The Authoritarian Impulse #nlpoli

Special Measures Enforcement

Jim Dinn used to be a teacher.

As head of the provincial teachers’ union, he spearheaded a drive against the public’s right to know how politicians spent public money.

And now he is a member of the provincial legislature.

“Let’s talk about rights,” said Jim Dinn on May 5, explaining why he felt it was a good idea to give the minister of justice the power to send police out to take people away to a detention centre. 

Not a judge. 

A politician.

“Funerals, people can’t be present for the passing of their loved ones. It is my right to attend a funeral, peaceful gatherings, …  for me, it’s the fact that I can’t be around my grandchildren. Now we have the double bubble and I’ll do anything to defend it. Weddings – all of them are rights. I took my mother to the hospital the other day. I couldn’t even go into the hospital with her. That’s my right, to go with her. I could not go.”

Not rights at all, really.  Things people like to do.  Things they expect to do.

But not the same as voting, speaking one’s mind freely, or – and this is the important one for this discussion – not having the police kick in your front door and spirit you away to some detention centre somewhere in the province because a minister said it was okay.

This is the kind of stuff they used to do in Argentina when the junta’s agents would disappear people.

They do it all the time in North Korea.

But in a democratic country like Canada, even in an emergency, we do not allow arbitrary arrest and detention, let alone do so quite so cavalierly as Dinn and the other members of the House allowed.

But in Jim Dinn’s world, this sort of thing is no biggie.  He felt it more important not to be like the United States.   

Not satisfied with his frighteningly shallow argument, Jim then praised himself and his colleagues for their “collaboration, co-operation and self-sacrifice” in attending the House of Assembly for a few minutes one afternoon to pass a few pieces of legislation.

The Bow Wow Parliament creates a Kangaroo Court #nlpoli

The Bow Wow Parliament

The first casualty of the current pandemic in Newfoundland and Labrador was democracy and on Tuesday, the pandemic added to its draconian toll.

A handful of members of the House met with the permission of a government official and passed without much discussion a measure that created a kangaroo court in which the official could apply in secret to two cabinet ministers, obtain a de facto conviction of someone without what lawyers call due process, and then send off the police to scoop up the hapless person who may or may not have violated a health order under the health protection law. 

Health minister John Haggie introduced the amendment. He shed no light on why the government had banned all non-residents from entering the province except people in two special categories.  Haggie did not explain why the restrictions that had been in place were not working. He gave no indication why he and his colleague the justice minister needed the powers of a judge already set out in another section of the health protection law to enforce any orders.

When his turn to speak came, opposition leader Ches Crosbie spoke briefly about what he referred to as new police powers that would be used to enforce all the chief medical officer’s special orders.  He noted the concerned expressed to him by lawyers that the recent travel ban was illegal and/or unconstitutional. 

Then Crosbie said that he and his caucus had decided to vote for amendment in exchange for a promise the government would:   

1. read a submission from the Canadian Bar Association about the travel ban, and 
2. ask the chief medical officer to amend her improper travel ban to allow a few categories of exemptions they wanted.

That is all.

Such are the intellectual, ethical, and legal standards of the Bow Wow Parliament.

Borrowed Money and Borrowed Time #nlpoli

Tom Osborne was in Ottawa on Tuesday with his fellow finance ministers trying to squeeze some extra cash out of the federal government. 

The wealthiest provinces in Canada – Alberta,  Saskatchewan, and Newfoundland and Labrador – are looking for some changes to the Fiscal Stabilization Program that would give them extra cash.  They’ve given up on changes to the Equalization program since it is intended to help poorer provinces deliver essential services at roughly comparable levels of taxation. 

FSP “enables the federal government to provide financial assistance to any province faced with a year-over-year decline in its non-resource revenues greater than five per cent.”

Provinces may submit a claim to the Minister of Finance as late as 18 months after the end of the fiscal year in question or may also submit a claim for an advance payment based on as few as five months of data for the fiscal year.

The program doesn’t compensate provinces for losses due to changes in provincial taxation rates. A drop in resource revenues is taken into account only if and to the extent that the annual decline in revenue exceeds 50 per cent.

As Osborne’s financial update for 2019 indicates, though, a bit of extra federal cash won’t fix the problems Osborne has.

Political Foote Ball #nlpoli

Since 2003, the legislature has become more about political theatre than the public interest.  This past sitting of the House proves how much that is so.

