If Danny was sticking around, Steve likely wouldn’t be leaving.
When long-serving staffers take a hike from a political office it usually means others will follow, including the Old Man Hisself.
And when junior staffers get promoted to senior jobs, it’s the sign of an office not keen on renewal or reinvigoration. Today’s announcement from the 8th floor screams of a crowd just killing time until the movers arrive.
-srbp-
And then there’s natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale:
Mr. Speaker, when the members opposite sat over here they certainly had no expertise in developing deals, negotiating contracts, as we saw on a number of occasions in the fourteen years of their mandate.
Of course not, Kathy.
After all, Hibernia, Terra Nova and White Rose didn’t happen in those 14 years.
And they didn’t produce every single nickel of the billions that have raised the public treasury to unprecedented heights since 2003.
No.
And it’s not like those original deals not negotiated by Dunderdale’s boss will produce the bulk of the money she claims will come from Hisself’s efforts:
…three major oil deals that we have negotiated with a value to this Province over the life of those projects, Mr. Speaker, of $35 billion.
Let’s not even remind Kathy that the figure $35 billion is pure fabrication.
All Dunderdale did today in the legislature was confirm her profound, undeniable, astounding ignorance.
There’s no other word for it.
-srbp-
It could be an episode of Fawlty Towers.
Then again mentioning Germans and industrial development in Newfoundland and Labrador is more likely to conjure up images of the numerous colossal failures of the Valdmanis/Smallwood industrialization program from the 1950s.
The Germans are coming to central Newfoundland.
As natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale told the House of Assembly on Tuesday:
I am happy to say that we have had an Expression of Interest from Germany last week, principals in, looking at what we have to offer in Central Newfoundland. We are very hopeful about that prospect, Mr. Speaker.
Well, maybe.
Outside the House, though, Dunderdale was somewhat less enthusiastic. As the Telegram reported:
Outside the House, Dunderdale told reporters the company was a reputable pulp and paper company.
But she cautioned people in the province — especially those in central Newfoundland — not to get their hopes up.
Dunderdale said even though the company has seen the former mill and gotten some information about operating a pulp and paper operation in this province, it’s too early to tell if the company will submit a proposal to set up shop in the province.
That’s pretty much the state of things in central Newfoundland these days where the provincial government keeps insisting its expropriation of Abitibi assets was not a disaster yet has a hard time proving otherwise.
There are Germans coming but no one should count on them.
Such a bizarre concept: perfidious Germans.
It’s like the shifting definition of “assets”. In December 2008, the assets were the hydroelectric generating stations and the transmission lines. The rights to the land and the timber leases all reverted back to the provincial government anyway once Abitibi stopped making paper.
Fast forward two years and the assets now include all the land. As Danny Williams put it on Tuesday:
By way of example, and this is a very simple example, the land that we recovered, the land alone that we recovered for the people of Newfoundland and Labrador - forget the water rights, forget the timber rights - is three times the size of Prince Edward Island.
Of course, as Williams knows, the water rights and the timber rights - as well as the mineral rights he didn’t mention – are what make the lands themselves valuable. Their size is irrelevant. The fact he is now citing them as assets to offset liabilities for environmental damages is likely to turn up being used by Abitibi’s smart lawyers to further demolish whatever defence Williams and his apparently not-quite-so-swift lawyers try to fend off Abitibi’s claims against the provincial government over the expropriation.
This danger – that his words will colour the legal action - is something Williams is acutely aware of, of course, since just before he identified the land as an asset he cautioned New Democrat leader Lorraine Michael that “anything that I may say in answer to that question would only help the Abitibi case in the NAFTA dispute.”
So he carried on and gave them something just as juicy to use against him.
This is the essence of this entire matter: a hasty decision followed by bungling, then excuses and then unsubstantiated claims. Laced through it all is the lecturing and condescension from the premier and his ministers. none of that really comes off, of course, since the entire gaggle of them have shown they have a very tenuous grasp on most of the facts of these matters themselves.
Here one need look no farther than the hydroelectric assets which people have been led to believe have some means of generating cash for the provincial government or, more particularly, its energy company.
