29 October 2009

The Fan Club

There has always been this bizarro cult of personality thing to Danny Williams’ supporters.

They worship him as if he was a celebrity.

Some out here in the rest of the world – your humble e-scribbler included – have taken to calling the truly hard core cultists The Fan Club.  They make comments all over the Internet faithfully  pushing whatever line is currently on the go from the Club directors or simply attacking anything that they think undermines the gloriousness of their idol.

They’ve got a language of their own, too, but that’s another story.

Six years in, though, the Fan Club doesn’t have quite the same impact as it once did.

Take the past 24 hours with two examples.

Not so very long ago, the sort of attack on supposed foreign demonios being launched by Hisself and the Fan Club  against Hydro-Quebec (again) would be spreading like wildfire.  For examples of the Fan Club talking points, just check the comments sections at the Telegram, CBC or even here at Bond Papers.

Not so this time.

This is all old hat around these parts and ordinary taxpayers seem to be having a really hard time connecting a theoretical issue in far off New Brunswick to real-world issues in this province and in their lives. 

People have built up an immunity to the same old, same old.

Now that’s really interesting because the immunity is really at the heart of the results in the Straits by-election.  Hisself framed the whole thing around the same old, same old:  look at all the riches I brought you.  $137 million.  Show me how much you appreciate that by voting for me.

Well, they didn’t. 

A couple of thousand people didn’t and likely lots more didn’t who just never bothered to show up at the polls.  A monumental effort worthy of the most grandiose display of the faltering Smallwood empire failed to motivate enough to win the seat as it has every time since 2001 in the Straits and on the overwhelming majority of other similar cases across the province ever since 2001.

That’s not good.

Nor is it good that the Hydro-Quebec attack – another same old, same old – ain’t working either. 

That is intended for two purposes:

First, it lets Hisself vent his frustration that the Lower Churchill just isn’t happening. 

Second – and perhaps most importantly -  it is supposed to help change the channel and get people’s mind off the disaster in the Straits.

But it isn’t doing that second thing.  The ordinary taxpayers seem to have caught on.

Meanwhile, there is another problem for the Fan Club beyond the fact their usual stuff just doesn’t work any more.

As he left, Trevor Taylor provided his membership in the Fan Club by praising Hisself to the highest heights on every level.  Hisself returned the favour in his comments about Trevor.

Until the loss in the Straits.

Now party insiders are spinning the story to local media – see David Cochrane’s report on Wednesday’s Here and Now, for example –  that the whole loss was Trevor’s fault.

That sort of stuff just isn’t going to sit well with a whole bunch of people who haven’t joined the Fan Club but who like the stuff Hisself puts out.  They’ve been buying his CDs for a few years now just like they’ve bought The Other Blue Note CDs before. 

But maybe not so much any more.

Not, that is, if people like Trevor are getting blamed for stuff they really didn’t do.

Fan Club takes on a whole new meaning when it’s the fans getting clubbed.

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Eating his own

Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Danny Williams is tearing strips, not off New Brunswick Premier Shawn Graham or Hydro-Quebec but his own deal with Hydro-Quebec from last April.

Williams attacked the deal in a letter to Graham:

Despite our expectation of regulatory fairness [ in wheeling electricity across Quebec], Nalcor Energy has encountered obstacles in Quebec. Nalcor has been forced to lodge four complaints with the regulatory authority in Quebec about the tactics being used by Hydro Quebec Transenergie that serve to delay and inhibit our progress.

Under an agreement announced in April 2009, the provincial government’s energy corporation sells power to unidentified customers in New York state.  The power is wheeled along transmissions lines in Quebec under what is known as the open access transmission tariff.   NALCO pays Hydro-Quebec $19 million a year to wheel the power.  The figure was not released by NALCO or the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador.

While Williams is now slamming the deal – making it sound as if there was no wheeling agreement at all -  back in April, he was positively giddy with excitement at what he termed an “historic” agreement:

“This is truly a historic and momentous occasion for the people of our province, as never before have we been granted access through the province of Quebec with our own power…”.

