Nalcor, the provincial government’s energy corporation, paid $142,332 in royalties on North Amethyst in 2010. The company has paid $317,399 in 2011 on the same project up to the end of June. That’s information provided to SRBP by Nalco…
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The Sir Robert Bond Papers: And the drug store owners’ situation gets worse…
They are already in an untenable political situation. And now the drug store owners are in an even worse situation as they fall to fighting with pharmacists. Here’s the way VOCM put it: They say that independent pharmacies are well represented …
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Memorial University announces new members of board of regents
From Luminus Express: The election of alumni representatives to Memorial’s Board of Regents was finalized on Aug. 4, with five new representatives and one incumbent taking the six available positions. Rex Gibbons returns for another term on th…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The 2011 Regatta Week Top 10
The continued taberization of political reporting in Canada When bullshit fails… No thought, please. We’re Danny. Debt, electricity rates and Muskrat Falls Jane Taber – Twit Blochead-Dipper Watch The medium of the bread…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Bloc Quebecois not separatist party: NL NDP leader
You read that correctly. Newfoundland and Labrador NDP leader Lorraine Michael is quoted by VOCM making the argument that the Bloc Quebecois is not a separatist party: On VOCM’s Backtalk with Paddy Daly Thursday, Michael also said that, according …
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Bond rater drops American credit rating
From the Globe, in a story that Standard and Poor’s had lowered the United States government’s rating from AAA to AA Plus: “The downgrade reflects our opinion that the fiscal consolidation plan that Congress and the Administration recently ag…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The medium of the bread and circuses message
How short is a news cycle? How long is a piece of string? Give any story a couple of days and odds are you won’t be reading or watching on Day Three what you were reading about and watching on Day One. Like Bloc NDP leader Nycole Turmel who – sp…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Opening the doors on government information
There are lots of good ideas floating around that could make Newfoundland and Labrador a stronger and better place to live. One simple one would be to emulate British Columbia: throw open piles of government information so that people can use it…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Resource give-away
The provincial government’s energy company controls billions of dollars worth of hydro-electric and oil resources – much of it handed over as free gifts from taxpayers – but the company pays very little to the provincial treasury in return. Na…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The continued taberization of political reporting in Canada
Only Jane Taber – a well-known twit – could compare Nycole Turmel to Winston Churchill and, at the same time, try and float the ridiculous premise that a handful of people changing political parties in the past couple of decades federally counts as…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: By the numbers – infectious syphilis rates
Inspired by a comparison of rates for infectious syphilis for Canada and for Alberta, your humble e-scribbler took a gawk at the tables from the Public Health Agency of Canada that the Globe staff used to make their tables. Alberta’s rate per 100,00…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: When bullshit fails…
try more bullshit. Well, that’s apparently the latest tactic the Bloc NDP are trying to deploy in an effort to distract attention from the fact that Jack Layton’s handpicked successor was a card-carrying member of the separatist Bloc Quebecois unt…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Why drug store owners – and some politicians – will lose
Shills might like you to believe that their party is on the side of the angels by backing some drug store owners in the province, but all they are doing is showing how little they know about the drug store business and consumers in Newfoundland a…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: BlocHead – Dipper Watch
Bloc NDP leader Nycole Turmel is supposed to be in St. John’s on Wednesday for the annual regatta. Local Dippers will be out in force. As local president Dale Kirby tweeted on Tuesday: Will be at Royal St. John’s Regatta tomorrow with Inte…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: No thought, please. We’re Danny.
In the summer doldrums, odd things poke through to grab your attention. Like this piece in the Calgary Herald about a speech Danny Williams gave back in June. Williams said the federal government spends "too much (time) worrying about how o…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Debt, electricity rates and Muskrat Falls #nlvotes
The editorial board at the Telegram understands the point exactly. It’s a point your humble e-scribbler has been harping on for six years to one extent or another. And it’s one of many major problems with Muskrat Falls and the plan to double elec…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Dunderdale tops in senior management churn
Kathy Dunderdale has the distinction of making more changes to the public service than any of her predecessors as Premier in the past 15 years. Since taking office in December, Dunderdale has made 15 announcements of a changes in the senior ranks of t…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Compare and contrast: election policy edition
Compare the New Democrat “policy” announcements on the fishery and shipbuilding, slipped out there last week with the Liberal one on health care and seniors, announced on Monday morning at a news conference.
The Liberal one wasn’t available online as of 1330 hours local time on Monday. That’s not encouraging, given the announcement happened at 1000 hrs.
The Libs will need to sort this out to make sure their information is readily available. Online media coverage of this announcement sucked. Most didn’t have a story and the one that did appear covered only a small portion of a much larger announcement.
But this is not just a case of announcing a vague intention. The Liberals announcement includes:
- a ministry of aging and seniors,
- an aging and seniors strategy that will also feature health and wellness promotion, respecting and celebrating seniors, supportive communities, seniors’ financial security, employment and life transitioning, secure housing options, and, caregiver assistance and support.
- a seniors’ advocate, similar to the child and youth advocate,
- a funding shift to rehab and other support to enable seniors to stay in their own communities longer, and
- better funding for long-term care and home care.
How this announcement plays with the public remains to be seen. Just recall that health care is the single biggest issue for voters according to polls. And don’t forget that seniors and seniors’ care is already a sensitive political issue. it will only get bigger in the years ahead.
From the sliding a sheet of paper department, a lot of this will look familiar to people who have been paying attention to any sort of policy announcements over the past decade.
That’s because many Conservative policies after 2003 just continued work that was already done or already in train under the Liberals.
From the superficial reporting department, consider that any media coverage of how many candidates the parties have nominated at this point is pretty much a pile of irrelevant bullshite.
Update II: Here’s the policy document in a version you can read and enjoy.
– srbp –
Update: CBC has an online story that went live after this post first went up. It is pretty vague on details despite the fact the Liberal announcement had tons of specifics.
What’s more interesting to see in the CBC comments section are the number of NDP astroturf (fake identities, likely all done by one or a small number of people) comments that criticise the announcement or claim – falsely – that the ideas are NDP ones.
You can expect a lot more of that sort of foolishness, especially if the NDP can’t come up with solid policy announcements of their own.
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The July 2011 Traffic
Top 10 posts for July 2011, as decided by Bond Papers readers: Trade talks with Europeans = “doing back-room deal with a bunch of serial rapists” Forecasting the fall Skinner makes false statement in letter to Telegram Free tuition at …
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Sliding a sheet of paper, NDP version
The New Democrats announced a couple of policy planks last week for the general election campaign. Well, sort of announced. The party’s news release says that leader Lorraine Michael announced something but part of it sure doesn’t look…
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