RNC mugshot revealed

  From the Chronicle Herald.

Snow Day Quiz: Talk Radio Comparison

Grab a listen to this exchange between a radio talk show host and an irate caller.

You don't need to know much about American politics and the constitution to find the thing funny.

But today's question is:  What's the difference between American talk radio and the local variety, like say the afternoon laugh riot (and ratings bust) known as Back Talk?

Post your answers in the comments section and after a little while, the answer will follow.

[h/t to Daimnation! for the clip.]

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Canada Post omits national holiday from 2008 calendar

June 24 is just another day on Canada Post's 2008 calendar, apparently.

In Quebec, Canadian Press is reporting the story since June 24 is Saint-Jean Baptiste Day, the nationalist holiday in that province.

But, June 24 is also an important day for Canada as a whole.

According to legend, Giovanni Caboto (John Cabot) sighted land on his exploration voyage for the King of England on June 24, 1497.  The land he found was Newfoundland, and as such, June 24 is a day of national historic significance.  The day has long been celebrated in Newfoundland and Labrador as Discovery Day, but since 1949, the date should also mark a discovery day for all Canada.

Too bad Canadian history isn't better known among Canadians.

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"Too bureaucratic": Andy Wells

Translation:  "I couldn't verbally abuse and browbeat people into submission.  The board expected me to read briefs and have an informed opinion instead of just shooting off with some colourful words and phrases."

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Wasn't this a graphic novel before they made it into a movie?

Who said Hollywood's fiction writers are on strike?

The Globe's Danny Chavez piece is the sort of fluffy, insubstantial silliness we might have expected four years ago, but at this point, it's just downright bizarre to see John Gray's piece when so much fact and detail is known.

How many myths can you find, right down to the one about everything past the overpass on death watch or Danny running in Corner Brook to fight the overpass syndrome?

At some point, some reporter from somewhere will write something serious.

John Gray ain't it.

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GIGO editorial; GIGO policy

There's an acronym among the amateur computer programmers out there:  GIGO. It stands for Garbage In;  Garbage Out. In other words if you start off wrongly, then odds are what comes out the other end of the process will be wrong, too.

It really applies to just about any process. Like say an editorial which is ostensibly about the current racket over Equalization and political promises made and broken:

Welcome to the nation's capital, where it doesn't take long to discover why Newfoundland and Labrador's fight for offshore revenues is such a hard sell.

There's the garbage in and here's the garbage out:

Just informing people in other provinces about the nuances of this debate is nearly impossible, and in the absence an understanding of the nuances, you end up sounding like an oil reactionary of some kind, lathering up about federal unfairness while everyone else is waiting for the next dish to arrive.

You see there is no "fight for offshore revenues".  There hasn't been since 1984 when the federal and provincial government signed the real Atlantic Accord.

The current political racket isn't about offshore revenues;  the provincial government gets them and spends them, just as it has since oil started flowing in 1997.  All of them too, just like in any province where the oil and gas is on land.  Just like the minerals on land in Newfoundland and Labrador. it doesn't lose a nickel of offshore revenues the province is supposed to collect and when it comes to royalties - the rent paid to the resource owner for the right to develop them - the provincial government is the only one collecting them and spending them.

The current racket is about something else and, to be brutally frank, it isn't clear what the row is about beyond some need for political theatre.

On the face of it, the fight is about Equalization and how to treat revenue going to the provinces from non-renewable resources, things like minerals and oil and gas. So let's consider the provincial government position in that light and see what happens.

Equalization is a top-up scheme.  Provincial governments that don't collect enough revenues from their sources to meet a national average get a transfer from the federal government.  The money doesn't come from other provincial governments.  It comes from federal revenues, from things like personal and corporate incomes taxes. That's your pocket and mine, whether you live in Petawawa or Pasadena.

If we ran the program based on the official provincial government position in 2005/2006, Newfoundland and Labrador wouldn't get a nickel of top-up after next year.  Every penny of oil and mineral money would be counted. The provincial government would collect more revenue than the national average and therefore, there'd be no more top-up.