There is no obvious explanation for Williams sudden attack on his own project nor is there any explanation for his claims that Hydro-Quebec is blocking or trying to block NALCOR’s access to markets.  The April deal proves there is no real obstacle.

What makes the latest tirade all the more bizarre is that in a scrum with reporters two days ago, Williams acknowledged  that there was no obstacle to getting power to markets in the United States.  In the same scrum, he said Hydro-Quebec might be trying to do just that. 

His disdain for the sale of NB Power to Hydro-Quebec is apparently based on losing the race for new markets for hydroelectricity.

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A cross between Karnac and Kreskin

In 2006, the Globe’s Konrad Yakabuski warned Danny Williams that he might be beaten to market by the people at Hydro-Quebec.

Turns out Konrad was right, after all:

Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams decided earlier this year to go it alone on a proposed $6-billion to $9-billion (according to already stale estimates) hydroelectric development on the lower Churchill River in Labrador, rejecting an offer from Hydro-Quebec and the Ontario government to jointly build the 2,800-megawatt project. It was great politics. Newfoundlanders still feel they're being stiffed by Quebec on the massive 5,400-MW Churchill Falls hydro deal that their late premier Joey Smallwood negotiated in the sixties. They'd dearly love to see their current leader stiff Quebec on the lower Churchill.

The problem is that it's impossible. Hydro-Quebec is the biggest and most savvy hydroelectric company on the continent. When Mr. Williams turned his nose up at its offer, it took about two seconds for Hydro-Quebec chief executive officer Thierry Vandal to move to Plan B. The latter entails fast-tracking 4,500-MW worth of hydro developments within Quebec. If Hydro-Quebec's stated goal is not to prevent Newfoundland from proceeding without it on the lower Churchill, its decision to green-light competing projects in la belle province certainly casts enough of a pall over Newfoundland's project in order to make it a tough sell for Mr. Williams.

Anyone have the full article?

It is amazing the number times people have forecast things like this since 2003 and they have come true.

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28 October 2009

Williams miffed that HQ beat him to market again

In his written reply to Shawn Graham released today, Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Danny Williams reveals that his government energy corporation was in discussions to sell power to New Brunswick from the still largely conceptual Lower Churchill project.

But Hydro Quebec – with as much power as the Lower Churchill may one day offer already under construction -  evidently beat Williams to the punch.

The real  source of Williams’ frustration at news of a deal to sell NB Power to Hydro Quebec is buried after six lengthy paragraphs of irrelevant frothing:

One of the potential impacts of Hydro Quebec’s dominance may be the premature cessation of current, good faith discussions between Nalcor Energy and NB Power to sell competitively priced Lower Churchill power to New Brunswick and jointly advance the long term, mutual interests of both of our provinces in conjunction with Nova Scotia and P.E.I. These discussions have not yet reached an advanced stage, so it is not possible to quantify the benefits that might be lost to our two provinces and all of Atlantic Canada if discussions are terminated. If New Brunswick narrows down its range of alternatives to a single-window with Hydro Quebec, full information may not be available to evaluate the opportunities that other alternatives may bring. I would reiterate that our province feels compelled to look into the potential of anti-competitive behaviour on the part of Hydro Quebec given the potential monopoly that could exist as the result of an agreement between them and NB Power. [Emphasis added]

The revelation that Williams had been beaten to the market by Hydro Quebec is almost as astonishing as word last month from Williams energy minister that he had been working for five years, making secret offers for Hydro-Quebec to take an ownership stake in the Lower Churchill project. 

Williams criticises the Churchill Falls deal in the Graham letter but, according natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale, Williams was willing to set the issue to one side in exchange for Hydro-Quebec buying a piece of the Lower Churchill.

In 2006, Williams rejected a proposal from Ontario Hydro and Hydro-Quebec to jointly develop the Lower Churchill.  Williams said the province would go-it-alone.  He made no reference at the time to efforts to lure Hydro-Quebec into another deal, as Dunderdale revealed.

Hydro-Quebec already had significant hydro projects in the works and added about 4,000 megawatts of wind energy to its mix of new project.

The Lower Churchill proposal currently undergoing environmental review consists of transmission through Quebec and a line to bring power from the project to eastern Newfoundland.  There is no proposal in public to run the power to New Brunswick.