Turns out that, as Dunderdale told a legislature budget committee recently, there isn’t enough demand on the island to warrant generating power from these hydro sites. Meanwhile, on the island east of Sunnyside (on the Isthmus of Avalon), there is demand. Unfortunately, the existing transmission lines are at capacity. NALCOR has no plans to add more transmission capacity unless the Lower Churchill goes ahead. As a result, the central Newfoundland hydro assets won;t be shunting power to Long harbour and the Vale Inco smelter. That is going to be powered by, among other things, the Holyrood thermal generating plant and its oil-fired generators.
So much for closing Holyrood as a public policy goal.
So much too for fears the hydro assets would benefit the whole province rather than keeping them tied to central Newfoundland. Some people thought that the cash from the hydro power would be a nice nest egg for economic development. They were concerned about the benefits flowing outside the region.
Once upon a time, back before the rest of us learned of the mill expropriation fiasco, the provincial government refused to tie the hydro assets to local economic development funding in central Newfoundland. As industry minister Shawn Skinner put it:
“However, as with any investment, the collective impact on the province as a whole must be measured as these resources are provincially owned."
Well, now that everyone knows there really isn’t any use for the hydro facilities – and hence they have no revenue-generating ability at the moment – the provincial government is going back to its old line that the hydro assets will be used to lure potential new industries to the region. As Dunderdale said in the House on Tuesday:
Mr. Speaker, we are not writing off Central Newfoundland. We may not have an industrial customer at the moment looking for that power, but that day will come, Mr. Speaker. When that day does come, we will have the assets to do something with, to drive economic development in that part of the Province, Mr. Speaker, once again.
Assets are not assets.
Non-assets are, in fact, assets.
There are Germans, unnamed but apparently respectable, but they can’t be counted on to deliver the goods.
And we predicted everything but couldn’t predict disaster, which of course it isn’t because the current situation is the one we foresaw after examining all the potential outcomes, but we didn’t really foresee it at all. The whole thing is unfolding as we knew it would but in completely unpredicted ways.
And for God’s sake, don’t mention the war.
In next week’s episode, more hilarity ensues.
-srbp-
Christopher Lockett writes:
…all language is rhetorical. All language is designed to convince us of something. In moving from political oratory to poetry, I hoped to illustrate how that "something" is not necessarily specific, and can in fact possess a multiplicity of meanings—and [in?] that very multiplicity resides an exercise in reimagining the world.
That is the value, and necessity, of poetry to the contemporary moment: poetry is the antithesis of propaganda. The same can of course be said of literature more broadly, but poetry is the most overt expression of this principle….
How superbly put.
After all, what is life without a touch of poetry in it?
-srbp-
The provincial government’s 2010 budget – due to pass the House of Assembly by next Monday – is based, in part, on crude oil average about US$83 a barrel for the entire year.
Just to make sure everyone is keeping a sharp eye on the unsustainable Tory financial ball, the budget forecasts a cash deficit of about $1.0 billion. That would eat up just about all the surplus cash on hand. As a result, the net debt, which was hidden from prying eyes by all the surplus cash would spring back into full view in all its $10 to $12 billion splendour.
And if the following year’s budget needed some propping up, the provincial government would be back in the markets looking for some bank will to see the public debt balloon even larger.
But oil is trading this past week down in the neighbourhood of US$70 an the dollar is still pretty close to par. Production is slightly below last year’s so there doesn’t seem to be much hope extra production would generate extra cash.
Oil is now the major source of provincial government income by quite a margin. It’s about twice the amount the government gets from federal transfers which - when piled together is the next biggest source of income at about $1.2 billion. Oil royalties, forecast at $2.1 billion is about two and a half what personal income tax, the next largest provincial government’s own revenue source, brings in.
There are a couple of things to take away from all this.
First of all, when Danny Williams talks about putting the province’s finances in order such that there is less dependence on Ottawa, he’s pretty much jerking everyone in the province around.