Incidentally, the provincial government here currently spends more than all but two other provincial governments, calculated on a per person basis, but that's another issue.

As for Equalization offsets, the federal government would have paid out more in its $2.0 billion transfer in 2005 than the famous 2005 transfer deal (called the Atlantic Accord to be deliberately confusing to most of us) would have generated between 2004 and 2009 without the up-front cash.

On the other end of the spectrum, leaving all the oil and mineral revenues out of the calculation might well have delivered more than the $10 billion the Premier and his supporters are currently focused on. That figure came from a calculation that used an average price of oil that is now $25 to $30 per barrel lower than current prices. It also cut out in 2020-2021.  Carry it on past that date and the potential top-ups go way beyond the Premier's adopted figure.

The problem with that scenario is at the heart of the current dispute.

Provinces looked to change Equalization a few years ago because they felt the existing system treated them unfairly.  The expert panel set up to study it agreed.  They concluded the provincial government's approach worked against it and favoured provinces that had little or no revenue from non-renewable resources.  Those with non-renewables wouldn't catch a break and would have to spend that cash to pay the day-to-day bills without being able to create some sort of long-term benefit from them that would be felt once the resources were gone.

By the same token, the other scheme, in which non-renewables were left out, worked against the provinces without much cash coming from things like oil wells and mines. Both schemes - all in or all out - didn't seem fair across the board. none of this was a secret, especially to provincial governments which, in the case of the local one, opted for some reason to hitch its political future to a promise that was known to be as much of a dead issue as the system as it existed.

Instead the experts came up with the current system.  They argued their system was fair because, if nothing else,  it balanced out the advantages and disadvantages of the all-in or all-out options.  Argue with it all you want;  that's the rationale they offered.

There's something compelling about the argument, though,  given that the 10 provincial governments couldn't come to any agreement among themselves on all-in or all-out or on anything else except the need for some change. The Equalization program that we have is one that is in effect, a compromise between the first version of Danny Williams' Equalization idea and the one he now has latched onto.

No surprise either, that many people outside Newfoundland and Labrador, like a great many inside the province, don't quite get the idea Danny Williams is pushing. 

After all, he's basically arguing that every taxpayer everywhere in Canada should funnel cash into the local provincial bank account based not merely on a political promise but because this province deserves it somehow.  Spending more money per person than seven other provinces, Newfoundland and Labrador wants more still. And that's despite reaping huge windfalls from high oil and ore prices. 

The debt, you say?  Well,  those same taxpayers  from St. John's to Victoria can also see the same provincial government doing nothing of consequence about its own debt burden.  There may be something coming in the next budget but they likely heard loudly and clearly the recent admission by finance minister Tom Marshall that they'd done very little - some might say nothing  - to reduce the provincial debt load despite running surpluses and still boosting public spending over the past couple of years well beyond the rate of inflation.

The garbage out part of the editorial is the idea that some mainlanders - people in Ottawa especially - are somehow blind to reality, that they sweep aside the little things that are really important just like - as the metaphor goes - those little sidewalk sweeper machines in Ottawa flick away snowflakes.

Not really.  They just aren't confuddled by the latest political blather being offered, the kind that would claim - for example - that St. John's city sidewalks are already cleaned of snow magically overnight and that Mile One Stadium is not an economic sinkhole.

After all, if you believe this row with Ottawa is about offshore revenues, you'd likely be willing to believe just about anything.

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Cheeky monkey, Part II

The Speaker of the House of Assembly approved $12,000 plus HST for office accommodations for cabinet minister Tom Rideout in his constituency of Baie Verte-Springdale.

