The importance of what we care about #nlpoli

When we do not talk about the most vulnerable people in our society – sex workers and people in homeless shelters to name just two groups – we tell the world that our community does not care about them.  Last week’s spectacle in the House of Assembly showed the world that the 40 people who Newfoundlanders and Labradorians elected to represent them and run the province do not care about very much at all.

Alison Coffin and Ches Crosbie
talk to reporters on Friday about Gerry Byrne.
(Not exactly as illustrated)

A 23-year-old man lay on the pavement in downtown St. John’s last Tuesday night, the blood running out of him and mingling with the rain on the cold pavement.

He died outside a shelter for homeless people. The community learned very quickly that it was a shelter, that it was a rental property, and that police frequently visited the place to deal with disturbances among the people who came and went from the house with great frequency.

We learned that information because neighbours put it on social media, where the local conventional media – newspaper, television, and radio - picked it up and repeated it.  Before anyone knew who the young man was, or what had gone on, they had decided what the issues were in the story.

That morning, in the House of Assembly,  the opposition parties asked for the Premier’s opinion on the fact that provinces in Canada received transfer payments from the federal government because they  - unlike Newfoundland and Labrador – didn’t make enough money on their own to meet the national minimum government income standard.  There were questions about flooding in a district on the west coast, a couple of questions about specific constituents who needed government money, and about the deaths of a couple of million salmon in a fish farm a couple of months before.

There was only one question thread - about ferry service to northern Labrador - that stood out for its consistency and seriousness - and the only question about homelessness was about people with high paying jobs in western Labrador who had to couch surf.

The morning after the death,  the few questions related to the murder were generic:  “’What plan does the government have’  to deal with crime and homeless in St. John’s?” opposition leader Ches Crosbie led with.  His second question was about a growth in payments to temporary shelters run by landlords, not not-for-profits.  That story had been in the local media before and brought back because of the assumed connection in media reports between the for-profit shelters and the murder.

Attention then turned to a general discussion of health care.  By the time the official opposition was done, the New Democrat leader Alison Coffin’s question about homelessness was also generic: 

“APEC reports that despite growth in the oil industry, our province is struggling. Homelessness, addictions, cost of living, bankruptcies, gangs, unemployment, electricity rates, out-migration are all on the rise.

“I ask the Premier: Will Advance 2030 address these pressing issues, or will we continue to stumble forward?”

That was the lone NDP question before her colleague got back to the dead salmon.

SOL Day 22: Cash and Pictures and some Hickey-ups with facts

On this, the 22nd day of the Summer of Love campaign, the provincial government issued no fewer than six cash announcements.

The biggie was Premier Danny Williams and finance minister Tom Marshall handing out cheques in their own districts to support the 2008 Newfoundland and Labrador Summer Games and an ironman competition. The cheques came complete with grip-and-grin photos distributed by the provincial government information service.

Also announced:

- Funding for the Baccalieu Trail tourism industry;

- $575,000 in funding for medical student bursaries;

- Tender award for construction of a new courthouse in Corner Brook; and,

- Another announcement on the Nicholsville bridge in Deer Lake in which transportation minister John Hickey shows a Rideout-esque propensity for saying things that are not backupable. Would that make them Hickey-ups?

In the release Hickey claims that "[t]he Williams Government assured the people of the Nicholsville area from day one that we would replace their bridge in a timely fashion and we have delivered."

What Hickey actually said on Day One - October 30, 2006 - was that the bridge was closed.

What Hickey actually said on Day Two was this:

If we look at the whole Humber Valley district here, there are a number of bridges … that need work," Hickey told CBC News.

"Many of those locations only have one bridge in and out of the community or location, so it will be something we'll be putting on our list of priorities for review when budget time comes."

What the provincial government actually said on Day 19 was that they were working on some solution but that they would look at all the choices before deciding:

"Government’s primary concern regarding the Nicholsville Bridge was the safety of the general public. We addressed that by closing the bridge," said Minister Hickey.

"We are aware of the anxiety of residents regarding the future of the link and we began reviewing our options immediately after we made the decision to close the bridge. However, we want to ensure due diligence before making any pronouncements."

Hickey didn't announce funding for the bridge formally until May 11, 2007; that would be Day 195 or thereabouts.

What a Hickey-up that release was.

-srbp-

Summer of Love, 2007: Day 2 Lower Churchill long shot

The State of Rhode Island and Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro will conduct an "analysis and assessment of a potential power purchase of up to 200 megawatts of electricity [by Rhode Island] by the year 2015".

The MOU institutes a two-phase process to explore a possible arrangement for the sale and purchase of power. The first part of the process is a six-month mutual assessment of the merits of long-term sale and purchase agreement, as well as the development of an action plan to address any technical, regulatory and statutory requirements of the transaction. Upon completion of Phase I, the parties may enter Phase 2 negotiations for a binding agreement on the sale and purchase of power.

Key to developing the Lower Churchill successfully would be long-term power purchase agreements that would insure creditors can recover investments in the project, which has been estimated to cost upwards of CDN $9.0 billion to complete.