Nothing – and let’s say that again for good measure – n-o-t-h-i-n-g, not a single, solitary, flipping thing Danny Williams and his cabinet have done in provincial government spending since 2003 has put the provincial government on a secure financial footing. To the contrary, they have put the provincial government in an incredibly precarious financial position even compared to when they took office.
The facts on this speak eloquently for themselves in both the fragility of the economy and unsustainable level of public spending. When he announced in early March that balanced budgets were no longer a target for his administration he pretty much confirmed that none of his claims about sound fiscal management were close to being accurate.
Second of all, bear in mind if oil stays at current prices, the cash deficit is more likely than not going to be about $1.0 billion and we are yet again staring at the prospect of one of the largest if not the largest cash deficits in provincial history.
Put all the faith you want in people who forecast triple digit oil prices as the way of the future. Oil is not going to be the saviour of this province if its government keeps spending the way it has been spending.
It’s that simple.
So as all things out there go sour for the current administration, as it faces the prospect of hundreds of millions of dollars in costs from the Abitibi expropriation fiasco, as investment interest in the province dries up, the parlous dependence of the provincial budget on oil prices just adds to the pressure.
Imagine what things will be like a year and a bit from now when voters troop to the polls.
-srbp-
For those who missed them, here are the top 10 individual posts at Bond Papers for the past five days:
Some of these were one day wonders. Kevin O’Brien’s masterpiece of political hara kiri took the idea of “fairity” to number one with a guffaw but that was just on the day it appeared.
Ditto Charlene Johnson and her nonsense about Buchans.
The Lower Churchill post – tied for number nine – is one that is still drawing hits a week or so after it first appeared.
This week, the Premier and his wing man managed to score a series of multi-day hits. The Premier’s contemptible effort to scapegoat the people of an entire province and his despicable use of language in the process scored multiple hits over multiple days.
By far and away the biggest was the chart in “The World the Old Man Lives In”. Sometimes things just line up right: there was no way of knowing that was the day he would chose for his appalling display. But it fit and it resonated with readers like very little else ever has.
Here’s the way your humble e-scribbler put it in a comment on one of the posts:
When political leaders attempt to smear entire groups of people based on their ethnicity or language, to use them as scapegoats then we are headed for a very dangerous place.
We have already seen too much of this sort of extremist language - "traitor" and "quisling" for example - over the past few years. Over the past couple of days the language has sunk to a whole new level particular in the extent of the scapegoating, the mocking use of French, and the claims about some gigantic ethnic conspiracy against people who live in this province.
Something say that people weren’t reading those posts because they agree with the Premier’s views.
Not to be outdone, the Premier’s parliamentary secretary went on a commie hunt during his speech on the budget. Not to be limited, though, he also took the chance to let us all know that while equality is a nice idea, it just isn’t “realistic” in the society in which we live.
It’s a good thing that after seven years, Ridgeley finally gave us some insight into his own political philosophy. It would be interesting to see him knocking doors in the next general election defending that idea, but your humble e-scribbler is going out on a limb here to predict that Tail-gunner Bob won’t be running again.
You have to wonder, though, if these two in their views – the Premier and his wingman – really do represent the views of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, as the Premier once claimed?
-srbp-
By the time this cartoon appeared, the thing was a full-blown scandal.
And…
Murphy had learned to draw Walter Carter so he didn’t look like Jim Morgan.
-srbp-
The release:
The world's largest advertising database will now include data from 13 countries in Latin America as well as introduce global content to Latin America
St. Johns, NL (May 20, 2010) - Newfoundland-based Global Ad Source has signed a strategic agreement with IBOPE Media to launch and market a new portal including data from 13 Latin American countries. The Creativos Global portal will be a Spanish language interface to the Global Ad Source database and will be marketed to Latin American ad agencies and advertisers via IBOPE Media throughout the continent. The subscription based service will allow users to review metadata associated with global advertisements as well as access high-resolution version versions of the ads.
"We are very excited about our alliance with IBOPE Media. They are clearly the leader in the Latin American advertisement and media measurement services and have a fantastic roster of blue chip clients. We feel our unique content set will be well received by IBOPE clients and allow a deeper insight into global advertising and creative strategies," explained Ed Clarke, President of adfinitum, the developer of Global Ad Source.