Public discussion of policy issues in Newfoundland and Labrador takes place inside an echo chamber. It tends to stay inside arbitrary, artificial boundaries.  Participants  ride their hobby horses and ignore or try to shout down anything that contradicts their assumptions. often comments are not about what is actually going on.  They emphasise the trivial and superficial – the spats with Gerry Byrne and Tom Osborne – and ignore the  far more serious. Much of what they do is absurd:  they chase Chris Mitchelmore, knowing that Dwight Ball actually made the decision. 

Only the Premier can approve appointments
to the senior public service. 

You see them a lot.

New releases from the provincial government announcing changes to the senior public service in the province.  New people taking jobs.  People being moved from one job to another. A handful of retirements or people who left, implicitly to take up another job.

In October 2018, for example,  there was an announcement of a new appointment as associate secretary to cabinet for communications. There’s no mention of what happened to the person who used to have that job,  although the release for that earlier appointment came in January 2016.

The senior public service includes deputy ministers, associate and assistant deputy ministers, and executive directors.

There were 56 changes at that level in 2016, 60 in 2017, and only 16 in 2018. 

They don’t issue news releases for every one, any more.  Dwight Ball stopped announcing any appointments below the rank of deputy minister.  The high number of changes in the senior public service under Kathy Dunderdale became a major issue and an easy way to stop people finding out about the changes was to simply stop announcing some of them.

Fortunately for openness, transparency, and accountability, there’s a database online of orders-in-council that anyone can search.  Those are the legal documents that make each senior executive appointments official. 

The word is "curious" #nlpoli

B'y, it is really hard to call the changes announced on Wednesday as a "shake-up" of the public service or any kind of major change to anything really.

Aside from chucking a very small number of people out the door,  this change to the structure of government didn't do much of anything but leave you wondering what the point was.

There have been rumblings of these changes going back months.  Folks looking for some sort of massive shake-up in the fall might be disappointed to discover this was it.  Most likely the next big news we will get is in the budget next spring.

But let's run through Wednesday's head-shaker-upper-whatever.

Friends and enemies #nlpoli

Craig Westcott tells a story from his short stint as communications director for the Liberals in opposition in the last days of Danny Williams and the early days of his handpicked successor, Kathy Dunderdale.

"I kept after the very small caucus we had to keep asking questions,"  Westcott said in an email to SRBP, "hoping that even if the media ignored us, some of the folks watching at home would cotton on to how bad the deal was.  That might generate some heat. It kept the flame of criticism and skepticism alive."

"We looked at everything from the lack of documentation to support Nalcor's demand projections, to the big question of water rights, the actual usage of Holyrood as part of the island's power supply for the previous 20 or so years, the free power to Nova Scotia, the privatization of the Labrador to Island transmission line to give [Emera] a cut,  the free block of power to Nova Scotia, the likely cost of Muskrat Falls-generated power, which early on we pegged at over 20 cents per kWh, and on and on. The deal was so flawed it was difficult to find anything positive in it."

One major problem Westcott ran into was that the local media weren't interested. "[CBC's David] Cochrane tired pretty quickly of the Opposition asking questions on Muskrat," Westcott said.  "He complained several times that we weren't asking anything new. Some days he walked out of the legislature after Question Period and made a point [of saying] that he wasn't going to scrum our guys because we were still on Muskrat. The other legislative reporters would follow him out."

A foundation of lies and deceit #nlpoli

You could feel the shock among the local media on Friday as Stan Marshall carefully dissected the insanity that is Muskrat Falls.

Didn't matter if you heard the voices on the radio,  watched them on television or read them online.   The reporters' emotional reaction transferred through whatever medium it was that conveyed their words.  Here it was laid out in stark detail:  billions over budget,  years behind schedule,  a financial burden for the province its people will be sorely pressed to bear and all of it built - in essence - on a series of false statements,  faulty assumptions, and anything but facts and reason.

Never mind that all of what Stan Marshall said was - in effect - already widely know and had been known for most of the preceding decade.  Here you had someone as rich or richer than Danny Williams telling them that Muskrat Falls was utter shite.  By the unspoken law of Newfoundland politics,  the poor benighted scribblers now had no choice but report it.

Changing the direction. Changing the tone. #nlpoli

A month ago,  a CBC “analysis” by David Cochrane warned against a band of Liberals running the government with too much power.

Two weeks ago,  another CBC “analysis” by David Cochrane told us that Dwight Ball was an “unlikely” fellow to be Premier who now faced an enormous task of dealing with the government’s financial problems based on a campaign platform that was, supposedly, “greeted with enormous skepticism in the final week of the campaign.”