Even if Rhode Island enters into a power purchase agreement the total involved is only 7% of the project's total estimated generating capacity. Rhode Island is also one of the farthest potential markets for Lower Churchill power.

No other power purchases or potential power purchases have been announced to date.

-srbp-

nottawa has a humorous take on the whole thing.

Traffic in the heat of the Summer of Love 2011

Fire trucks, Twitter and a 60 year old who dropped a hundred pounds in six months wanting a job today she didn’t want six months ago.

Must be the Summer of Love 2011.

All that is fodder for another post.  For now let’s just check out the 10 stories most Bond Papers readers were pondering last week.

1. Free tuition at NL university for Nova Scotians;  NL NDP leader
2. Like Momma always said…Part Deux und Trois
3. From the Earth to the moon
4. And Harry won’t be running either
5. Rumpole and the Cardinal Rule
6. Nurturing a democratic revolution
7. Bullshit then or now?  Nalcor boss changes story on Muskrat megadebt project and natural gas
8. Making the Most of our Energy Resources – Oil and Gas in the Future
9. Former Tory fin min not giving up fight against Muskrat
10. Containing Ottawa’s Skyrocketing Power Bill

- srbp -

The Summer of Love, Tobin style

The year: 1998.

The Premier: Brian Tobin.

The political plan: Flood the province with optimism and cash on the Lower Churchill. Drop the writ for an election in September/October after only two years in office.

The specifics:

March 9 - series of announcements on Churchill Falls negotiations, framework for talks, chief negotiator, a joint announcement with Lucien Bouchard on the talks, and the text of Tobin's remarks.

June 18 - environmental contract

June 23 - environmental contracts

June 26 - engineering contracts

June 29 - environmental contracts

June 30 - engineering contracts

July 3 - environmental contracts

July 14 - environmental contracts

July 24 - environmental contracts

July 31 - engineering contract

August 4 - engineering and environmental contracts

August 7 - seismic testing notice (extended repeatedly during August)

What spending announcements will mark the Summer of Love, Danny Williams-style, now that we are in full election mode?

-srbp-

The graveyard of ambition #nlpoli

Think of it as an inside joke.

James McLeod interviewed Premier Dwight Ball about the horror show that has been Ball's first year in office. "Ball also came under heavy fire,"  McLeod wrote, "for his handling of Nalcor Energy and perceived dishonesty about what he knew about outgoing CEO Ed Martin’s exorbitant severance package." McLeod quotes Ball:  "'I understand why people would suggest that, well, this guy, I can’t trust him, simply because of the HST or because of this or that.'"

This or that, of course, would be Ball's claim that he knew nothing of the plan to pay Ed Martin any form of severance although he'd quit as the head of Nalcor. That's the sort-of joke part. I can see, said Ball understatedly, how people might think I have some trouble telling them the straight story.  Subsequent evidence made it pretty clear Ball knew about severance payment Martin got, even if it was only to the extent he believed Martin was entitled to a severance payment under his employment contract and didn't know about the elaborate fraud perpetrated by the Tory-appointed Nalcor board.

Simon Lono , 1963-2019

Simon Lono  - husband, father, grandfather, advocate, orator, writer, mentor, friend  - died Friday, May 24, 2019.  

He was 56.  

When our friends are alive, we do not spend time thinking about the past.  We do not think about how we met them, about all the things we did with them, or why it is that we like them.

When they are alive, we do not need to remember because they are there, every day.

We only feel a need to remember, once they are not there any more.

Simon Lono’s family and friends spent Saturday as they are likely to spend a lot of days from now on.  They thought about him, remembered when they first met him, all the things they had done together, why they loved him.

Simon is dead.

And so, we remember.

We recall.

Frantically.

As if the memories will make the hard truth go away.

As if the memories will replace all of the things that could have been or would have been.

But that will never be.

Because there is a hard truth.

Simon is dead.

Killed by a rare disease.

In itself, entirely fitting.

Williams lowers expectations for Lower Churchill...again

In an interview with The Telegram, Premier Danny Williams admits there are considerable hurdles to overcome in developing the Lower Churchill hydroelectric project. The story isn't available online.  [Amended;  by request, we've removed the article from the post. If it turns up online, we'll supply a link.]

Williams repeated his January estimate that the chances of the project going ahead are 50/50.

"Well, at best that would be late 2009," said Williams. "We're going through the environmental process. We're attempting to reach agreement with the Labrador Innu. I'm optimistic that can happen. (Then we'll
decide) what the nature of the project will be and get the financials in place and be ready to rock'n'roll."

Take that statement as being an admission the project is unlikely to proceed at all. The crucial element is project financing. If that isn't even being reviewed until 2009 - at the earliest - then it's a well as saying the project is not happening in the near future.

In the interview Williams exaggerates the development issues, referring to them as hurdles, and claiming that the hurdles are larger than on other mega-projects either under development or under consideration in the province. The other projects are all private sector ones.

The development issues aren't larger.

It all boils down to markets for the power and financing to make it happen.