The Lower Churchill project  - estimated to cost between $6.0 and $9.0 billion – has no confirmed markets.  An opening to Rhode Island apparently fell apart because power could not be delivered at a marketable price.  That isn’t what the energy minister told the public.

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The best by-election commentary

1.  There is nothing that trumps the analysis by a political veteran like nottawa.  The Temelinis, Dunns and Marlands of the world are so far removed from what actually goes on they really can’t offer anything beyond theory and abstraction masquerading as fact. 

To take it a step further, nottawa has really hit on the essence of the Danny message since Day One.  Back in 2001 and again in 2003, it was “Elect me and I will personally take away all your pain, bring you jobs and gobs of cash.”  In 2007 and since then, it was all about Hisself and how much Hisself had brought in fulfillment of the earlier promise.

2.   Right behind nottawa is Winston Smith.  His round-up includes a reference to Yvonne Jones pithy observation that:

"People want a voice, and there isn't a voice inside the Williams government," she said. "Most of the backbenchers are silent. Many of the cabinet ministers are allowing critical cuts to happen in their districts without ever speaking out against it."

Winston has a couple of other things in there including the complicity of the local media in supporting the cult of personality but that’s almost old hat.

3.  Undoubtedly there’ll be more but that should hold you for now.

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Separated at birth: Magicians

Harry Blackstone Junior








Marshall Dean

Kremlinology 11: Words that start with “p” and “o” together

Just notice in the by-election follow up media how much the Premier and others – including Memorial University profs like Alex Marland and Michael Temelini  - base their assessment of the importance of Marshall Dean’s win in the Straits pretty much exclusively on how popular Danny Williams is showing in the polls.

Just notice it.

Pretty well exclusively.

It doesn’t really matter, they say, because we are/he is hugely popular.

Just keep that in mind.

Polls.

Popularity.

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27 October 2009

Libs win Straits

Marshall Dean took the by-election in the Straits and White Bay North this evening against Premier Danny Williams, just about all the provincial cabinet and millions in public cash.

Dean defeated provincial Conservative candidate Rick Pelley – former executive assistant to Trevor Taylor – and New Democrat Dale Colbourne.

The results (40 out of 40 polls) were:

Dean – 1925

Pelley – 1799

Colbourne – 320

The Straits was one of two by-elections won by the provincial Conservatives in 2001 and heralded by many as a sign of the ascendency of the Tories under Danny Williams. 

Trevor Taylor won the seat for the Tories.  The by-election Tuesday was necessitated by his unexpected resignation in September.

Danny Williams, the former cable television mogul,  was the only declared candidate to lead the provincial Conservatives at the time of the 2001 by-election in January 2001 and was acclaimed as leader a few weeks later. 

In many respects this Liberal victory is truly remarkable.  Williams’ Conservatives have been virtually unassailable for years and their bank account is full.  that’s exemplified by the 2008 financial reports which show the Tories raised the better part of $600,000 while the Liberals barely pocketed $40,000.

While Williams, his cabinet and long-time party organizers rushed to the district to back the Tory candidate, the Grits could rely on little more than moral encouragement from other parts of the province, a very small cadre of provincial organizers and whatever Dean could pull together himself. 

The next test will be a by-election in Terra Nova necessitated by the surprise resignation of Paul Oram only days after Taylor bailed out.

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Lash-up

With municipal affairs minister Diane Whelan hospitalized with an undisclosed but reportedly very serious illness, the Premier shuffles a few more portfolios off to ministers on a temporary basis with no sign of a permanent set up.

Whelan was already carrying the temporary assignments resulting from Trevor Taylor’s surprise resignation.

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Shawn to Danny: sod off, mate

New Brunswick Premier Shawn Graham sent Newfoundland and Labrador premier Danny Williams a polite letter on Wednesday telling him to keep his nose out of the NB Power talks and stick to running his own province.

image

Graham also repeats the point that others have made, namely that any suggestion that the grid through new Brunswick might be somehow closed or restricted as a result of any deal with Hydro-Quebec is without merit or foundation. Click that image, by the way, and you’ll get the whole letter, courtesy of cbc.ca/nb.