And now we have the latest Cochrane “analysis” that tells us that the public service is liking their new bosses.  The administration has been delivering on “Ball's campaign promises of evidence-based decision-making and to bring [sic] stability to cabinet by ending the practice of frequent shuffles, thereby leaving ministers in place long enough to build command of their portfolios.”

What changed?

Well, it certainly hasn’t been Dwight Ball and the Liberals he led to a substantive victory in the recent election.

White is the new black #nlpoli

2002.

Stephen Harper said that his party had a program that would help change the dependence in Atlantic Canada on government spending, a dependence that had led to what he called a “culture of defeatism.”

That’s the actual phrase, by the way,  “culture of defeatism.”  Not a culture of defeat as some politicians have put it in the innumerable times since 2002 that they have used that phrase against Stephen Harper in a federal election campaign.

Money and Politics – the Chronic Enforcement Problem #nlpoli

We can have all the rules in the world about how political parties and political candidates receive and spend money in Newfoundland and Labrador, but they are useless without meaningful enforcement.

It’s been illegal since 2011 for municipalities to make political contributions.  The association representing the province’s towns and cities knew about the 2011 amendment to the Municipalities Act.

The people at the electoral office didn’t.

The Dysfunctional House of Assembly #nlpoli

Politics in Newfoundland and Labrador (2015) – Part 3

In the third instalment in the series,  SRBP looks at the way the House of Assembly operates.
_____________________________________________

Liberal finance critic Cathy Bennett’s recent op-ed piece in the Telegram said that the provincial government’s current financial mess is about more than unexpected changes in the price of oil.
She’s absolutely right.

Bennett pointed to the Equalization offset transfers under the 1985 Atlantic Accord as the root.  The provincial government got about $4.6 billion under the deal.  “The province collected $4.6 billion in federal funding under the Atlantic Accord,”  wrote Bennett.  “A long-term financial plan should have been put in place to account for the future loss of those revenues.

Equalization transfers.

Sounds a wee bit familiar, doesn’t it?

Not fit for it #nlpoli

It’s not surprising that the provincial Conservatives and their supporters want to reduce the representations the people of the province have in the House of Assembly.

After all, the plan to cut 10 seats from the House of Assembly and make other changes in the interest of “modernisation” fits their pattern of behaviour over the past decade.

But there’s a bit more to it.

10 years later #nlpoli

Today marks the 10th anniversary of the first Sir Robert Bond Papers post.

In July 2004,  I wrote and released a paper that tried to “examine offshore oil revenues and the Atlantic Accord in light of what the Accord actually provides.It was an attempt to evaluate the provincial government's proposal based on what had been made public to that point.”

Which is to be master?  was supposed to be the first of a series of papers on different public policy issues.  Each would have a different author.  They would appear from time to time in order to foster “public discussion of issues affecting Newfoundland and Labrador.”  The title of the series was going to be The Sir Robert Bond Papers.

Errors in judgement #nlpoli

March 13, 2014 was a Thursday.

Normal cabinet day.

According to Auditor General Terry Paddon’s report on the Humber Valley Paving contract,  Nick McGrath, then minister of works and transportation called his deputy minister at 8:45 AM and asked him whether he’d heard that HVP wanted to get out of their Labrador paving contract. (p.39) He hadn’t.

There’s no indication of how McGrath became aware of HVP’s problems.  According to Paddon’s report,  McGrath told him that he “may have” heard about HVP from colleagues. (p.54)  It’s all pretty vague.

The deputy called Gene Coleman at 9:15 AM, according to Paddon.  Coleman,  son of the erstwhile Conservative leadership candidate McGrath claims he had not heard of, confirmed the company “would not be going back to Labrador” (p. 54) in 2014, at least not without compensation.  Coleman indicated that without compensation,  HVP would want a mutually-agreed termination of the contract with the government. (p.39)

The Fairity Intervention

At 9:30 AM,  the deputy got a call from Kevin O’Brien.  He was calling about  the HVP contract, too, even though O;Brien had no reason to be involved.  (p. 39)  Asked by Paddon later how he became aware of the issue, O’Brien  - who was also an organizer for Frank Coleman’s leadership campaign - said that he had heard “colleagues” talking,  wanted to speak with the deputy about other issues but raised the HVP issue because of the potential connection to forest fires in Labrador.  (p. 54)   O’Brien was minister of fire and emergency services

All hail the Glorious Leader Trope #nlpoli

“Province to deliver on promise of whistleblower law”  read the headline for the CBC’s online story about the provincial government throne speech read Wednesday in the House of Assembly.