In 2005, Williams rejected a joint project with Ontario and Quebec which would have seen both provinces purchase the power and assist in the financing and construction.

Williams rejected the proposal without explanation, inserting instead a so-called "go-it-alone" option which had not be evaluated by Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro or government officials before it was publicly announced. However, even in announcing his own idea of having the provincial government build project on its own, he left the door open to equity partners.

Shortly after he went to the federal government looking for a loan guarantee, still insisting the provincial government would build the Lower Churchill project - estimated to cost between $6.0 and $9.0 billion - on its own.

Despite receiving no such commitment from Stephen Harper, Williams insisted Harper promised a loan guarantee and used it as part of his political feud with his fellow Conservative first minister.

Williams has announced only two potential customers for Lower Churchill power. The State of Rhode Island and Nova Scotia's Emera have signed separate memoranda of understanding committing to explore the possibility of purchasing Lower Churchill power.

Beyond that, Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro has had no serious discussions with potential external customers for the project's estimated 2800 megawatts. Even the plan to sell power to eastern Newfoundland - covering at least $2.0 billion of the total project cost - is contingent on the project going forward. That idea, floated by natural resources minister Kathy Dunderdale just before last fall's provincial election seemed to confuse the radio host interviewing her at the time since she insisted the plan wouldn't increase electrical power rates on the Avalon peninsula.

The Lower Churchill project figured prominently in several campaign announcements both during last year's Summer of Love pre-election spending spree and in the energy plan campaign prop.

There are some factual errors in the Peter Walsh story. The Wells administration came close to a deal on the Lower Churchill in the early 1990s, however political issues at the time and changed economic circumstances scuttled the negotiations.

Brian Tobin used development on Churchill River as the start of a re-election campaign he started in 1998. Ultimately none of his promised development occurred.

Roger Grimes had a tentative deal to develop the Lower Churchill but it was scuttled by political opposition within his own caucus and cabinet, heightened by the dramatic resignation of Hydro chairman and Williams associate Dean Macdonald from the Hydro board.

Walsh also repeats a claim that the 1969 Churchill Falls deal has produced $19 billion in revenue for Hydro Quebec versus $1.0 billion for Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro. Those figures are not substantiated by any factual analysis. It is, however, a popular myth.

-srbp-

The Thick of It: environment minister version

Environment minister Charlene Johnson.

Think Nicola Murray but without the gravitas.

The province’s environment minister might still be wrestling to find a way to deal with a tire recycling program.  Her only solution to the piles of tires thus far has been shipping them to Quebec for burning.

Johnson might be struggling to sort out the waste management strategy she and her cabinet colleagues photocopied in 2007 from their Liberal predecessors’ version from 2002. 

Yes, friends they just pushed back all the implementation dates by a decade.

Charlene and her colleagues may have buggered up the Abitibi expropriation such that the public is on the hook for cleaning up three of five sites needing remediation.

The sustainable development act may be lost under someone’s desk.

But Charlene knows what it is to be a minister responsible for protecting the environment.

Consider her comments about calls for greater protection for woodland caribou, creatures she has under her jurisdiction:

"I know there [are] calls to have no harvesting at all within the core areas and the buffer areas, but then there would be no logging industry," Johnson told CBC News.

So there’ll be $15 million of study. That’s despite the fact that a decade-old study by government scientists showed that logging within nine kilometres of caribou can seriously affect the animal’s behaviour.

And in her latest round, Johnson thought a bottled water ban in provincial government offices was risible.

Yes, gentle readers, she didn’t just give a straightforward answer.  Charlene thought that ridiculing the New Democrat leader was the right way to go:

Mr. Speaker, I have to say I am absolutely shocked. We are dealing with an oil spill in Louisiana. We have all kinds of fishery issues that have been before the House. There are health issues, there are other issues in environment and I am getting asked questions about banning bottled water in government -

It is not to say that we do not take the issue seriously, Mr. Speaker, but I would certainly suggest that there are a lot of other issues, particularly in the environment that we can address.

Mr. Speaker, I just had a scan around government the other day. There are offices where meetings are held in government that there are no sinks. So, what is she proposing that we do not have anything to drink?

At the very least, we should all be thankful.

Thankful, that is, because even if Charlene is confused about what ocean it is that sits offshore (Hint:  it isn’t the Gulf of Mexico), then at the very least, Charlene knows that compared to the crap-load of major policy issues that have been sitting on her desk for years without any serious attention, bottled water in government isn’t actually the most pressing issue.

That is, not the most pressing even if it would be probably the easiest one of that back-log for her to deal with.

-srbp-

BTDTGTTS Update:  As someone reminded your humble and now increasingly forgetful e-scribbler, Newfoundland and Labrador already had a ministry like Nicola’s with her “fourth sector” initiative.  We still do.

It’s called the minister responsible for Penny Rowe, errr, the volunteer sector, currently run by Dave Denine.  The first minister responsible for liaising with Penny used to rattle on about the fourth sector, which is a term penny used to use all the time.

