The Memory Hole Nineteen eighty-four is popular these days. People think that the ideas in the book like the memory hole are modeled on communist or fascist dictatorships from the early part of the last century. What those people forget is that George Orwell worked at the BBC during the
Continue readingTag: Danny Williams
The Sir Robert Bond Papers: The Husky Boys’ Challenge #nlpoli
The Husky gambit last week presents the province’s leaders with a fundamental challenge. Do we continue on the current path or do we change? This is not just a question of oil development versus some nebulous, pseudo-intellectual gibberish called “decarbonization”. It is the question from 1984: who will control the Newfoundland and Labrador
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Populism: the lesson from Venezuela #nlpoli
Born and raised in Venezuela, Andreas Miguel Rondon is an economist who now lives in Madrid. He wrote for The Washington Post last week on the lesson Americans should learn from the Venezuelan experience with Hugo Chavez. Trump may be a capitalist and Chavez may have been a socialist but
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Duff in the hole encore #nlpoli
Oh dear. The CBC has gone off to the mainland to get Duff Conacher to make a comment about the need for political finance reform in Newfoundland and Labrador. Three observations: 1. There is a desperate need for campaign finance reform in Newfoundland and Labrador. SRBP has been writing about
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Kevin, Donald, and Danny #nlpoli
A Forum poll released on Monday showed 27% of those surveyed thought celebrity businessman Kevin O’Leary would make the best leader of the federal Conservative party with Maxime Bernier a distant second at 11% and Lisa Raitt coming in at a mere seven percent. Among self-identified Conservatives, O’Leary’s support climbs to 31%,
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Ratings trump truth #nlpoli
Sometimes the universe delivers you the magical set of circumstances you just can’t ignore. Danny Williams turned up at the St. John’s Board of Trade luncheon on Thursday to deliver a speech the day before Donald Trump’s inauguration as president. As much as people might like to forget, this was
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Grits and Cons play dodge-fact over Labrador hydro talks #nlpoli
“There are no discussions between this government and the Quebec government.”
That’s part of a statement sent out by email to local reporters from natural resources minister Siobhan Coady’s office. You can’t find it on the government website or the party website. Coady was responding to a release from provincial Conservative leader Paul Davis challenging Dwight Ball to state the administration’s plans for the province’s hydro resources in Labrador.
Words matter. No one has suggested that the two governments were talking about anything. The talks would take place between Nalcor and Hydro-Quebec and, whether we take Nalcor boss Stan Marshall’s own words or the local scuttlebutt, the talks are going on between the two companies.
They can’t dodge a wrench, either
Coady and Premier Dwight Ball need to stop playing dodge-fact. They suck at it.
Coady’s misleading denial is the same as Ball’s deceptive statement mentioned in yesterday’s post that there are “no talks about Hydro-Quebec taking over Muskrat Falls.”
No one said anything about HQ “taking over” Muskrat Falls then or now. The rumble around town is that Nalcor and HQ are in talks that would see HQ taking a major role in an expanding Lower Churchill project.
To really signal the administration’s her difficulty with a simple, true statement, Coady tried to claim the Tories were “fearmongering.” That just comes across as looks silly. The simple truth is that if Nalcor and HQ weren’t talking, both Coady and Ball would have said precisely that. Based on the way Ball and Coady are carrying on, we know something’s up. We should be even more concerned given the fact that – yet again – Coady and Ball prefer to be cute rather than make simple statements that deal directly with the issue.
Constable Clueless Strikes Again
As for the Conservatives, they don’t get off much better in the fact department. Davis’ statement said that the “Muskrat Falls project was designed to end Quebec’s longstanding stranglehold on our hydro exports by creating a new route through the Maritimes to give our province new leverage after Quebec played hardball for decades, costing us enormous amounts of potential revenue a year,.”
That was what Danny Williams claimed in 2010 but, as Williams surely knew at the time and Davis should know now, it just isn’t true. Changes to American trade rules in the late 1990s made it impossible for Quebec to trade electricity into the United States without opening up their grid to competition. They did, which is how Nalcor was able to sell electricity to Emera starting in 2009. In fact, when Williams announced the deal in 2009 he said that the deal proved the stranglehold was a thing of the past. Williams claimed the Muskrat deal with Emera broke the stranglehold, but it wasn’t true then and it isn’t true now.