There is no explanation why in the simple briefing note the Speaker tabled with the legislature's management commission, even though the Regulations to the House accountability act clearly state there must be an explanation (S. 18(4)):

Where the speaker makes a decision under subsection (3) to authorize an increased allowance, he or she shall, in writing, report that decision to the next meeting of the commission together with the reasons for that decision and that information shall be recorded in the minutes of the commission meeting. [Italics added]

The Speaker's report on the issue actually misrepresents the requirements under the House accountability act when he states that a member may make application to exceed the approved sum.  They can, but they can only be approved where the Speaker is satisfied that suitable accommodation cannot be obtained within the regulations.

But here's the thing:  under s. 20 (8) b, the idea is pretty clear:

Where choosing office accommodation in a member’s constituency under paragraph (5)(a), a member shall...where accommodation, suitable in size, quality and location to the member, can be obtained in a Crown-owned building in the constituency, choose that space;

So is there no publicly-owned building in Mr. Rideout's constituency that can give him an office out of which he can operate?

What did his predecessor - also a cabinet minister - do for an office?

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Health board under-staffed

Dr. Oscar Howell, vice-president of medical services for Eastern Health said the province's largest health authority is short-staffed and is "struggling every day" to assure it follows appropriate policies.

That comment came in testimony today at a court hearing into an application by the authority to limit access by a public inquiry to two quality assurance reports into the operation of its labs.

Interestingly, Howell's comments don't seem to be entirely relevant to issue at hand. The breast cancer screening issue may not have surfaced until 2005, but the problem dates back to a time when the health authority was much smaller than it is today.

Howell's comments do go a long way to explaining how the authority has handled several major crises since it was created in 2004/2005.

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Danny confesses to breaking cell phone law

There was an official news release issued late Wednesday in which the premier admits to talking on his hand-held cell phone while driving.  He claims it was an urgent call.

[Almost immediate update:  The Premier's statement refers to taking an urgent call "yesterday", i.e. Tuesday.  Kevin Little indicated that he spotted the Premier on his cell phone on Monday. Did the Premier cop to a second incident, inadvertently?]

This isn't the first such story to circulate and within the past 24 hours, your humble e-scribbler has had accounts of two similar events.

The excuse is a bit lame.  After all, it's not like the guy couldn't afford a hands-free attachment.

Maybe that would be a good idea for the Premier to investigate, once he's forked out for the $100 fine.

Speaking of lame, the Premier's Pitcher Plants must be feeling a might sheepish.  Seems they spent the past day or so bombing CBC and VOCM with e-mails and calls attacking the integrity of the guy who filed the complaint.  They accused him, among other things, of "picking on" the Premier.

Perhaps now that the Premier has fessed up, the Pitcher Plants would have the decency to retract their e-mails and publicly apologize - each and every one of them - for their smears.

In the meantime, the Premier should still be careful, just as all politicians should.  As this particular individual showed, just because you happen to be a prominent person, you shouldn't be above the law. 

People are a bit more likely to use their cell phones to take pictures.

You know, just so that they can back up their claims next time and mow down the Pitcher Plants in advance.

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Cheeky monkey

Before Christmas, Tom Rideout went to the Speaker of the House of Assembly looking for a exemption from the maximum limit on constituency office costs.  The cap is $7,000 and according to a report filed by the Speaker with the House management committee, the best price Rideout could get was $12,000 plus HST.

But here's the thing;  doesn't Tom  - as a cabinet minister - get an office, rent-free, in a government building?

Hmmm?

Maybe office space be found in a provincially owned building, maybe, that would cost less than $1,000 per month plus HST.  That seems a solution that takes into consideration the burden on the taxpayer's pocket.

Twelve thousand bucks is pretty pricey digs, even for a guy used to renting elaborate "offices" that come complete with a basement, three bedrooms, a bathroom or two, a living room, kitchen and dining room.

Very cheeky for Tom, especially considering that this request was already submitted to the legislature  - and likely already approved by the Speaker - when the whole mess on Tom's old "office" exploded in the Telegram.

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Utterly Monkey: where can I get a copy?

From the Times.

Not that one, the real Times.

in London.

