FREDERICTON (CUP) – Power was the running theme at last weekend’s New Brunswick Liberal Biennial Convention, but not the kind you can win in an election.
The proposed sale of the province’s electrical utility, NB Power, to Hydro-Québec by the governing Liberals in New Brunswick was the elephant in every room at the Fredericton Inn, the convention’s host. Selling the utility would rid the province of the $4.8 million debt currently held by the Crown corporation, but members of the public and opposing political parties have been up in arms over, among other reasons, a lack of consultation over the deal.
Federal Liberal and Opposition leader Michael Ignatieff was in town for the convention, though he kept a distance from commenting on the sale.
“[It’s] a provincial matter,” he said in a November 13 media scrum. “[Premier] Shawn Graham doesn’t get asked about Afghanistan, and I don’t get asked about provincial matters.
“It’s important that New Brunswickers have their say, that the details come out and there’s a full public debate,” he added.
On Saturday, November 14, members of the public were invited to speak Graham about the proposed deal.
The New Brunswick premier pre-empted the question-and-answer period with a speech outlining his thoughts on the memorandum of understanding signed between New Brunswick’s utility and Hydro-Québec, which is not yet legally binding until officially legislated.
“By making this debt payment,” said Graham, “we are releasing future generations of New Brunswickers from debt.”
The premier then related a situation where a young single mother approached him and told him not to drop the deal for the sake of people in situations like hers.
A number of questions were asked on topics ranging from Point Lepreau to energy efficiency.
Graham’s responses largely reiterated his belief that debt would be eliminated and rates lowered if the deal goes through.
A few details of the agreement were cleared up during the session. Energy Minister Jack Keir said that the province “will not be giving up energy policy decisions to Quebec.“
Plans for more wind power are also in the works, and it was said that these plans would be a “transparent process.”
One audience member brought up the projected $5 billion in rate savings expected for the next five years, should the deal go through. Instead of rate cuts, the young man asked why the province wasn’t focusing on energy efficiency initiatives such as retrofitting houses.
Graham responded by saying that other provinces have sold their utilities, and that “we’re the only political party offering the option to fix rates and debt going up.”
The man who asked the question responded that his question had not been answered.
Another audience member questioned the value being put on the sale, claiming that the sale value of the Point Lepreau nuclear generating facility was for less than its actual worth, and that Hydro-Québec would then obtain the rest NB Power’s assets essentially for free.
He asked if a fresh appraisal of the assets was conducted, why or why not, and if so, why the information had not been made available.
Keir responded that the total value of NB Power is between $3.3 and $4.1 billion, and that he had been briefed on the value by the province’s department of finance prior to the convention. The deal, he said, has taken many months to work out, and was not “a weekend thing over a beverage.”
“There will be a full transparency process when the deal is finalized,” Keir said.
“We weren’t going to start a debate until we had a deal to debate,” Graham said.
Graham also addressed Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams’ highly publicized comments against the deal.
“Williams is using the province of New Brunswick as an opportunity to get a better deal for himself with Quebec,” he claimed.