BOHICA Update:  Meanwhile, the environmentalist minister landed a major gaffe on Tuesday which is likely to do wonders for the ongoing negotiations and legal action over Abitibi.  Things that were TARFU and FUBAR just went to the final stage, BOHICA. 

Charlene, quoted in the Wednesday Telegram which is sadly not online: 

“Our only concern is that the environment be brought back to the state that Abitibi found it in when they came here to use our resources.  We don’t even ask what the cost is.  As long as we’re fine with the way they’re doing it, that cost is really Abitibi’s responsibility.”

Charlene, God love her little socks, likely thinks that the big evil old company got here in 1905. That is the year on those leases which Carlene and the crowd in the House of Assembly voted to tear up a couple of years ago.

Unfortunately, the woman should actually read the backgrounders on the files she has stacked up on her desk. 

If she did, she would know that Abitibi arrived in the province in 1969.

Not 1905.

Two years after the first Summer of Love.

So basically, Charlene just said that it is government policy to restore the only land in the province Abitibi still owns back to the condition in was in 1969.  Would she like the original pollution restored then, in the places where,as the prov gov already acknowledged, the company has cleaned up a bit? Let’s hope not.

So that’s Botwood sorted out back to the year Sesame Street started.

Then there’s Stephenville.

Abitibi didn’t get that land until 1979.

And by that time both the US Air Force and the provincial government had been peeing on it for the better part of three decades.  First there was an air force base and then there was the infamous linerboard mill.  Huge disaster – at least financially – which shut down in 1979 and left both a contaminated site and a gigantic debt load for the taxpayers.

Then Abitibi bought it for a dollar, at the behest of the Peckford administration.  Abitibi, meanwhile, diverted a brand-spanking new Valmet paper making machine from its original destination of Grand Falls and set it up at the old linerboard building. 

Poof:  the long-awaited third mill, made by splitting one of the others in two.

Now since 2005, Abitibi has already levelled the building the linerboard crowd put there.  So strictly speaking, they’ve actually put the site back in the shape it was just after the Americans frigged off - 1967.

That’s even better than Charlene said the government wanted.

And yet Charlene accuses others of not understanding what is going on.

As Ron Stoppable once said, this would be so cool if it wasn’t going to hurt us.

The Summer of Love 2011

Five years after your humble e-scribbler first wrote about it, the world pretty much accepts the notion that the governing Conservatives time their communications to coincide with polling done by their contract pollster. A couple of university professors have taken up the task of documenting the extent of the poll goosing and talk radio stacking activities.

Well, labradore posted a couple of reminders last week about just exactly how intense this can get.

First, he show a chart comparing the number of releases issued in the middle of summer.  Not surprisingly, 2011 showed the heaviest news release output on record.  That’s not surprising because it is an election year and the the incumbent Tories apparently are having some problems with popular support.

Second, labradore charted the number of media advisories issued by the provincial government, by month from 1996 onward. No one ever said this poll goosing thing was something the Tories invented.  It’s just that they do it more aggressively than the gang that went before.

- srbp -

From the Worst Kept Secret file...

Danny Williams will visit the Lieutenant Governor on September 17 to seek a proclamation of the fall election on October 9.

Remember that date.

Monday.

September

17.

Two weeks from today.

Williams told reporters that date last week.

Call Elections NL and that's the date they will tell you.

They will also tell you people have been casting votes already.

Yes, people, the election started two weeks ago.

That's what makes the whole thing increasingly farcical.

Farcical, as in idiotic, as in having the House of Assembly management committee boasting it had stopped members of the House from using their allowances during the election period.

Problem 1: There are no members of the House of Assembly one the election proclamation is issued and the House is dissolved and the seats are vacated.

Do they think we are stupid or are they that stunned?

Problem 2: The election has been on all summer, what with the Premier and his Winnebago running around dispensing public cash to anyone with their hand stuck out. The House management committee - including three of the cabinet ministers who approved the Summer of Love spending spree - knows full well that what they announced amounts to the old limerick about some guy named Paul's hexagonal sphere.

Problem 3: Even if that weren't true, voting started on August 20. The fantasy restriction doesn't start until 17 September. Big freakin' deal.

-srbp-

McCartney and Williams: weekend update

The old hit counter is smokin' like it hasn't done since the last days of the last federal election and it is all due to:

seals.

The Larry King Live thing seems to have prompted some people to head for google searches and they wind up here and at a bunch of other blogs.

For some people, the whole question of Danny doing the show in the first place is quickly becoming something of yet another litmus test for racial purity - true Newfoundlanders...and Labradorians... are with Danny on this one against the Twin Towers of Evil.

There's another crowd who simply worship Danny Williams and all that he has done in the same way people still keep a picture of one of the Joe S's from the last century on their walls hoping one or the other will make a comeback.

Yes, the people who pee green,white and pink and/or love Danny-boy think this is a marvelous idea and are reveling in each point of fact or logic he scored over the McCartneys. They thought so before now; they still think so.