A new book, titled, curiously enough, Utterly Monkey:

Nick Laird’s first novel is an inventive, arresting variation on a familiar theme: that your home stays with you, wherever you go. In the case of Danny Williams, a young London lawyer with a bachelor pad in Dalston and newly single status to go with it, home is Ballyglass, a small town in the centre of Northern Ireland, where “for every Protestant business . . . there was the Roman Catholic equivalent”. This complicated “instance of the parallel universe becoming visible, as if two separate towns existed and somehow inhabited the same space” seems safely distant until Danny’s old friend Geordie pitches up on his doorstep in London...

Odd parallel universe in a single town.

Sheesh.  How about a whole province? 

An odd parallel world in which facts are fiction and fiction becomes fact.  in which it is somehow both know to the accused and relevant that a fellow alleging the Premier flouted the province's cell phone laws is a "NAPE worker".

Sorta like the time Danny Junior got the crap kicked out of him downtown and without evidence Dad was saying the whole thing was connected to NAPE. That was the parallel universe where an experienced criminal defence lawyer suddenly didn't know the correct procedure to be followed, so he called directly to the cop shop at 4:00 AM.  The fact the lawyer was also the first minister didn't enter into the issue, supposedly, at least in the first minister's skull and his call early in the wee hours would not at all influence the conduct of the investigation.

How about after he appears in staged  photo ops with the chief and other police officers, in what appears to be a pretty plain violation of the police act, during and election campaign?  No influence there either?

The union had nothing to do with either incident, but ya know, this latest police issue might just go away for lack of hard evidence.

Then there's the other thought, this being a parallel universe and all:  that's not the first time "Danny on the cellphone in the Avalanche" has been reported in townie conversation. And cell phones these days come with cameras that take stills and movies.

So really, no matter what the outcome of this episode, it's only a matter of time before pictures of Danny start turning up all over the place.

Candid snaps.

On his cell phone.

In the Avalanche.

Out buying groceries.

Playing golf.

Boarding an airplane for parts unknown.

Picking his nose.

You name it.

The local mini-paps will be taking snaps of their Fearless Leader.  They'll be posting them to facebook or sending them to blog writers or the local newspaper or television station.

And the next time something happens, there'll be instant pictures.

Yep.  The place will be utterly full of shutter monkeys.

All watching Danny Williams.

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Fog Devils sold to Verdun

Say goodbye to the Quebec league franchise, St. John's.

Après cinq ans d’absence, Montréal sera de retour dans la Ligue de hockey junior majeure du Québec (LHJMQ) dès l’automne prochain. Dans l’attente de la construction d’un nouvel amphithéâtre répondant aux normes du circuit Courteau, l’équipe disputera ses matches à domicile à l’Auditorium de Verdun qui subira néanmoins une cure de jouvence avec l’ajout de loges corporatives et d’une galerie de presse digne de ce nom.

Say hello to a major financial mess at city hall.

L'homme d'affaires montréalais Farrel Miller a acheté les Fog Devils de St. John's (Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador). Il déménagera la formation à Verdun pour la saison 2008-2009.

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Tekoil spuds Glori E-67

Tekoil began exploration on January 14 in northwestern Newfoundland, near Port au Choix, as part of an agreement with Ptarmigan Resources.

Tekoil & Gas Corporation announced today the spud (start of drilling) of exploration well Glori E-67. Contract work was awarded to Newfoundland owned and operated, P. Sullivan & Sons Co. Ltd. to set conductor casing. The company said that drilling began on January 14, 2008, and it is estimated this onshore portion of the program will take 20 days to complete.

Tekoil's Chairman and CEO, Mark Western said: "This is a true milestone in our young company's history, following two and a half years of exhaustive planning. Exploration in western Newfoundland has been one of our goals since inception, and we have finally made it."