Stunning.  Not.

Incidentally, there’s also no small irony in Williams’ comments warning about New Brunswick selling off its natural resources to Hydro-Quebec.

In September natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale revealed some details about Danny Williams’ previously secret offers to Hydro-Quebec to take an ownership stake in the Lower Churchill.

labradore offers chunks of the transcript of Dunderdale’s interview. So much for “despicable.” 

Those Dunderdale comments were all the more stunning in light of Williams’ previous position about demanding redress for the Churchill Falls contract before there would be any deal on the Lower Churchill.  According Dunderdale, Williams was willing to set the whole issue of the odious 1969 contract to one side in the interest of giving Quebec a fair return on its investment in the new project.

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26 October 2009

NL and the NB Power story: the facts

For the benefit of those who keep using the Premier’s comments on the NB Power story, here is what is really going on, in the words of natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale:

We know that if you come in here as an equity player that you have to have a good return on your investment. And we want you to have a good return on your investment. But it also has to be a good deal for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador. Now we have been with that message back and forth [i.e. to Hydro-Quebec] for five years. No, sir. No, sir. There is no takeup on that proposal.

Yes.

That’s right.

Danny Williams wants Hydro-Quebec to have a good return on its investments.

In this case, it was a good return in exchange for owning a piece of the Lower Churchill.

So what is the pseudo-racket all about?

It might all be irrelevant by tomorrow evening.

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25 October 2009

The next target for over-the-hill celebrities

cute

That used to be a seal in there somewhere.

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Kremlinology 10: Ah to be a Tory in Gander in October, when the dogs are fit to wag

When the political going gets tough, what better way to handle it than to launch a phoney jihad against a completely imaginary enemy over a completely imaginary dispute:

The Premier is gearing up for another fight on the national stage. Danny Williams says Hydro Quebec continues to try and block this province from developing the Lower Churchill, now refusing to sign onto a water management agreement for the Churchill River in Labrador.

For starters, Danny Williams is only pissed at Hydro-Quebec because they aren’t willing to take the ownership of the Lower Churchill he offered then. It’s not that they are so interested in the LC and Danny that they are blocking him, it’s really bothering him that Hydro-Quebec just isn’t interested at all.

And that’s after five years of desperately trying:

[Natural resources minister Kathy] Dunderdale told VOCM Open Line show host Randy Simms on Friday morning that over the past five years, the Williams administration “got a path beaten to their [Hydro Quebec’s] door” in an attempt to have HQ become what Dunderdale described as an “equity partner” in the Lower Churchill.

Dunderdale described the Lower Churchill “piece” as a “win-win” for Hydro Quebec. She said that despite efforts by the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador there was “no take up [from Hydro Quebec] on the proposal.”

But the biggest thing you have to consider on this water rights agreement thingy is that if the two parties – NALCO and Churchill Falls-Labrador Company – can’t reach and agreement on their own, the whole thing will be settled legally and finally by the public utilities board.

No big public, hair-mussing fuss required.

Danny Williams knows this because that’s what he amended the law to say in preparation for just such an event.

Well, okay first the provincial government tried to screw with the contract – as someone else tried in the 1980 water rights case - but they got caught red-handed in that little bit of tomfoolery.

While Williams and his ministers tried to downplay it at the time, they were caught so far in the wrong they even had to call an extremely rare emergency session of the legislature to deal with the mess created by someone’s childish legalistic game.

Anyway, that’s another story.

CFLCO not interested in the deal on water rights Williams wants?

Well that’s no problemo.

The whole thing just falls along according to amendments made to the Electrical Power Control Act in 2007 by none other than Danny Williams’ own administration.

The public utilities board – headed by Williams’ new buddy Andy Wells – just imposes a deal on the two sides:

5.5 (1) Where 2 or more persons to whom subsection 5.4(1) applies fail to enter into an agreement within a reasonable time, one or more of them may apply to the public utilities board to establish the terms of an agreement between them.

(2) Where an application is made to the public utilities board under subsection (1), the board shall establish the terms of an agreement for the purpose of achieving the policy objective set out in subparagraph 3(b)(i).

