CanPol: *****-umen Showdown

[Wezil]

WTF is your beef.

It was a business venture. They sold a bad future.

My "beef" is your altruistic description of the ass rape Quebec put Nfld through.

Yes, it was an agreement but as Flubber pointed out, it has poisoned the well ever since.

[Asher]

Are Canadian provinces constantly trying to screw each other or something? What a bizarre version of federalism.

Yeah, that never happens in the US.

[notyoueither]

Are Canadian provinces constantly trying to screw each other or something? What a bizarre version of federalism.

It is a national pastime in Quebec, not so much the rest of the country. But from time to time...

I'm pretty sure this is grandstanding on the part of Clark. She is playing purely to the electorate of BC. She has a lot of wiggle room should she win the upcoming election. I see this as an attempt to win votes in the centre in BC, pure and simple. Alberta's premier (Redford) actually appears to be playing along (what could be settled with a five minute conversation is put off since Redford refuses to talk to Clark about it).

[The Mad Monk]

Yeah, that never happens in the US.

I agree, I can't think of anything on this scale in at least the last century.

[Flubber]

WTF is your beef.

It was a business venture. They sold a bad future.

Yes it was a business venture but many believe hydro Quebec intentionally stalled the deal to put brinco in dire financial straits ( which hydro Quebec knew because it had a board member on the brinco board) and then demanded the most offensive conditions which kick in in 2016.(the automatic renewal at even cheaper prices

Read an analysis by James Feehan. .. He's an economics professor that has written a few articles( somewhat duplicative)on the history and economics of the deal.I think he does a good job of setting out exactly what the beef is.

AS a business deal it simply reeks. Hydro Quebec as customer was negotiating with a corporate supplier while it had a senior Hydro Quebec exec on the board of directors of that supplier. they demanded huge NEW concessions at a point in the negotiations almost precisely when the suppliers financing was running out.

Newfoundland has had a couple of legal runs at overturning the contract which were doomed to failure. In Feehans analysis he does point out that none of the challenges has targeted the 2016 renewal clause so don't be surprised if they go at it again. I don't have a lot of confidence in any such challenges but 40 years later this is still a huge issueto Newfounlanders.

Now Newfoundland has become a " have" province recently anyway due to oil wealth while Quebec toils as a have not despite pocketing billions more on this deal than Newfoundland. Maybe there's some karma at work out there

[Flubber]

It is a national pastime in Quebec, not so much the rest of the country. But from time to time...

I'm pretty sure this is grandstanding on the part of Clark. She is playing purely to the electorate of BC. She has a lot of wiggle room should she win the upcoming election. I see this as an attempt to win votes in the centre in BC, pure and simple. Alberta's premier (Redford) actually appears to be playing along (what could be settled with a five minute conversation is put off since Redford refuses to talk to Clark about it).

Perhaps... The royalty stuff gets a reaction and makes the paper. If she had said something blander, it's just typical routine stuff so no one pays attention

I Also thought that if someone wanted to make BC- Alberta deals, the right way isn't through the media... This looks like posturing... Weird that the bestosturing is to make a completely unreasonable demand but this is the world we live in

[Ben Kenobi]

keep in mind the BC opposition is even more anti-pipeline than the government - this is as good as it gets

We're talking the NDP? BC Conservatives are on Asher's side of this - BC needs the jobs. If AB really wants the pipeline through they should be kicking money out to Bill Vanderzalm.

[Hauldren Collider]

Yeah, that never happens in the US.

No, the way it works in the US is that states try to screw the feds, while the feds screw everyone equally.

[Wezil]

Forget BC, native opposition will kill this pipeline.

Albertans are incensed BC put a price on co-operation... and so are the natives.

A group comprising several First Nations opposed to the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline project are accusing B.C. Premier Christy Clark of selling out British Columbians and putting a price tag on the future of native people.

Last week, B.C. Liberals laid out five demands that need to be met before the province would back the $5.5 billion project that would carry Alberta crude to Kitimat, B.C., to then be shipped to Asian markets.