Ptarmigan Resources Ltd. ("Ptarmigan") has mapped four prospects within the Ordovician carbonate platform in the Foreland Basin, and farmed out to Tekoil in January 2007. In addition to the Foreland Basin setting, Ptarmigan has also mapped two prospects in the hanging wall of the regional thrust, and these prospects are comprised of the same Ordovician carbonate reservoir systems. It is within the hanging wall that Glori E-67 will be drilled.

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Brazil offshore strikes big

PetroBras, the Brazilian state-owned oil and gas company, announced today that it had discovered an offshore oil and gas field that may contain as much as eight billion barrel-equivalents of oil and gas.

Its the second such announcement from PetroBras in the past 10 weeks.

The new field is located some 290 kilometres offshore and lies underneath more than five kilometres of ocean and seabed.

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Big policy importance; itty bitty board

For all the importance attached to the province's Hydro Corporation and its associated energy corporation, you'd think the provincial government would keep the board running at its usual complement of 10.

oddly, that doesn't seem to be the case.

Dean Macdonald packed it in shortly before Christmas to be replaced by John Ottenheimer. 

But other than that, the Hydro board is seriously short of bodies. Chris Keilly is the deputy minister of natural resources and is, in effect an ex officio appointment.  Besides Ottenheimer and Keilly, the board comprises Edna Turpin, Ken Marshall and Gerry Shortall. There's no indication publicly of how long the Hydro Corp has been short of directors nor is there any clue as to why it is the case.

In 2006, the board consisted of those plus M5 advertising vice president Craig Tucker, MUN associate business dean Tom Clift, Bill Kelly, Ed Martin, and Bill Kelly. The new Hydro Corporation act didn't changed the size of the board; in fact, the Hydro board is currently doing double duty running the energy corp.

A small board made of people with little experience in the energy sector would make it pretty easy for the company to be directed, in effect, by Ed Martin or by Martin and the Premier. That might seem like a good idea to some, but given that the Premier has other things to do, the provincial cabinet should have set the new board up with a full complement and set it to work making the energy corporation grow based on general directions from cabinet.

For all the supposed importance of the energy corporation, it looks like government is running it the same way it ran the business department.  And we all know what a success that hasn't been, some four years and three ministers later.

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The global fishery crisis hits the New York Times

Monday's editorial : "Until all the fish are gone".

The institution with the most potential leverage is the World Trade Organization. Most of the world’s fishing fleets receive heavy government subsidies for boat building, equipment and fuel, America’s fleet less so than others. Without these subsidies, which amount to about $35 billion annually, fleets would shrink in size and many destructive practices like bottom trawling would become uneconomic.

The W.T.O. has never had a reputation for environmental zeal. But knowing that healthy fisheries are important to world trade and development, the group has begun negotiating new trade rules aimed at reducing subsidies. It produced a promising draft in late November, but there is no fixed schedule for a final agreement.

The world needs such an agreement, and soon. Many fish species may soon be so depleted that they will no longer be able to reproduce themselves. As 125 of the world’s most respected scientists warned in a letter to the W.T.O. last year, the world is at a crossroads. One road leads to tremendously diminished marine life. The other leads to oceans again teeming with abundance. The W.T.O. can help choose the right one.

Then there are two articles:

"Europe takes Africa's fish..."

"Europe's appetite for seafood fuels illegal trade"

Fish is now the most traded animal commodity on the planet, with about 100 million tons of wild and farmed fish sold each year. Europe has suddenly become the world’s largest market for fish, worth more than 14 billion euros, or about $20.6 billion a year. Europe’s appetite has grown as its native fish stocks have shrunk so that Europe now needs to import 60 percent of fish sold in the region, according to the European Union.

In Europe, the imbalance between supply and demand has led to a thriving illegal trade. Some 50 percent of the fish sold in the European Union originates in developing nations, and much of it is laundered like contraband, caught and shipped illegally beyond the limits of government quotas or treaties. The smuggling operation is well financed and sophisticated, carried out by large-scale mechanized fishing fleets able to sweep up more fish than ever, chasing threatened stocks from ocean to ocean.