There is still a sizeable body of opinion out there, though, including many on the street in Newfoundland and Labrador who consider the whole affair a waste of time, at best. A set-up, on a Friday night when the audience isn't likely to be at peak, discussing the seal hunt with a semi-conscious ex-Beatle and his latest wife. I'd be thinking of checking in the air in my tires if a hit with Larry under those conditions was the only alternative.

I am with this latter crowd.

But don't take it from me. Just take a look at the eloquence of our own Rex Murphy from Saturday's Globe. The inescapable conclusion from Rex's column is that Danny would have been better off - by any measure - simply ignoring these latest anti-seal harvester.

But what he [Paul McCartney] knows about the Newfoundland seal hunt would fit in a gnat's armpit and what the rest of us should care about how he feels bout it would gladden an even more rank receptacle. He's just one more in the endless file of soap-star intellects, preening starlets, sitcom revenants, small-screen action heroes and full-bore Hollywood poseurs who, over the years, have given an ounce of their time to drop by the ice-floes, park in front of a whitecoat, do the caring press conference and go back to whatever it was they were doing when they were not saving seals. [Emphasis added]

It's quite a list. Brigitte Bardot, Pierce Brosnan, Richard Dean Anderson, Yvette Mimieux, Sean Penn (pre-Baghdad tourism), Loretta Swit and, to bring matters up to date, ubertart Paris Hilton are just a petty fraction of the names that have found the seal hunt their cause du jour. Ms. Hilton, who in my view has caused the world more pain than four centuries of the seal harvest, gave the full power of her T-short to the crusade against the hunt when she sported this slogan at the Sundance Film Festival: "Club sandwiches, not seals."

If Paul McCartney and Paris Hilton are on the same page it must be a picture book...

Last summer for a day, it was Make Poverty History. Sir Paul headlined the London concert with Bono for that monstrous hypocrisy.

Multimillionaries protesting poverty, while keeping their bloated fortunes is a dissonance that may peal through eternity.

As for Sir Paul and the seal hunt - who cares? The before, Larry King had on Roseanne Barr. Larry, Paul, Roseanne - it's all so... yesterday.

The Jim Bennett Effect #nlpoli

Having tried to slide by without renewing their party,  the provincial Conservatives are now talking up the joys of change.

They’ve talked about everything else. 

Change is the only thing they haven’t talked about.

So now it’s their new talking point.

Problem is that they don’t seem to be doing much to … well… change.

Nothing says "election" like politicians and cash, the BC version

Stockwell's wetsuit apparently has a big "S" emblazoned on it.

Well, we presume he wears the wetsuit under his day clothes since there's no other way to explain how  he could be in St. John's propping up a retiring caucus mate and at the same time be announcing $272 million bucks for British Columbia.

Meanwhile,  the Uncaped Crusader, Minister of Public Safety stopped off at some point in the recent past to visit glorious Drayton Valley, unveil a memorial and chat with the locals about important issues of the Day.

Like, for argument's sake, the wonderful benefits of having a fixed election date:

Day said having a scheduled date not only removes power from the governing party to call a snap election, but it also allows voters to weigh the government actions accordingly.

“The people will no longer look at a new tax credit policy and wonder if it has been introduced because an election is going to be called soon,” said Day.

Maybe it is the Summer of Love, federal edition.

The local mayor got in a pitch for some of this decentralization stuff Stockwell and his pals have been musing about.  The local mayor said the town is interested in getting something related to intelligence, the town apparently being a "good fit" for intelligence what with its emphasis on crime prevention.

Tell us, Moe - and that is the mayor's real first name - if there is a burg in this country from one end of 'er to the other that has an emphasis on crime encouragement?

And of course, this movement of intelligence from the National Capital Region into Drayton Valley would occur  - should it occur - in such a manner that no one could possibly confuse the relocation of  those fat federal paycheques with any pending election.

We'll leave aside the obvious joke about transferring intelligence from Ottawa and only note that public tit-sucking is clearly a national pass-time.

Moe might be running Drayton Valley, but Larry's heading up a Great City these days,  Shemp has got a regional borough in Manitoba and another Larry, his brother Daryl and his other Daryl are the reeve, police chief and fire department head in a township in southwestern Ontario.

-srbp-

Risk and reward on the east coast oil and gas frontier

Rob Strong, one of the senior figures in the Newfoundland and Labrador oil industry told CBC Radio that the local oil patch is looking forward to increased exploration offshore Newfoundland this year.

As Strong notes, over 20 years have elapsed since the last major discovery in the Newfoundland offshore and for most of the past 15 years, exploration drilling has dropped to near zero.

Technological advances, high demand for oil and gas and the consequent high world prices for oil, coupled with political instability in some regions have led to a renewed interest in the north Atlantic's oil and gas potential.

A record $670 million was bid for Orphan Basinland plots in 2003 and the drilling program this year is further evidence that international capital is willing to look even in frontier regions. The Basin is located about 370 kilometres northeast of St. John's. The basin may hold as much as eight billion barrels of oil.