"CreativosGlobal.com users will have access to over 7 million high resolution advertisements from over 50 countries. At our current rates we fully expect to surpass the 10 million ad mark by the end of this year. This content will enable users to research and plan with competitive marketing intelligence from all over the globe," added Clarke.
Additionally, IBOPE will offer through Global Ad Source, Latin American data to clients in Europe, North America and Asia. IBOPE's data currently includes over 100,000 ads and 5,000 new ads are expected to be uploaded monthly.
"This is another market driven action by IBOPE. Globally, companies are growing more and more interested in Latin America. Parallel to the recent economic growth in the region, both the FIFA World Cup and the Olympic games will be hosted in Brazil during this decade which always serves to create a bullish environment. We are also very excited about IBOPE being able to offer its clients a unique look into the global advertising trends." added Antonio Wanderley, Regional Director, Business Development, IBOPE Media.
Media contact: Ed Clarke Tel: +1 709 753 1000 or +1 709 749 9928
-srbp-
Hisself, on May 20, in the House of Assembly:
Quebec lovers, if we could only keep the Quebec lovers quiet, Mr. Speaker, it would be nice.
Such is The World the Old Man Lives In.
-srbp-
Specifically a gear replacement program funded by the provincial government and used by many fishermen as a subsidy to help them upgrade their equipment.
Walter Carter, the newly-appointed fisheries minister, holds up a stinky left-over from his two predecessors, John Crosbie and Harold Collins. All three men held the fisheries portfolio in succession in 1974. It used to be an important department.
Children and those with very short-term memories will notice that in those days cabinet ministers could actually operate without instructions from the Old Man of the day.
-srbp-
At least two of companies whose long-term power purchase agreements were ripped up under the December 2008 expropriation bill will still get all their cash under long-term power purchase arrangements, according to natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale.
Abitibi is not included in the arrangements, apparently.
Dunderdale told the House of Assembly on Thursday that:
…we made a commitment to both of those companies [Fortis and ENEL] that regardless of what happened with Abitibi, at the end of this process we would ensure that they were kept whole, that they were properly compensated for fair market value for the assets. The PPAs that they have with Abitibi would also be honoured, Mr. Speaker.
Dunderdale said that the provincial government’s energy corporation - NALCOR - is still discussing arrangements with the two companies. The power purchase arrangements date from 1997 and 2001. The exact duration is currently unknown to your humble e-scribbler but would typically be in the range of 20 to 30 years.
ENEL partnered with Abitibi on the Star Lake project to supply electricity to Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro. Bill 75 seized all the generating and transmission assets of the Star Lake partnership and revoked all the agreement related to it, as listed at Annex E of Bill 75.
Dunderdale made no reference to the other companies also affected by the seizure:
Fortis – the other company Dunderdale discussed – was a partner in the Exploits Hydro Partnership. Under a long-term power-purchase agreement, Exploits partnership sold power to Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro.
Dunderdale also admitted what Bond Papers readers already knew: the provincial government is paying for a long-term loan for the Exploits partnership. The outstanding balance on the loan is $59 million. The provincial government paid the 2009 instalment.
The hydro-electric assets are likely the only ones seized in 2008 that could generate any reliable revenue to offset the costs of environmental clean-up at former Abitibi sites in the province. Payment of loans and royalties to the companies other than Abitibi as if the expropriation never happened would significantly reduce any revenue NALCOR could gain from the assets.
Dunderdale’s admission today could also further undermine any legal cases the provincial government is pursuing. One of the problems government faced in recent Quebec court decisions on the Abitibi bankruptcy protection proceedings is that its environmental clean-up actions appeared to be aimed solely at Abitibi and were not part of the routine administration of provincial environmental laws.
Dunderdale’s admission makes it pretty clear that the government is treating some of the companies affected by the expropriation very differently from Abitibi.
Colouring the expropriation as aimed solely against Abitibi could also colour the move and undermine any defence of Abitibi’s NAFTA challenge.