They include beefed up oil spill safeguards and a greater share of the economic spinoffs related to pipelines.

The Yinka Dene Alliance, a group of five First Nations in B.C.'s interior who hold more than 25% of the proposed pipeline route in their territories, were incensed by Clark's demands.

"It is absolutely unacceptable for our premier to play a game of 'the Price is Right' while putting our lands, our waters and our futures at risk to devastating oil spills," Terry Teegee, Tribal Chief of the Carrier Sekani Tribal Council, said in a statement Saturday. "The premier is putting on a show because she's under political pressure and needs votes, but her actions have very real consequences for us here on the land.

"This is our lives, the well-being of our families that she is playing with. We won't let her sell our lands out from under us."

[Ben Kenobi]

putting our lands, our waters and our futures at risk to devastating oil spills

Goddamn, not this **** again.

who hold more than 25%

They CLAIM, not hold. They also as a whole claim 125 percent of the entire goddamn province.

Reroute it under the Yellowhead. Problem solved.

[Asher]

Forget BC, native opposition will kill this pipeline.

Albertans are incensed BC put a price on co-operation... and so are the natives.

I'm going to go easy on you because you're not from around here.

The Natives are incensed because they do not benefit from BC taking from Alberta's royalties.

The Natives are incensed because they typically received financial compensation (as well as other things such as infrastructure, jobs, education, training, etc) directly from the companies involved. BC is basically asking for a share of the pie, so of course they don't like that.

If the Natives hate oil companies and what they're doing so much, why do they keep giving awards and recognition to companies like Syncrude? IIRC, the President of Syncrude was just the second person to be awarded for "excellence in Aboriginal Relations" a couple months ago (the first was former PM Paul Martin).

They play games like this all the ****ing time, both provincially and locally. Calgary wants to build the SW portion of a ring road through a reserve. The Natives did the same song and dance - "no way, no how! This is our land, our ancestors, blahblahblah", then the Province threw money at them and they went "Hmmm...well, how about X more? There's no way we can do it for less than X! Our ancestors...blahblah". So Alberta said '**** it, fine. We will go around it'.

Within months they were begging for the province to come back to the bargaining table.

[regexcellent]

Sounds like they're well practiced at working the government gravy train.

[Fake Boris]

Yes it was a business venture but many believe hydro Quebec intentionally stalled the deal to put brinco in dire financial straits ( which hydro Quebec knew because it had a board member on the brinco board) and then demanded the most offensive conditions which kick in in 2016.(the automatic renewal at even cheaper prices

Read an analysis by James Feehan. .. He's an economics professor that has written a few articles( somewhat duplicative)on the history and economics of the deal.I think he does a good job of setting out exactly what the beef is.

AS a business deal it simply reeks. Hydro Quebec as customer was negotiating with a corporate supplier while it had a senior Hydro Quebec exec on the board of directors of that supplier. they demanded huge NEW concessions at a point in the negotiations almost precisely when the suppliers financing was running out.

Newfoundland has had a couple of legal runs at overturning the contract which were doomed to failure. In Feehans analysis he does point out that none of the challenges has targeted the 2016 renewal clause so don't be surprised if they go at it again. I don't have a lot of confidence in any such challenges but 40 years later this is still a huge issueto Newfounlanders.

Now Newfoundland has become a " have" province recently anyway due to oil wealth while Quebec toils as a have not despite pocketing billions more on this deal than Newfoundland. Maybe there's some karma at work out there

Some quick research shows that these "huge" last minute concessions were a 4% lower price - from 0.255 to 0.245 cents/kWh.

Other facts to consider:

1) It was not feasible to export to the US at the construction costs
2) Electricity costs between 1935 and 1970 had been on a constant downwards curve

[Flubber]

Some quick research shows that these "huge" last minute concessions were a 4% lower price - from 0.255 to 0.245


ve

Research more.

Hint....... renewal clause at fixed price for 25 more years

Read Feehan's analysis and then confirm it 50 ways if you want, but his analysis sets it out pretty succinctly

[The Mad Monk]

Perhaps the pipeline could go through points south

...after January, of course.