With increased exploration and development in other deep water fields, the supply of rigs that can work offshore Newfoundland is tight, as a recent public meeting on the province's upcoming energy plan was told. Nonetheless, the Erik Raude, a semi-submersible shown in the picture at right, and the Rowan Gorilla VI, a jack-up, will both be drilling exploration wells this summer.

East coast Canada is very much a frontier region in the oil and gas business, which is code for high cost and high risk. Technically challenging from an engineering perspective, a well offshore may cost as much as $100 million to drill. Improvements in seismic technology has reduced the risk of producing a duster - a dry well - but the risk remains.

The region also brings with it a political and regulatory issues that add further costs. One recent comparison showed that it may take twice as long for a proponent to get production approval offshore Newfoundland or Nova Scotia as it would in the North Sea or the Gulf of Mexico.

The regulatory issues are not insurmountable. Both the Government of Canada and the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador have expressed an interest in streamlining the regulatory requirements for exploration and have taken preliminary steps to do just that. The Atlantic Canada oil and gas industry has also pressed for regulatory reform that balances the need for environmental and safety protection with the need to drill wells and bring new oil and gas fields into production.

Politically, the oil and gas industry remains a potent symbol of riches, especially in Newfoundland and Labrador, and that is reflected in the premier's rhetoric about jobs, cash and getting a bigger stake for the government in the offshore. That will be the harder hurdle to climb if the Newfoundland and Labrador offshore is to become truly globally competitive.

The provincial government and the consortium behind the Hebron/Ben Nevis development, for example, are currently negotiating local benefits and royalties but there is no guarantee the project will proceed. Premier Danny William has publicly talked of front-loading the project with added costs like construction of a local oil refinery and letting the province's hydro-electric generating company buy an equity stake in the project. As Williams told Canadian Press late last year:

The premier said as owner of the resource, Newfoundland and Labrador is seeking a financial stake in the project unless the companies agree to build a refinery in the province or hand over higher royalties.

"We'd love to take a stake," he said. "By getting a piece of the action, not only do we get a return and some of the profits from the dividends, but at the end of the day we will have assets that are worthwhile."

Both the Hebron consortium and Williams have set April 1, 2006 as the deadline for achieving an agreement on Hebron. That's slightly less than a year after the consortium reached an operating agreement among themselves for the project. Whether or not an agreement is reached with the provincial government may depend in large measure on where the economic tipping point is for developing an oil field in the already high cost offshore frontier.

Williams' other dream, of having a provincial Crown corporation operating in the offshore may depend, ultimately on the province's willingness to undertake the risks private sector companies have been taking for the past 40 years. Talks to gain an equity position on existing projects are rumoured to have run into flat-out opposition and repeated efforts to acquire the federal governments shares in the Hibernia project have similarly met with no support from either the federal Liberals or the Harper Conservatives.

Ultimately, in order to get a direct stake in developing the offshore beyond the government's political and regulatory control, Williams may have to invest in exploration licenses and doing all the grunt work of finding oil and gas in the north Atlantic. That's the tough and costly way, but there may well be no realistic alternative.

With frontier oil and gas, those who take the risks reap the rewards.

Nothing says "election" like politicians and public cash

Stockwell came to town today.

Along for the ride were Loyola Hearn, the federal fisheries minister, Conservative member of parliament Fabian Manning, and Norm Doyle, soon-to-be double pensioned. 

Stockwell, a minister in the federal government,  took a few moments from traipsing around a provincial prison and a few other choice spots not featured in the usual tourist itinerary to pass out some federal dough with the local boys. 

$279, 349 in money from the federal disaster fund, f'rinstance.

For a disaster that happened in 2000.

The merry band handed out another cheque;   280-odd thousand to let communities tally up crime numbers.

Local reporters asked the moneybags about the $150 million in cash for a federal prison.  Some enterprising souls, you see, are one step ahead of the local daily.  They have hit on another island on which to model for our future, this time Alcatraz, using an election goodie floated out before the last time the Tories held power in Ottawa.

Stockwell assured the reporters that no decision had been made yet on the future of the provincially-owned and operated Lakeside Hilton,  a.k.a Her Majesty's Penitentiary.  

You can tell there's an election coming, can't you? 

It's not quite the Summer of Love, but then again it hasn't been much like summer this summer in St. John's so it all fits.

There's another announcement scheduled for tomorrow with Stockwell and Norm.  More public cash, no doubt, for something called "flood recovery".

-srbp-

It's the bit they don't say that kills you

There's yet another piece on Newfoundland and Labrador in the Globe. Today's topic is the Lower Churchill project, which may become part of the Summer of Love election campaign just as it was in 1998 under Brian Tobin.

But here's a comment from PetroNewf chief executive Ed Martin that leaps out for the unstated bit:

"But with respect to the maritime route, it is a viable alternative [to shipping power overland through Quebec]. It's a hands-down viable alternative from a technical perspective."

Technically, engineers can put the proverbial arse back in the proverbial cat.

Technically, engineers can run a single strand thinner than human hair around the globe at the equator and tie a knot in it with tweezers, via remote control from the moon, while blind folded and being distracted by the voice of Lucy Liu's efficiency expert in the original Charlie's Angels (it's a nerd thing).