(3) An agreement established by the public utilities board under subsection (2) is binding on the persons named in the agreement.

Poof.

Job done.

Pas de sweat.

And lookit, the company involved here isn’t Hydro-Quebec, it’s the Churchill Falls-Labrador Corporation. That’s the company in which the provincial government’s energy company – NALCOR - owns a 65% stake.

And if you are still not convinced this is all yet another case of Tory dog-wagging, just consider that this evil foreign demonio Hydro-Quebec hates Williams so much and is working so hard to block the Lower Churchill they were will to sign a deal allowing energy from Labrador wheel across their province.

Wheel power and they make millions off the wheeling charges. Gee, that’s really putting obstacles in the way of the Lower Churchill. Yep, what better way to block the Glorious Lower Churchill project than demonstrating that Danny Williams can wheel power through Quebec to some other market than Quebec without any obstacles.

So what is all Danny Williams’ puffed chest really about?

Not even Ed Martin - the head of the provincial government’s energy company - seems to know.

But if one Ed doesn’t, maybe your humble e-scribbler can offer some easy suggestions on what issues are causing the provincial Conservatives to go hunting for a distraction:

- The by-election in the Straits is really not going well at all for the Tories. Then there’s Terra Nova to fight where the Tories haven’t even got a candidate yet and the Liberals wound up having two to pick from. Eight cabinet ministers in one day and four trips by the premier Hisself don’t seem to be working on the voters, at least not the way it is supposed to work.

Very frustrating when the old tricks don’t work any more.

- It’s really, really, really painful to make one decision and then be forced to make another. Think Danny Williams and the whole lab and x-ray thing. Jerome Kennedy confessed just this past week to what some of us have known all along: the decision to chop service was made by the entire cabinet.

That’s why they all stuck so hard to the line about “improvements.

That’s why they resisted changing their minds right up until the point they had no choice.

That’s why they tried desperately for weeks to try and blame someone else for the shag up rather than the people who actually shagged up.

It really bruises the ego to lose.

- And that’s on top of a string of “losses” including the Gros Morne one. Again, as much as they tried to downplay it, the whole emergency session of the legislature must have deeply embarrassed cabinet.

- There’s also the ongoing embarrassment of Paul Oram coupled with his decision to up and run when the going got tough. A cabinet minister resigns hot on the heels of another, thereby creating a mini-crisis in the government? Not a way to make the leader feel cheery. Paul Oram took himself off a raft of Tory Christmas card lists with his poorly executed exit.

- Unflattering comparisons to Roger Grimes? Lighten up a bit, people. It’s a joke.

- Let’s not forget the admission that the provincial Conservatives haven’t been doing such a fine old job of managing the public purse as they’d claimed. The word Oram used was “unsustainable.” Finance minister Tom Marshall said much the same thing.

- Then there’s the revelation that the government’s satisfaction rate ain’t what it was purported to be by the government’s own pollster. Between the opposition and local media, three recent CRA polls – never released publicly before – show that the people of Newfoundland and Labrador told CRA one thing but CRA told the public something else. The truth is sometimes painful but it does come out.

- Then there is the ongoing frustration of the Lower Churchill. As a story in the Telegram noted [not available online], NALCO has to go back and answer a whole bunch of questions for the environmental review on the Lower Churchill and that is now behind schedule. That’s on top of the lack of partners (see above), lack of markets - think Rhode Island - and the huge embarrassment to the government of being forced to abandon their original plan of slinging power lines through a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

On the whole it has been a very rough patch for the ruling Conservatives, at least from their perspective over the last six weeks and a bit more.

And what better place for provincial Conservatives to engage in some traditional Tory dog-wagging than the annual convention in Gander.

After all, that’s where ABC was born, at a time – as the House spending scandal broke in 2006, among other things – when things didn’t look all that rosy for provincial Tories in the short term.

Come to think of it, Loyola Sullivan packed it in not long after that, as did Paul Shelley and a few others.

Hmmm.

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24 October 2009

Minister in hospital, “seriously ill”

Revealed at the Tory convention in Gander:  municipal affairs minister Diane Whelan has been hospitalised and is “seriously ill.”