-srbp-
From the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Regulatory Board:
“It is prudent practice for a regulator to conduct an internal review following an incident like the one in the Gulf of Mexico to determine if more can be done from an oversight perspective to address concerns about the risks of offshore drilling. Chevron’s plan to drill the Lona O-55 exploration well in the Orphan Basin, which was spudded on May 10, 2010, has undergone two levels of environmental assessment in accordance with C-NLOPB’s requirements and the company has met the regulatory requirements for drilling in the Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Area. However, in light of the situation unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico and heightened public concern over drilling operations currently underway in the Newfoundland and Labrador Offshore Area, the C-NLOPB has taken the following measures for overseeing well operations at Chevron’s Lona O-55 well. We have met with Chevron in St. John’s and advised them of these measures, which are in addition to requirements contained in the Drilling and Production regulations and associated guidelines. Chevron has confirmed that they will facilitate the C-NLOPB’s oversight.
A team has been established within the C-NLOPB to provide regulatory oversight of Chevron’s operations. This team is comprised of the Chief Safety Officer, the Chief Conservation Officer, members of the Board’s Management Team and selected senior staff with extensive experience in the regulatory oversight of drilling programs. Chevron is expected to ensure the timely posting of daily reports (seven days a week) so that up-to-date information is always available to this team.
Chevron is required to meet with the C-NLOPB’s oversight team every two weeks to review matters of interest. The Board’s Chief Safety Officer will chair these meetings.
Chevron is required to provide the C-NLOPB’s Well Operations Engineer with copies of the field reports prepared in respect of the following: testing of the blowout preventer (BOP) stack; function test of the acoustic control system; function test of the Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) intervention capability and function test of the automode function (AMF) system, together with an assessment of the readiness of the ROV system in terms of equipment, procedures and spare parts.
Chevron is expected to monitor developments at the Deepwater Horizon incident and provide periodic assessments on the impact of any lessons learned from that situation to operations at Lona O-55, in particular any lessons learned with respect to well operations, BOP equipment or spill response readiness.
The frequency of audits and inspections onboard the Stena Carron will be approximately every three to four weeks. Normally, audits and inspections are conducted on offshore operators every 3-4 months.
Prior to penetrating any of the targets, Chevron must hold an operations time-out to review and verify, to the satisfaction of the Chief Safety Officer and the Chief Conservation Officer, that all appropriate equipment, systems and procedures are in place to allow operations to proceed safely and without polluting the environment.
Prior to penetrating any of the targets, Chevron should assure itself and the C-NLOPB that all personnel and equipment for spill response identified in its oil spill contingency plan are available for rapid deployment.
Chevron must also make arrangements for a representative of the C-NLOPB to be onboard the Stena Carron to observe the cementing operations of the last casing string set prior to entering any target zones. The observer will also be present to witness the BOP testing, well control drills, and results of the pressure test of the cementing job.
In the case of the BOP testing, a representative of the Certifying Authority will also be present.
In due course, Chevron must provide, for review and assessment by the C-NLOPB’s oversight team, a copy of the proposed well termination program to be issued to field personnel for implementation.
Chevron must also make the necessary arrangements for a representative of the
C-NLOPB to be onboard the Stena Carron to observe the well termination program.”
-srbp-
In Hisself’s own words, in the House of Assembly, dutifully and accurately recorded by Hansard, the Old Man describes the nefarious forces that circle around him.
In response to this question about the Abitibi expropriation - “Are you planning to seek leave to appeal this court loss to the Supreme Court of Canada at this time?” – he begins:
Mr. Speaker, let’s do a little history lesson first of all, and what this is all about. This goes back to the late 1960s when we had the best project in the world that we wanted to develop but we could not do it on our own because we were a poor Province - because of what happened as a result of Confederation and everything else. We were the poor and the weak sisters of Canada. So, we basically entered into a partnership with Quebec in order to develop that particular project. For that, they acquired at least one-third of the company which developed that particular project.
