Access denied: CFLCo and Hydro-Quebec version #nlpoli

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

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

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

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

 

Churn, churn, churn #nlpoli

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

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

So how does that stack up with her immediate predecessors?

The Poster Child for the Churn #nlpoli

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

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

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

Newfoundland and the start of the Great War #nlpoli

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

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

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

Darkness on the Edge of Town #nlpoli

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

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

This summer.

2013.

Bruce toured North America last year, 2012.

This year all his gigs have been in Europe.

What gives?

The Smartest Move She Ever Made #nlpoli

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

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

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

The Q2 2013 Churn Appointments #nlpoli

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

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

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

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

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

-srbp-

On bigotry and prejudice #nlpoli

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Don’t stop when you get to the end.

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

Des:

The Emera application  was issued on January 28, 2013.

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

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

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

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

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

Premier Dunderdale may get Premier Dexter re-elected yet.

-srbp-

Whatever happened to Ryan Cleary? #nlpoli

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

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

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

Media Facilitation 101 #nlpoli

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

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

*sigh*

Liberal Leadership Videos #nlpoli

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

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

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

  -srbp-

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

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

*sigh*  

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

Relative Costs #nlpoli

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

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

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

Leave that to one side.

The Cabana Cases #nlpoli

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

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

Voids and Spatter #nlpoli

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

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

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

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

Yakabuski nails it… again. #nlpoli

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

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

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

Guess again.

-srbp-

More Gil Bennett nuttiness #nlpoli

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

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

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

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

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

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

Here’s a bit of the Telegram story:

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

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

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

-srbp-

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

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

The price of a dam #nlpoli

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

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

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

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

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

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