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$10 billion for NB Power

A deal is close according to the Globe and Mail that would see Hydro-Quebec buy all of NB Power for $10 billion.

But the Globe story contains some of its characteristic shit reporting in the sub-head: “blocking access of other provinces' utilities to U.S. markets”.

There’s more the same drivel farther down the story but don’t buy most of it because it just isn’t true.

This sale can’t block access for anyone to NB’s power grid.  It can’t, not if NB Power and HQ want to keep selling power into the US.

And from the looks of it at least one statement could be completely false:  “Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro has complained to regulators in Quebec and the United States that Hydro-Québec's transmission arm is not providing it fair access to U.S. markets.”

You see Danny Williams has bitched alright, but he was bitching because he couldn’t get HQ to buy into the Lower Churchill. 

But…

According to Ed Martin, Williams right-hand on any of a number of issues, there is no problem whatsoever with Hydro-Quebec.  Thus it would be very odd if the company Martin runs was doing things – as the Globe reports -  like filing formal complaints alleging some pretty serious unfair market practices against HQ. 

All they have actually done is pursue a tariff through Quebec which they duly got.  Your see – Shawn and Rheal take note – NL Hydro has already been wheeling power into the United States across lines in Quebec in a deal touted by none other than …wait for it…Danny Williams Hisself.

Notice there is no further detail on that in the Globe story.  That’s a pretty good clue that Rheal Seguin and and Shawn McCarthy just didn’t do their homework.   Instead, they seem to have opted for a half-backed paraphrase of an equally a half-baked version of the old Danny story and not rely on what Danny’s energy minister said. 

In the process, the bitching morphed into a complaint filed with a Canadian or American utility regulator.  Look farther on in the story and that’s exactly what they do, and as you can see they got the bitching story and the bit about the alternate transmission line wrong too.  That’s what you get for quoting Liz’s thumbs and not doing any real research.

There’s also another completely asinine comment about HQ getting greater access to the US as a result.  If the guys at the Globe even bothered to check their facts, they’d know that HQ already owns capacity on the grid through New Brunswick. The story has been out there since the spring. That’s definitely not the motivation for this deal.

The upside to this story is that New Brunswickers will shed a 90-year-old chronic debt pig and retire in the process what the Globe describes as 40% of public debt in one fell swoop.

Let’s just hope that while about half the story appears to be complete fiction, the bit about New Brunswickers shedding their debt burden turns out to be true.

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That’s likely to impress the hell out of them

Fisheries minister Tom Hedderson, campaigning desperately in the Straits and White Bay North tells talk show host Bill Rowe that he’s having a great time in the district.

Apparently it’s been wonderful to be reacquainted with the district and the local concerns.  In fact, it’s the first he’s been there since 2001 when Trevor Taylor won the by-election.

Hmmm.

And this would be the same district hard hit by the economic downturn, particularly in the fishery.  Where Tom offered people make work at minimum wage in October using a form that evidently had been around since July.

First time back since 2001, eh?

Oh yeah, that’s bound to impress the hell out of the locals in the run-up to what voting day in what appears to be a very tight race.

And Tommy is not the only cabinet minister expressing his surprise at discovering there are actually people who live out beyond that overpass thing.

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23 October 2009

Competitive Advantage versus the Albania Solution

New Brunswick and Quebec have some interesting common energy interests, not the least of which is New Brunswick’s electricity interconnection with the United States.

No surprise therefore that the two provinces are talking about co-operation, possibly including the sale of some of NB Power’s assets to Hydro-Quebec.

What  parts of the New Brunswick company might be of interest to Quebec aren’t clear.  One thing is certain, though:  the nuclear division is mired in cost over-runs on the up-grade for the Point Lepreau site.  That might well make it a huge liability for NB Power in any broader sale.

The one competitive advantage the province has is its transmission lines and a strong, continuing relationship with New England customers.  By contrast, Newfoundland and Labrador can’t even figure out if they are still working with Rhode Island.

Expect a local talking point that heads somewhere close to the giant conspiracy theory floated earlier by the Premier.