Then, when it got down to the short strokes and we were months away from concluding it and we were out of money, the company was basically out of money, they squeezed us. That is when they squeezed us for another twenty-five years on a contract that already was a complete giveaway of a very valuable hydro resource. They squeezed us for another twenty-five years at a lower price -
So based on that history, Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, particularly this Newfoundlander and Labradorian, and all these Newfoundlanders and Labradorians here and all the people in this Province, feel very, very strongly about the way Quebec has treated us. So if we have to fight them in the courts or fight them at the Régie, or if I personally got to get down and go toe to toe or roll around on the ground with them to fight them, we will do it.
…
And then after discussing Churchill Falls for all that time he answered the Abitibi question:
…we are now reviewing it.
But he couldn’t just state that simple answer to a simple question without further embellishment:
We are looking at asking for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court of Canada. I think that, as a Province, we have to keep fighting Quebec because if we don’t they will take away everything we have.
In response to the second, simple question - What is the recourse for the Province to now be added to the list of unsecured creditors? – came a further rant:
Of course, what we are dealing with is obviously a very biased court.
When you look at the Quebec courts, you look at the decision that was given here. The opinion, of course, that we have from our solicitors on this is that the court dodged a central legal and policy issue. So we had constitutional and factual arguments and the Court of Appeal completely and totally avoided that. In addition, they completely ignored the same rationale which has been used by the Ontario Court of Appeal, B.C. Court of Appeal, the Alberta Court of Appeal, and the Supreme Court of Canada. So, basically, these courts are doing whatever they can to try and stop us.
The same thing with Judge Gascon, we just saw the Régie ruling which came out of Quebec, which is one of the most horrendous, absurd rulings that I have ever seen. They ignored facts. They said that what Hydro-Quebec was doing was discretionary. They ignored the evidence - a complete abuse of process. So, throughout this process we will just keep hammering away.
Yes, folks, there was a duplicate key to the wardroom icebox where they kept the strawberry ice cream. The only thing missing was the ball bearings in his hand.
At that point, opposition leader Yvonne Jones asked exactly the same question over again (The Old Man didn’t come close to answering it the first time, after all). There followed another diatribe in which the Premier noted the holding company set up to deal with the two properties the provincial government didn’t expropriate:
Instead, Mr. Speaker - if I may have a moment -of what they have done in Botwood and Stephenville, put those assets in a shell company so that they could go bankrupt so that we get nothing.
Not exactly what happened, nor does the Premier explain why his lawyers consented to the arrangement, but that’s another issue.
At that point, the question of costs deflected off to justice minister Felix Collins.
A question about an English translation of the decision by the Quebec energy regulator brought Hisself to his feet once more to fulminate about Quebec:
Mr. Speaker, I said it last week, and I can say it again in all honesty today, I have not seen an English copy of the Régie decision. We are waiting on the Régie to provide us with an English copy.
It is really interesting, too, when you go on their Web site, pretty well everything that they have is always in English and French, but on this particular one we have not been provided an English copy. That tells me a lot about the Régie, the attitude of Quebec against Newfoundland and Labrador.
Basically, while the Premier’s parliamentary assistant is on a hunt for Commies, the Premier himself is fighting against the evil machinations of the seething nest of anti-Newfoundland conspiracy that is Quebec.
To conclude, some simple observations:
You could not make this stuff up if you tried.
-srbp-
Danny Williams in the House of Assembly today:
Mr. Speaker, 93 per cent is a lot of confidence. That is the kind of confidence I think people have in this government as a result of our performance so far.
Let’s see what those numbers look like after this month and more of non-stop problems for Williams’ beleaguered administration.
After all, gentle readers, it is polling month and the gang that couldn’t shoot straight can’t even seem to find fairity let alone stick with a consistent line on the Abitibi expropriation mess or agree on a simple policy on closing down Holyrood.
Williams had a nice tan, though, on his first day in the legislature in a while.
-srbp-
The thoughtful fellow on the right is Robert Wells, then the newly appointed health minister in 1975 in Frank Moores’ administration.
Wells left politics in 1979, wound up on the bench and retired not so long ago after a distinguished career. He is currently heading up an inquiry into offshore helicopter safety.
