___________________________________________________
"The Government of Newfoundland
and
Labrador has never tried to defend the
expropriation of the mill ... It was
never
our intention to expropriate the mill,"
Premier Kathy Dunderdale
____________________________________________________
This weeks conclusion to the legal saga spawned by our
Provincial Government’s nationalization
of Abitibi-Bowater’s hydro, land, forest limits and the mill in Grand
Falls-Windsor provides an important lesson in trust.
The Bill was a rushed piece of work.
The opposition and the
public were told that the i’s were crossed and the t’s were crossed. The
Minister of Natural Resources backed by NALCOR’s new CEO Ed Martin assured the
province that they what they were doing. Trust us!
It would not be fair to state that everyone bought it. There
were some voices in the woods who articulated their concerns about a rushed
process and the potential impact of the nationalization of private
infrastructure under the NAFTA
Agreement.
The plan, we were assured was bullet proof. The mill itself would be left in the hands of
the company. The purpose was to ensure that public resources did not fall into
the hands of draconian foreign interests who had no interest in producing
paper, who wanted to sell electricity.
Every individual and party in the House of Assembly bought
the sirens song. They were lulled into a sense of comfort. The government’s
legal beagles, NALCOR and Legislative Council had this one down pat.
On a late December night in 2008 after a rushed debate the legislation
was passed. Premier Danny Williams with the unanimous support of the House of
Assembly became the Hugo Chavez of the North.
Shortly afterwards we learned that the assurances provided
by government were wrong. The nationalization had inadvertently included the mill
itself! Some faceless bureaucrat had
provided false data that placed the land the mill sits on inside the
expropriation zone. The Minister of Natural Resources –Kathy Dunderdale &
the CEO of NALCOR shagged up.
This week the government exhausted the legal avenues it had
perused to have Abitibi pay the costs for the environmental remediation of it’s
former properties. The province is on the hook for $100 million bill.
That is in addition to the federal government subsequently agreed to pay
AbitibiBowater $130-million to settle a claim under the North American Free
Trade Agreement.
That does not even include the costs
associated with the pensions of former mill workers or economic diversification
funds targeted for the region.
Fast forward to the present. One again the major players in
the 2008 debacle are once again saying trust us, we have this. Kathy Dunderdale
is now the Premier and despite a plethora of concerns from independent
regulatory organizations, is plowing a ten billion dollar project down the
public’s throat with a similar refrain, trust us – we have the expertise and
the experience to manage the Muskrat Falls project.
As Liberal and NDP MHA’s learned from the 2008
Nationalization legislation, having blind faith in government, assuming they
know what they are doing, can lead to monumental expenses.
Can you/we afford to risk $10 Billion +
on the word of NALCOR and the Premier?
I don’t think so.
1 comment:
Peter, we definitely cannot afford to take that risk but are committed to jump over our own fiscal cliff by a reckless administration and a power-hungry group of "wanna be" business types at NALCOR.
Why the foolhardy and urgent decision to sanction a risky and, I would submit, totally unnecessary project? As I have alluded to previously, there is more to this than meets the eye but we will be the poor suckers who have to pay the piper.
It is sickening because of the impotence of the electorate and the inability of basic democratic processes to stop this madness. A project of this magnitude MUST never be allowed to pass without the full support of the general populace but we, as electors, have abdicated our responsibility. In that regard we deserve it..... but it is most unfortunate that this is not one of those blunders that we can recover from.
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