But is it viable financially?

That's where the answer typically comes up with a simple and emphatic "No!"

200 megawatts shipped all the way from Labrador to Rhode Island? Ya gotta be kidding.

The cost of the land lines down through New Brunswick, Maine and into Massachusetts alone would make the thing dodgy. Add in the underwater cabling to both the island of this province and to the mainland and you have a pretty costly venture.

All of that will be borne, supposedly, by a block of power that is actually less than the power block used annually by two industrial projects in western Labrador.

Now for his part the Premier calls this Rhode Island thing "very,very" crucial and "very, very" something else. When politicians use words like "very" and then use them repeatedly in relation to the same thing (always positive), you can usually be concerned that there is more than a little exaggeration on the go.

It's a verbal nose pull.

And so is Ed Martin's emphasis on the technical feasible of the sub-sea route.

The real question is whether it will be financially viable.

And that's not a poser for engineers.

-srbp-

SOL Day 23: Announcing another announcement previously announced

Like every other news outlet in the province, CBC is reporting that federal fish minister Loyola Hearn released management plans for two marine protected areas in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Okay.

The official fisheries and oceans news release includes this odd comment:

"As we move closer to these two new Marine Protected Areas, it shows what can be done for the environment when everyone works together," says Minister Hearn. "This is another example of how Canada’s New Government is taking real action to protect our precious marine environment."

It's odd because there's no way of knowing what Hearn means by "move closer to these two new Marine Protected Areas."

These MPAs aren't new. They received official MPA designation in 2005, but the actual work at Eastport, for example, began in 1997 with the establishment of a joint management project involving a local fishermen's committee and the fisheries department. Eastport remains a model for co-operative management of fisheries resources. Ditto Gilbert Bay where that MPA is protecting a subspecies of North Atlantic cod. Another project at Leading Tickles is struggling along but it hasn't achieved the same success as the other two.

Hearn might mean "moving closer" in the sense that he went to Eastport to make the announcement but other than that the phrase is a head scratcher. The management plan is good news but the MPAs have worked with some sort of management plan from the outset.

In the Summer of Love, there is obviously no reason not to announce an announcement of a previously announced announcement.

-srbp-

A mid-summer night’s gambol

“Love”, as Shakespeare put it, “looks not with the eyes, but with the mind and therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.”

Of all the political pixie dust in the province, none has clouded the eyes more than the Lower Churchill.  And while many have played the part,  no Lysanders have been more besotted of this megaproject  than our current one.  

T the course of true love also never runs true and in this case, the course has run nowhere near as true as claimed. While Danny Williams had hoped to be rid of his current job and on to other things by now, he is now saying he will be around until the project is done.   But not a fourth term.

Williams said the project will likely be completed before the 2015 election, and he will be done with politics by that time.

"I can guarantee I won't be around for four terms," the premier said.

The new target date is before 2015, much as the old date, except that now the Premier  is proposing to finish two dams and a power line through the UNESCO World Heritage site and on to St. John’s in less than four years.

The power line, though doth wander everywhere.   According to the latest version it will go over hill, over dale, thorough bush, thorough brier, over park, over pale,  thorough flood, thorough fire, and through some other unnamed provinces to get to market.  Where those markets are remains a mystery.

One major problem with this power line tale is that the project – as laid down in the environmental review documents – is exactly the same one described by an earlier Lysander, namely Brian Tobin.   One line to get the power to Quebec and another down through Gros Morne park – the government’s clearly preferred option – and thence to the townies.

That’s it.

There is no line proposed to run from Newfoundland off to Nova Scotia or anywhere else.

But gentle readers, enough of these jests.

Let us walk through the Premier’s latest musings on the Lower Churchill, as contained in a Telegram story this August Saturday, and wash the pixie dust from your eyes.  One megaproject-love-struck player is enough.

1.  Show me the money or Follow the money:  The fact Williams didn’t talk about money should be a clue this whole thing is a crock.  Of course, the Telly reporter also didn’t ask about it, so Williams managed to skate around what likely could have been a very testy and difficult part of the interview.

Basically, there’s no talk at any point in the entire interview about power purchase agreements and those puppies are the key to raising the $10 billion to build both dams and the transmission lines.

It’s that simple:

No money?

No project.

2.  Timelines.  Done by 2015, which was the plan back when the project would have been sanctioned in 2009.  The timeline before that was first power in 2011 based on project sanction in 2007.

Early last year the whole thing was a dodgy proposition according to Williams.  At this point, the environmental reviews won’t be complete until 2010 or 2011, leaving, supposedly, a mere four years years to get all the work done.

Horse feathers.

The project cannot be sanctioned – that is approved for construction – until it clears the environmental process.  As such, the project that was supposed to be sanctioned in 2009 is effectively two to three years behind schedule.  Even if everything goes according to the current timeline – and there’s no guarantee that won’t change too – the whole thing will not be up and running until some time around 2019 at the very earliest.