The fellow on the left is Dr. A.T. Rowe, at the time the member of the House of Assembly for Carbonear and outgoing health minister. he left politics in 1975 and took up a post at Memorial University’s School of Medicine where he headed the family practice department from 1978 to 1985.
-srbp-
While his embattled environment minister blustered and stuck to the old line during Question Period, outside the legislature Premier Danny Williams admitted to reporters today that the taxpayers of the province will be stuck paying for the environmental cleanup from his expropriation mess.
CBC.ca/nl has a version of the story that’s worth checking out.
The cost of the clean-up, legal fees, any NAFTA penalties for the expropriation and the cost of compensation for seized assets belonging to three companies could reach $500 million or more based on the provincial government’s own estimates.
More to follow.
-srbp-
Bob Ridgley, the Premier’s parliamentary assistant, lays out his own political philosophy:
I think she [NDP leader Lorraine Michael] did lay it out clearly. She laid out very clearly the stark difference between their party and the governing party. There was a reference down in the Leader of the NDP’s speech, and she said, "It is the job of elected government to create systems that work for everyone, not just for some." They work for everyone, not just for some.
She went on to say, Mr. Speaker, "It is the job of elected government to make sure that the communal pot is shared so everyone is living in a healthy and nurturing society." An ideal, Mr. Speaker, worthy, I suppose, of us pursuing, that everyone would share equally from the communal pot.
We remember the days of Communism, Mr. Speaker, and I suppose, if you want to pursue that, it may be a worthwhile ideal that we are all equal, but I do not think, in reality, it is a realistic philosophy for the society in which we live. It is not a share and share alike. There is no element, I suppose, of Robin Hood in it: rob the rich and give to the poor. [Emphasis added]
That explains everything: equality is a lovely idea but it is unrealistic.
-srbp-
Provincial cabinet ministers like to accuse everyone else of not understanding what is going on or of being mistaken.
Here’s a typical quote from May 18 in Question Period:
MR. KING: Mr. Speaker, I realize members opposite are not in the habit of stating the facts, but I want to correct the member opposite,…
The problem for Mr. King and his colleagues, though, has been that they often don’t seem to have a sweet clue as to what is going on in the world around them. Some of them have about as much familiarity with facts and reason as a 12 year old girl looking for tickets to a Justin Bieber concert.
Take, for example, this claim – an old chestnut – by the province’s natural resources minister also made on May 18:
Nalcor has costed out the infrastructure that is going to be required to bring in the right number of megawatts of electricity to serve the Avalon Peninsula with the elimination of Holyrood. That is a stated goal of this Province. It is one of the major reasons why we are so focused on the development of the Lower Churchill, Mr. Speaker.
All of the infrastructure that is going to be required to bring the power onto the Island part of the Province, transmit it across the Province and eliminate Holyrood, and also create a subsea line to Eastern Canada and through to the United States is all part of the planning of the development of the Lower Churchill.
Got that?
Eliminate Holyrood.
Provincial government policy.
Spearheaded by the energy corporation, currently doing business as NALCOR Energy.
Someone needs to tell NALCOR, then, because here’s what the company said in its 20 year capital plan that it submitted to the public utilities board:
It is important to consider that whichever expansion scenario occurs, an isolated Island electrical system or interconnected to the Lower Churchill via HVDC link, Holyrood will be an integral and vital component of the electrical system for decades to come. In the isolated case Holyrood will continue to be a generating station; in the interconnected scenario its three generating units will operate as synchronous condensers, providing system stability, inertia and voltage control.
Holyrood: integral and vital component for years to come.
-srbp-
At some point you have to feel sorry for the crowd currently running the province or, as some astute political watchers are calling them: the gang that couldn’t shoot straight.
In the rotation of private members’ resolutions, the Tory turn came up this week and Ray Hunter stepped forward to offer a motion on the provincial government’s ongoing war with Quebec over just about everything.