The European Commission estimates that more than 1.1 billion euros in illegal seafood, or $1.6 billion worth, enters Europe each year. The World Wide Fund for Nature contends that up to half the fish sold in Europe are illegally caught or imported. While some of the so-called “pirate fishing” is carried out by non-Western vessels far afield, European ships are also guilty, some of them operating close to home. An estimated 40 percent of cod caught in the Baltic Sea are illegal, said Mireille Thom, a spokeswoman for Joe Borg, the European Union’s commissioner of fisheries and maritime affairs.

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Private company wants equity in Lower Churchill?

Nova Scotia-based Emera would likely be looking for an ownership stake in the Lower Churchill if Halifax journalist Jim Meeks is right.

For Nova Scotia Power, it’s all about Nova Scotia.

For Emera, it’s not about geography but about opportunity.

You could see the differences between the two companies this week, when they each signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Newfoundland Power to (possibly) take power from the proposed Lower Churchill hydro project.

NSP wants another source of renewable energy for this province.

Emera wouldn’t mind that either. But it would also want a piece of the action if a subsea power line from Labrador lands in New Brunswick.

It could "wheel" that electricity through its enhanced transmission system in Maine, which it would like to extend to Boston.

So here's a question for the Premier:  if it would be bad to sell Labrador power to Quebec so it wheels the power to other customers at a higher price than they paid for it, why would it be better to have the same situation occur if the Labrador power was sold to a Nova Scotia private company? 

So much for go-it-alone.

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Mealy Mountains National Park in limbo

A victim of the family feud otherwise called ABC?

Mired in competing interests with the provincial government and other interests looking for ways to make sure mines in the area could develop? That would be kinda short sighted given the economic benefits of a national park.

Land claims hold ups?

A feasibility study was conducted in 2001.

it's 2008.

Why the hang up?

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But why the other "N" word, Warren?

In some of the corners of the online word, Warren Kinsella and Damien Penny are slogging it out over something or other.

But would Penny being from Newfoundland -  a "Newf" as Warren puts it - be relevant to the discussion?

Methinks not, but this will soon become another example of the great evils done to the Far East of the Western World by mainlanders.

Can't we all just get along, people?

Super duper quick update:  Warren apologises.

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House of Assembly scandal: why "no comment" is not an answer

Bond digs deeper and finds surprising result in AG saga

It's one thing to be blamed for something you did.

It's quite another to be blamed for something you didn't do.

It's another thing again to be accused of something you didn't do and then keep silent about the whole business.

In this instance, we are talking about a supposed gag order applied by the House of Assembly on the Auditor General when he makes reports on the legislature's operations.

The Telegram reported in late December that provisions of the House Accountability, Integrity and Administration Act "sets out special treatment for MHAs and House staff who may have improperly retained public money, and gags the auditor general from talking about such situations."

CBC recently took up the same point. On top of that the opposition party leaders are now raising questions about the issue.

The Canadian Press story on the opposition leaders' comments makes a fundamental error of fact when it states this:

The new law exempts legislature members and some staff from public auditor general reports involving "the improper retention or misappropriation of public money.

A Telegram editorial makes a similar erroneous comment:

It also means that we will probably never see another scandal like the one uncovered by the AG.

Why? Because, among other reasons, if an AG finds such a scandal, he or she is now specifically forbidden to tell us about it.

Pure nonsense. Bond Papers already dealt with the Telly editorial, but it's worth reviewing it again.

Section 45 of the new House of Assembly administration act sets out essentially the same directions to the Auditor General as the ones contained in s.15 of the Auditor General Act:  if he or his officials find a suspected case of improper retention of public funds, then he must report the case to authorities. s.45 specifies more people must be advised of the report than under the old s.15 and it includes - for the first time - clear direction that the accused person must have the right to address the allegations from the outset.

And while it's true that s. 45 does say the Auditor General cannot disclose anything about the report initially, as with s. 15, the AG is required - by law - to include a reference to the report in his next major report to the House of Assembly.  That is a public document. Even in the worst case scenario, the longest period that would pass before the public would learn something of a s.45 report is a year.

