Never heard the likes of it before, except for the 1992 Strategic Economic Plan.

The Great War and Newfoundland Nationalism #nlpoli

This is a revised version of post that originally appeared on July 4, 2012.

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Mark Humphries is an historian at Memorial University.  He spoke with CBC’s Chris O’Neill-Yates on July 1, 2012 about the impact of Beaumont Hamel on Newfoundland and Labrador.

Humphries does an interesting job of putting the 700 dead and wounded on that day into a larger context.  He likened it to 161,000 Canadian males between 19 and 45 years of age dying in 20 minutes today.

Then, in response to a question from Chris, Humphries turned it into a unifying event for the country.

Commemoration Day, 2013 #nlpoli

Tread softly here! Go reverently and slow!
You let your soul go down upon its knees
And with bowed head, and heart abased strive hard
To grasp the future gain in the sore loss!
For not one foot of this dank sod but drank
Its surfeit of the blood of gallant men.
Who for their faith their hope – for life and liberty
Here made the sacrifice – here gave their lives
And gave right willingly – for you and me.

-srbp-

Did his nose just grow… again? #nlpoli

According to Nalcor boss Ed Martin,  the absence of a mere $15 million of old-fashioned 2D seismic was an obstacle to multi-billion dollar global corporations doing business offshore Newfoundland and Labrador.

“The strategic investments we are making in our geoscience program in offshore Newfoundland and Labrador is laying the foundation, by lowering barriers, for major international petroleum companies to invest their capital for further exploration in the province,” said Ed Martin, Nalcor Energy’s President and CEO.

Seriously?

Ed Martin thinks people will actually believe that.  People are actually that dim.

Pinocchiosis is truly a horribly disfiguring disease.

-srbp-