About half way down the story,  it says that “Premier Tom Marshall is fighting back  against the perception” that the government he’s been a part of since 2003 is secretive. 

You’ll see the same idea in the Telegram’s story:

In today’s throne speech, Premier Tom Marshall made his most significant signal so far that the government is doing everything possible to be more open and transparent.

Last week, everyone told us that public satisfaction with the Conservative administration went up because of Tom Marshall. Corporate Research Associates certainly credited Marshall with the boost in the news release that covered the release of their poll data. The panel on CBC’s On Point with David Cochrane [March 8]all agreed that Marshall might play a significant role because, after all, he was the guy who boosted that satisfaction number.

What’s interesting about this idea, that Tom Marshall alone did all this, is simply not true.

Following the Money #nlpoli

After Bill Barry  - the only declared candidate -  former cabinet minister Shawn Skinner is the least imaginary of the potential candidates for the leadership of the Conservative Party in Newfoundland and Labrador.

“What I’m running for is to form the next government,”  Skinner told the Telegram’s James McLeod.  What I am running for.  Present tense.  Definitive. 

Not what I am thinking about running for.  Not what I might run for.

What I am running for.

And yet Skinner hasn’t actually announced that he is running.  The main reason he gave to the Telegram is understandable:  the party hasn’t announced the rules for the contest yet.

One of the rules Skinner is particularly concerned about is the spending limit for the campaign.

Inquiring Minds? You don’t want to know. #nlpoli

Denial and evasion, wrote Andrew Coyne last week, are only making worse three political scandals. He’s referring to Toronto Mayor Rob Ford and allegations of substance abuse, Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Mike Duffy Affair, and former Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty and a police investigation into McGuinty’ s staff, missing e-mails and a gas plant.

Coyne is his usual insightful self.

What’s more, added Telegram editor Peter Jackson, these three have made matters worse by making “false or misleading statements”. Not a good idea, sez Peter, since people “are naturally suspicious.”  You can’t have a good conspiracy because people will sniff out the foolishness.

And in some cases, people will even make stuff up. Peter points to the 9/11 Truthers and the Obama birthers as examples of people who will connect the unconnected.

In short, it’s bad enough when irresponsible rumour-mongers start the ball rolling. 

The last thing politicians should do is feed the flames with fibs and subterfuge.

Wonderful stuff, that, if only we could all safely rely on those inquiring minds to quickly ferret out the truth. 

Beth and Expenses #nlpoli #cdnpoli

All this talk of Senator Beth Marshall and her hefty annual stipend for chairing a committee that has met once in two years brings to mind the good senator’s role in the House of Assembly patronage scam, a.k.a. the spending scandal.

Marshall is credited with first sniffing something was amiss when she went hunting for Paul Dick’s expenses in 2001-ish.  She was barred from the House by the legislature’s internal economy commission.  The members were Liberals and Tories and, as accounts have it, they unanimously wanted to keep Beth’s nose out of their files.

But if you go back and look, you’ll have a hard time finding any indication Beth thought something else was on the go.  While we didn’t know it at the time, subsequent information confirmed that members had been handing out public cash pretty generously by that point. Yet Marshall has never, ever indicated she felt something more than a few wine and art purchases might have been amiss.

That’s important because of Marshall’s record once she got into the House herself as a member in 2003.

Oh for God’s sake, just get a room #nlpoli

If you want to read a strongly worded condemnation of a provincial politician, take a gander at the Telegram’s editorial on Yvonne Jones from Tuesday’s paper.

Jones told the provincial government last week that her vote in the House of Assembly on Muskrat Falls was up for sale. Word got around the province pretty quickly.  And the Telegram dutifully pointed out that Jones’ pork-barrelling was from another time, a time perhaps best left behind.

The editorial tuts the appropriate tuts at Jones’ style of retail politics, but there are a few other points the Telegram didn’t make about the episode that are worth laying out.

We get the message just fine, Jerome #nlpoli

“No, I don’t think that we have done a great job of communicating this,” natural resources minister Jerome Kennedy told the Telegram editorial board last week.

“I can give you a couple of examples myself that I’ve done. One is, ‘No debate! No debate!’ Then a week later, ‘OK, let’s have a debate now.’ That’s not good communication.”

The Telegram editorial on Wednesday then mentioned the provincial government’s general message to critics of the Muskrat falls project.  The editorial paraphrased it as “You’re all idiots, you don’t know what you’re talking about and you’re all wrong.”

Okay.

A bit of an exaggeration, but not much of one.

With all due respect to the newer, calmer Jerome Kennedy, the provincial government doesn’t have a communications problem.