12 months.

Not never.

Well, unless there is a conspiracy of such dimensions that no law could be written to preclude it. But for all conceivable circumstances and in light of the scandal itself, it is very hard to see how reporters might miss such a reference next month or the month after or even in three years time.

Just to be sure, here are the two sections of the bills laid side by side, in their entirety so you can read for yourself. The words are simple.  The sentences are not complex.

 

Auditor General Act

House Accountability, Integrity  and Administration Act

Improper retention of public money 15. (1) Where during the course of an audit, the auditor general becomes aware of an improper retention or misappropriation of public money or another activity that may constitute an offence under the Criminal Code or another Act, the auditor general shall immediately report the improper retention or misappropriation of public money or other activity to the Lieutenant-Governor in Council. (2) In addition to reporting to the Lieutenant-Governor in Council under subsection (1), the auditor general shall attach to his or her annual report to the House of Assembly a list containing a general description of the incidents referred to in subsection (1) and the dates on which those incidents were reported to the Lieutenant-Governor in Council.

Improper retention of public money 45. (1)  Where (a) during the course of an audit; (b) as a result of a review of an audit report prepared by another auditor employed by the commission; or (c) as a result of an internal audit procedure, the auditor general becomes aware of an improper retention or misappropriation of public money by a member, the clerk, the clerk assistant or staff of the House of Assembly service or the statutory offices or another activity that may constitute an offence under the Criminal Code or another Act of the province or of Canada, the auditor general shall immediately report the improper retention, misappropriation of public money or other activity to (d) the speaker; (e) the chair of the audit committee; (f) the Premier; (g) the leader of the political party, if any, with which the person involved may be associated; (h) the Attorney General; and (i) the Minister of Finance. (2) In addition to reporting in accordance with subsection (1), the auditor general shall attach to his or her annual report to the House of Assembly a list containing a general description of the incidents referred to in subsection (1) and the dates on which those incidents were reported. (3) Before making a report under subsection (1), the auditor general shall give to a person involved and who may be ultimately named or identified in the report (a) full disclosure of the information of which the auditor general has become aware; and (b) a reasonable opportunity to the person to provide further information and an explanation, and shall take that information and explanation into account in deciding whether to proceed to make a report. (4) The auditor general shall not make the existence or the contents of a report referred to in subsection (1) known to another person except (a) as part of his or her annual report to the House of Assembly; (b) in accordance with a judicial proceeding; (c) as part of proceedings before the Public Accounts Committee; or (d) as a result of a request from the commission. (5) The auditor general is a compellable witness in any criminal or civil proceeding and in a proceeding before the Public Accounts Committee relating to a matter dealt with in a report made under this section. (6) Section 19.1 of the House of Assembly Act does not apply to a report made under this section. (7) Section 15 of the Auditor General Act does not apply to a member, the clerk, clerk assistant or staff of the House of Assembly service.

The silence from the legislature on this has been nothing short of amazing.  There have been no comments from the House of Assembly on the issue and in the Telegram story, the Premier's spokesperson is merely quoted as saying that the Green bill was passed as received. No one from either the House or government has made any comment. 

The Auditor General has dutifully explained to every report who asked his own rationale for staying silent, but as it should be clear, the fellow has gotten some terribly odd legal advice.  Either that or he has taken it in his head to stay completely silent, given that, after all, it was his own unsubstantiated commentaries early on in the scandal and the AG's abusive investigative process that prompted Chief Justice Derek Green to write s.45 in the first place.

Take a look at sections of Green's report and you will be struck by the strong language with which Green criticizes what happened:

Undue publication of the information in a report at such an early stage - before decisions are taken to lay charges, or prosecute or seek reimbursement - risks interfering with important constitutional and other
values. Given the relatively low threshold justifying the making of a report, even though its issuance may cause considerable damage to an individual’s reputation that may be difficult to repair if it is ultimately shown that there is an innocent explanation, one ought to be careful about bandying details about in the public domain. Furthermore, undue publication of the information with its implicit suggestion of impropriety or criminality may have an effect on a person’s constitutional right to a fair trial if charges are ultimately laid.