The Road to Perdition
Brian Tobin and Roger Grimes came as close as possible to developing the Lower Churchill successfully. They had a market for the power, interest in developing the transmission grid and, as it turned out, enough cash from oil to ensure the provincial government and its energy corporation could have covered any cost over-runs.
The Sir Robert Bond Papers: Worst possible time for HQ deal #nlpoli
If the rumblings from Labrador are correct, an opinion column in lapresse – “Why Quebec should regain Labrador” – this weekend both fits right in and provides a cautionary tale for us all.
Pierre Gingras – right – spent 31 years with Hydro-Quebec (1966 to 1997) building large hydro-electric projects like Manicouagan and James Bay.
Gingras thinks the time is right to rescue tiny Newfoundland from itself and a very old injustice done to Quebec. After all, Gingras notes, people in Quebec should recall that, owing to what Gingras calls the “shenanigans of certain [but unnamed] financiers” the Privy Council in London tore Labrador from Quebec in 1927 and gave it to the British colony of Newfoundland without any protest from Canada.
“On se rappellera que le Labrador a été arraché au Québec (et au Canada) par le Conseil privé de Londres en 1927, à la suite des manigances de certains financiers, pour être rattaché à Terre-Neuve, alors colonie britannique, et ce, sans la moindre réaction du gouvernement du Canada.”
Quebec cannot buy power from Muskrat Falls as it is right now, according to Gingras, since the existing transmission lines are at maximum capacity. But a new transmission line costing $3-4 billion would make it profitable to develop Gull Island. Such a project would also allow for the development of many smaller projects in Labrador and along the Quebec North Shore that are currently held up, according to Gingras, by the uncertainty over the border.
Talk of a potential deal with Hydro-Quebec on the Lower Churchill has been swirling for months. Stan Marshall has done nothing to dispel public concern with his comments in August that he is busily improving the relationship between Nalcor and HQ. In June, Marshall said that Nalcor was looking at ways of boosting revenue from Muskrat Falls in conjunction with Nalcor’s existing partners Emera and Nyro-Quebec.
Nor did Premier Dwight Ball calm concerns when he said a couple of months ago that there were “no talks about Hydro-Quebec taking over MuskratFalls.” That sounds like one of his patented denials using very precise and misleading language. The deal apparently in the works would have HQ buy a significant interest in a much larger project that, as Gingras described it, would involve development of Gull Island. That isn’t about taking over Muskrat Falls, so Dwight’s comment would be literally true, even if it did not tell the whole truth.
The worst possible time
This is the worst possible time for Nalcor to be talking with Hydro-Quebec about the Lower Churchill. Nalcor and the provincial government are more vulnerable than ever before. Not only is the Muskrat Falls project spiraling out of control and unable to deliver its promised electricity, the provincial government is in the midst of its worst financial crisis since 1933.
Then there is the fact that the current government is in third place in the polls and the Premier is at the lowest point in the polls for any Premier since we have had polling information. The last time a politician was even half as desperate to make a deal on the Lower Churchill, Danny Williams cut one for Muskrat Falls. It guaranteed free electricity for Emera for 35 years, partially privatized the electricity grid in Newfoundland, and bound the province into the current mess. Don’t forget either that Williams himself spent five years desperately – and secretly – trying to get Hydro-Quebec to buy the Lower Churchill.
Dwight Ball has already made it clear he, too, is desperate to complete the Lower Churchill, despite the incontrovertible evidence that it is a mistake. His administration never completed a proper assessment of the alternatives to continuing the project, as it seems. Ball is in an even more desperate position than Williams was, if that is even possible. The government is vulnerable, therefore, to even the weakest offer that would beggar the provincial position and give Hydro-Quebec precisely the level of control of resources that Gingras is proposing.
Make no mistake, the provincial position had been strengthening in the late 1990s. It has deteriorated sharply since 2003, most significantly since October 2010. There is no reason to believe that the current Liberal administration – pot-committed to the ludicrous Muskrat Falls project – could produce a viable deal even with Stan Marshall. Indeed, Marshall is already jammed into an impossible position since Ball and the current Liberal administration have denied him the most power option anyone has in any negotiation: walking away from a deal. Marshall was interested in examining all options when he took over as chief executive at Nalcor. Dwight Ball has made it plain his only option is to finish the project.