What you get by putting the real stories together is that NB Power is considerably more attractive than a fanciful project in Labrador that is both far from market and far from existing. A recent Telegram report by Rob Antle [not online] noted that the project is behind schedule in delivering detailed answers as part of the environmental review process.

On top of that it can’t be discounted that political tirades by the current administration have poisoned the relationship with other provinces.  things are evidently so bad that even a willingness by Danny Williams to completely abandon his “redress” position and offer Hydro-Quebec an ownership stake in the Lower Churchill didn’t get even a sniff of interest from the Quebec Crown corporation.

Isolation is not good for Newfoundland and Labrador’s long term interest. The New Brunswick-Quebec connection demonstrates that pretty clearly.

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Kremlinology 9: By-elections

If it seems to you that there have been more by-elections since 2003 than at any comparable previous time in recent political history, you are absolutely correct.

Twice as many, in fact.

On average there was one by-election per year between  1982 and 2003.  But in the period of the provincial government’s greatest prosperity, politicians have been leaving their jobs on average at the rate of two per year.

There have been a dozen by-elections in the six years since the provincial Conservatives returned to power in 2003.  In the six years before that there were only seven and in the entire period of Liberal rule – four Premiers and 14 years – there were 16.

And just to really drive the point home, in the seven years between Brian Peckford’s massive victory and the fall of Tom Rideout’s Tories in 1989, there were just six.

The Conservatives have also shed more cabinet ministers compared to any administration since 1982 and lost them in unusual or controversial situations.

Former Tory leader Ed Byrne resigned to face corruption charges.  Former leader Loyola Sullivan left politics in a complete shocker later that same year. Paul Shelley resigned suddenly in early 2007.  Since the 2007 general election, Tom Rideout packed it in during a dispute over road paving work.  Trevor Taylor walked in the middle of controversies over health care cuts, fisheries and forestry affecting his district and Paul Oram pulled pin a week after Taylor amid controversy over health care cuts.

Here’s the data:

1.   Number of by-elections since October 2003:  13

  • Exploits
  • Placentia and St. Mary's
  • Signal Hill-Quidi Vidi
  • Port au Port
  • Kilbride
  • Ferryland
  • Humber Valley
  • Labrador West
  • Baie Verte-Springdale – 2007*
  • Baie Verte-Springdale – 2008
  • Cape St. Francis
  • The Straits & White Bay North
  • Terra Nova

*  Cabinet minister Paul Shelley resigned in early 2007 necessitating a by-election in Baie Verte-Springdale.  In the event, the by-election wasn’t called until late in the year with a date a few days before the general election.  The writ for the by-election was vacated by the general election writ.  The seat was won by Tom Rideout who resigned the next year.

2.  Number of by-Elections in same period before 2003 (i.e. 1997 to 2003): 7

  • Trinity North
  • The Straits & White Bay North
  • St. Barbe
  • Port de Grave
  • Humber West
  • Bonavista North
  • Conception Bay South

3.   Number of by-elections between 1989 and 2003:  16

4.   Number of by-elections between 1982 and 1989: 6

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NB Power up for sale?

Hydro-Quebec may be in the market to purchase NB Power, the government-owned New Brunswick power utility.

According to CBC,

In a statement Thursday, his communications director, Elizabeth Matthews, said Williams "can't imagine the people of New Brunswick would allow their government to sell their energy asset and put that power into someone else's hands."

Odd idea, that, selling an energy asset or even a chunk of an asset to Hydro-Quebec.

Surely Danny Williams would never do anything like that especially since he supposedly wanted “redress” on Churchill Falls first.

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22 October 2009

Kremlinology 8: Honestly, we’re so f*cking sorry

Count the number of Tory cabinet ministers lining up to tell the people of the Straits and White Bay North this simple little message:

We screwed up.  We are sorry.  Please, puhleese vote for our guy.  We are sorry.  We have spent a lot of money on you.  We are sorry.  Oh and did I say how sorry we were?

Jerome Kennedy.  Tom Hedderson. Two classic examples.

Could make for an interesting audio compilation, but in the short term it’s a huge clue as to how desperate things are getting for some people in the current by-election.

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