Still, it was striking that the Auditor General was continuing to decline any public comment on his last report, filed in September 2007, and citing Green.  Both reporters - one at the Telly and the other CBC - contacted Green and got the same reason.  They both came to the same conclusions even though, the plain English of s.45 did not apply to anything but a report on improper retention of public funds. The September mega-report wasn't one of those.

So why no comment from the AG? 

Well, either he had faulty advice, had been ordered to stay silent or there were more reports. Given that the report was made public, an order to keep his mouth shut would be odd, especially since he cited Green as the reason. He might have bad advice, but the most logical reason, namely that there had been more reports filed, is one that simply hadn't been explored by anyone. It would be pointless to ask Green himself since, by diligently following s.45 he wouldn't be able to confirm or deny the existence of a report on improper retention of funds. His silence on the whole report would be smart - under those circumstances - since he would avoid giving a hint on that a specific report existed.

The other officials identified in s.45 weren't constrained by the Act, even though the general principles Green cited in his report would restrict how much they could disclose.

So Bond started at the top and contacted the House of Assembly with a simple question

Has the Auditor General filed any reports in accordance with s. 45 of the Green Act (or s.15 of the AG Act but now covered by the Green Bill) other than those already made public on Hickey, Goudie and the individuals who have been charged?

The response took a few hours but when it came, it was as curious as could be: no comment.

No comment?

Neither "no" nor "yes", but no comment.

If there were no reports, that's easy enough to establish.  If there were reports, then their existence could only be withheld for a period, anyway.  A simple explanation of the fact that one existed and that it was being addressed would be news but - consistent with Chief Justice Green's own comments - details could be legitimately withheld to ensure the fundamental integrity of the process.  Integrity is what Green is all about, right next to accountability.

In the ordinary course, that no comment response would have been the end of it and, duly blogged, the local media would like take up the case.  They may still. In media circles and in public relations circles a flat "no comment" comes with all sorts of baggage, none of which is good.  Much like an American pleading the "fifth", no comment is often taken as being tantamount to an admission, in this case, that at least one new report existed.

Other inquiries lead your humble e-scribbler to conclude that, in fact, there are no other reports. The Auditor General has some odd legal advice or is just keep quiet and using Green as an excuse.  That's something he will have to, and should, answer for.

But at the House of Assembly, there is clearly a need to get a grip on a basic policy to handle this sort of contingency, this sort of question.  It's only by sheer coincidence that two reporters, working separately, made the same erroneous conclusion and didn't ask the obvious.  Frankly it didn't spring readily to mind at Bond until there were three examples of the AG using the same excuse.

Yes, Green creates a new set of issues and policies for the legislature but this one - a report on alleged improper retention of funds - is what broke the whole story in the first place.  In the series of media stories since Christmas, the legislators are being accused of gagging the Auditor General when clearly they haven't.

And a "no comment" response to a simple question maybe now but definitely in the future will only fuel media and public curiosity. The lack of attention to this story from the Speaker, on behalf of the management committee and the House, has allowed some to question the integrity of the very process set in place to restore public confidence. 

That shouldn't be allowed to stand unchallenged.  The House management committee meets this week and the issue of the AG gag is on the agenda.  However, the opposition leaders are coming at it largely based on erroneous media reports. This needs to be dealt with quickly and the public record set straight or the entire legislature will continue to operate under a cloud of suspicion.

Too much disclosure can lead to problems, as Chief Justice Green noted.  He gave the House of Assembly the means to address the problem based on an administrative mechanism to balance accountability with fundamental integrity.

Too little disclosure - in this case no comment - has obviously produced problems for the House and, by extension for every resident of the province.

-srbp-