Ball and Marshall don’t have many options. The federal government cannot increase its financial exposure in the project as it currently stands. It is a boondoggle and, as a recent court decision in Quebec confirmed, Nalcor does not control water flows on the river. As such, Muskrat Falls can scarcely produce enough electricity to meet the freebie Williams and Ed Martin gave Nova Scotia. The federal government will not pour more cash into it.
Having cut off every option for himself, Ball is clearly left with Hydro-Quebec and its deep pockets and experience as the only way to go. That’s why Ball must stop any discussions involving Hydro-Quebec and the Lower Churchill immediately. If he persists and, God forbid, he tries to implement a deal, Ball will precipitate a political crisis the likes of which the province has never seen. Given the government’s precarious financial state, such a political confrontation crisis over what can only be an inevitably bad deal on the Lower Churchill would be one the province cannot afford.
The Sir Robert Bond Papers: OCI dumps troubled shrimp plant on taxpayers #nlpoli
Ocean Choice International is in better financial shape today, having successfully dumped a surplus shrimp processing facility on the people of Port Union. The plant – seriously damaged in 2010 during Hurricane Igor still needs major renovations….
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Offense and Defense #nlpoli
If you’re not on offense, you are on defense.And in politics, if you are on defense, you are losing.The Liberals wound up on the defensive yet again Wednesday with the resignation of Ed Martin and the entire Nalcor board.To be sure, Williams-era appoin…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Getting while the getting is good. #nlpoli
As if on cue, Danny Williams’ publicist tweeted praise for Ed Martin as soon as news broke that Danny Williams’ right-hand for so many years was leaving the energy corporation Williams created.Almost an hour later, she flipped out a statement fro…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Us and them #nlpoli
This is the story of two politicians.One is a successful business man with major land developments in the works. He got into politics to defend his people against foreigners out to exploit them. With a quick temper, a tendency to just make stuff …
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The inexplicable persistence of nonsense #nlpoli
“There was a very good job done … of boxing this province out [of the Equalization program] a few years ago,”That was Premier Dwight Ball talking to reporters on Tuesday after the Throne Speech that set the agenda for his new administration. He w…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Lions, jellyfish, and a quotable Italian fascist #nlpoli
American media circles were all abuzz this weekend about a little episode on Twitter featuring Donald Trump and a quote he liked.Gawker created a Twitter account last year that spouted quotes from Italian fascist dictator Benito Mussolini but attributi…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: From a decade of prosperity to $2 billion deficits: What happened?
By Roger GrimesReflecting upon becoming the eighth Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador 15 years ago this month, I found myself chatting with a few friends and associates about where the province found itself fiscally at that time, what happened during…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Selling energy assets a good thing: Danny Williams #nlpoli
“It was a previous Liberal government that wanted to actually privatize Hydro. This particular government wants to strengthen Hydro, wants to make it a very valuable corporation: a corporation that will ultimately pay significant dividends ba…
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: The ABCs of ABC #nlpoli
In 2004, Danny Williams fought for three months against a federal government decision that had been settled – at least for the federal government – earlier in the year as part of the usual budget cycle. Williams got the money the federal government had allocated but won the domestic
Continue readingAlberta Politics: Fortune favours the brave? Trudeau risks advocating sane gun laws and ripping PM’s dog-whistle bigotry
PHOTOS: Liberal Party Leader Justin Trudeau during a visit to Edmonton last year. Below: NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair and Prime Minister Stephen Harper. It should have been natural for the leader of the NDP to finally be the one who clearly called out Prime Minister Stephen Harper for his unprincipled
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Brain Farts #nlpoli
Some people have a hard time with the idea that a great many political decisions are not the product of deep thinking, extensive research, and agonizing debate. They come from brain farts. You can hear that pretty clearly in the most recent episode of On Point. The political panel talked
Continue readingThe Sir Robert Bond Papers: Experience and government #nlpoli
In the 1980s, local entrepreneur Craig Dobbin bought a batch of helicopter service companies across Canada and merged them with his own company – Sealand – to form Canadian Helicopters. By the time Dobbin died in 2006, CHC was one of the largest providers of helicopter support services in the
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