Anyone who has followed this project consistently will recognise the timelines in this interview are simply a crock.

3.  And the departure date’s a crock too.  Danny Williams may run in the next election.  Then again he may not.  If Williams stuck to the original timeline, the project would be sanctioned this year and hence he could leave knowing it is on the way. 

The Lower Churchill isn’t the determinant of Danny Williams political career.  Something else is.  Figure that out and you can figure out whether he will go soon or run again in 2011.  You see, Williams has changed his commitment on departure so many times, it’s hard to take seriously his current version:  that he will leave, definitely, in 2015.

4.  NALCO – run from the Premier’s office.

Williams said he meets regularly with officials at Nalcor Energy - the provincial Crown corporation which is overseeing the project - to get updates on the outstanding issues which need to be addressed before the project is sanctioned.

Anyone who thinks Williams isn’t the de facto head of NALCO can take that quote as a slap upside the head.  There are a raft of implications that go with that but they should be fairly obvious for anyone with a clue.

5.  The sanctioning issues:

Some of those outstanding issues for the Lower Churchill include ratification of the New Dawn agreement with the Labrador Innu, an environmental assessment - expected to be complete next year - choosing a transmission route for the power, finding customers for the power and obtaining financing for the project, which could cost $10 billion.

But Williams is confident that all these matters can be resolved and said steady progress is being made towards the project.

"None of these are insurmountable, they all just take time," Williams said.

Well, let’s see.  There’s  money, something Williams didn’t talk about that much at all and that one isn’t insurmountable unless someone plans to stick taxpayers with the full bill.

As well, there’s:

6.   New Dawn or, as it is known around these parts, the Fart Man Accord.   The land claims deal with the Innu was supposed to be over and done with last January.  Right now the vote on the agreement is postponed until…well…never.  There is no date for a ratification vote.

There’s also no sign the federal government has accepted it and they have to be party to any land claims deal with the Innu

7. The environmental process.  Should be pretty much a mechanical exercise except for the Gros Morne bit.  That one is going to be sticky but only because the feds hold the trump card.  If the thing had included a line to the mainland outside the province, it would be subject to a federal environmental review.  As it is the provincial government will sanction its own power line project – what else would they do? -  but they’ll have to come up with something clever to deal with a backlash over Gros Morne.

Could that “something” be the jobs created by poking a few holes in the ground at Parson’s Pond which is just outside the park?

8.  The feds.  Danny Williams has a bunch of federal things that need fixing if his pet project goes anywhere.  At this point, all that is dead in the water, largely due to his own actions over the past couple of years.

He’s linked the project to federal funding but even as recently as this summer Williams ducked a chance to pitch the project directly to federal cabinet ministers.  Was it because Harper showed up?

The feds won’t just pony up cash for this.  Odds are good it would come – if it came at all – in the form of an equity stake.  That’s means the federal government would own shares in the Lower Churchill just as they do in Hibernia.  Is that something Danny Williams is prepared to accept since he is already so peeved that the Hibernia shares exist?

The feds are also not likely to be persuaded by a cheesy blackmail attempt: 

Williams said the Gros Morne route would probably be the cheaper and shorter route, but he said it could be taken off the table if Ottawa would commit to help fund the project.

9.  Not the preferred route…  Through Gros Morne and the park’s UNESCO World Heritage site designation, that is.  Not the “preferred route”.  Nope.  It’s the only route.

NALCO is pushing the line through Gros Morne it’s the only route they have looked at since all they’ve done is just updated plans that have been around since before the park existed.

Notice, of course, that in polling season Danny Williams is suddenly talking all sweet and purty.  The last time the park route came up he insisted he’d drive the line through the park based on numbers he pulled out of his ass on the spot and a totally shameless bit of nonsense about grandma and her heart surgery.

The time before that Williams was all for the route saying those who doubted the route would be persuaded once they saw the “trade-offs”.

10.  The only thing in the interview you can take to the bank. (Don’t buy the “green project” bullshit)

"This is going to happen, it's just a question of when."

The Lower Churchill has been a project in the works since the 1950s or 1960s.  It’s been going to happen for 50 years.  it’s always been a question of when. 

The only thing we can say for certain now besides saying the project will happen at some point is that the “some point’ will not be by 2015.

-srbp-

Gandhi, Mandela, and a guy in a chicken suit #nlpoli

If the provincial New Democrats had sent a garden gnome around the province, odds are that the photos he'd have brought back would be more interesting than the stuff Earle McCurdy is posting from his wanderings around the province this summer.

This is a picture Earle tweeted on Monday from a coffee shop in Gander.  Admittedly, it has been a few years since your humble e-scribbler has visited Suburbia-in-the-Woods, but recent news reports suggest that there is a sizeable population of folks still there.

Well, enough at least that a fellow of the political stature of Chainsaw Earle might possibly manage to draw enough of an audience on his own account as to populate a decent size photo.  And certainly enough if the local squad of New Democratic Party zealots got all together in one spot, they might be able to pass themselves off as  something resembling a handful, if not a bunch.

But one person?

That's just embarrassing.