The motion read:
WHEREAS Newfoundland and Labrador is home to one of the best undeveloped, clean, green, renewable energy projects in North America at the Lower Churchill River in Labrador; and
WHEREAS Ontario, the Maritime Provinces, and the Northeastern United States are in need of affordable, clean energy sources; and
WHEREAS last week’s ruling of the Régis [sic] de l’énergie in Quebec on a transmission service request by Nalcor Energy once again demonstrates that province’s arrogance and discriminatory business practices, in particular their determination to see the Lower Churchill proceed only on their terms; and
WHEREAS this ruling is deemed by this Province to be completely contrary to the rules of fair, open and competitive access; and
WHEREAS this government is determined to proceed with this project in the best interest and for the benefit of the people of Newfoundland and Labrador;
BE IT RESOLVED that the Newfoundland and Labrador House of Assembly affirms its full support for the approach of Nalcor Energy and the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador to continue plans to develop this extraordinary clean, renewable energy project, including two alternative routes to market, including the Labrador-Island Link, the Maritime route, as well as the pursuit of a separate 724 megawatt transmission service request into the Maritimes and New England.
Now the gang has had no luck at all in distracting public attention from their series of shag-ups and controversies so it is only natural that the guy by the back door to the House should come up with an effort to go with an issue the Tories should be able to win on.
Things were going along just fine until the Liberals pointed out the obvious, namely that the honourable members were being asked to vote on an issue - the Quebec energy regulator’s decision last week – which had only been published in French.
Now in the ordinary course that wouldn’t be an insurmountable problem since the Liberals only have a few votes and the motion is worded in such a way that they’d be voting down what has become motherhood and partridgeberry pie if they didn’t run alongside the Tories.
The whole thing seemed to be going along just fine. That is, until Kevin O’Brien, minister responsible for permits and licenses, the guy who doesn’t know what district St. Anthony is in, former president of the Progressive Conservative Party of Newfoundland and Labrador and erstwhile Tory leadership candidate decided to make a few public comments of his own on a local call-in radio show.
And that’s when things went horribly wrong, as the hideous television news cliche goes.
According to O’Brien he didn’t need to read anything to know how to vote. Talk show host Randy Simms seemed genuinely surprised at O’Brien’s argument. He also had an easy time ridiculing it as Simms noted that only a few short months ago all 48 of the members in the House had voted for a bill thinking they weren’t expropriating a paper mill.
Ouch.
Incidentally, here’s the shorty version of exchange from the vocm.com website.
The whole thing went completely off the rails as O’Brien insisted that all the province was looking for in Quebec was fairity. He didn’t say “fairity” just once mind you. He kept saying it.
Even a call from Ross Wiseman a couple of seconds after O’Brien hung up couldn’t save O’Brien’s performance and put what should have been a safe Tory motion back on the rails. Shortly after O’Brien hung up, calls started circulating that the Tories were pulling the motion and planned to sub another one in its place.
Now for those who don’t know, pulling motions like that happens about as often as special emergency sessions. So the obvious conclusion any seasoned political watcher would take is that the Tories had basically rogered themselves so hideously that they didn’t want to keep going. Even if they won the vote – as they inevitably would – the news reports would be all about the comparisons to the Abitibi TARFU, not the start of any great rallying to the barricades during polling month.
As it is, Question Period was basically a litany of those sort of comments anyway, all centred on poor hapless Kevin and the missing English translation:
Ms. Jones: I do not put a lot of credence into briefings, I say to the minister opposite. We got briefings from your government on Abitibi as well, and then we find out you expropriated a mill and liabilities around the environment which we were told were not part of the deal, Mr. Speaker. So forgive us if we want to see the information and read it ourselves.
I ask the minister again, Mr. Speaker: When that motion was being tabled in the House of Assembly yesterday I was receiving an e-mail on my BlackBerry from the Premier’s office telling me there was no English version of this available. Why would you even bring a motion to the House of Assembly to be voted on when you had no English copy of the information to be circulated for the debate?
The questioning then carried on to other topics, but the shag-up on what should have been an easy win for the crowd what runs the place was pretty much the front end of Question Period.
The rest of QP didn’t go any better for the gang that apparently can’t shoot straight, but that is another story.
-srbp-