Next provincial Election

[fenwick16]

There will probably be a provincial election sometime in 2013. I thought it would be a good idea to start a thread in this section (Business, Politics & the Economy).

There was a story in the Globe and Mail yesterday that I thought was interesting:

(source: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/...ticle11133254/)

Low approval ratings give B.C. and Nova Scotia premiers cause for concern

Éric Grenier
Special to The Globe and Mail

Published Friday, Apr. 12 2013, 10:19 AM EDT
Last updated Friday, Apr. 12 2013, 11:21 AM EDT

This week’s quarterly poll by Angus-Reid on the approval ratings of Canada’s provincial premiers contained bad numbers for Christy Clark and Darrell Dexter, the two premiers next scheduled to face the electorate. Compared to the ratings their colleagues in other provinces had just prior to an election, and their subsequent fate, the news looks even worse for them.
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I have mixed feeling about the provincial NDP. They have tried to keep the provincial deficit down, which is a plus, however the Nova Scotia economy has not done well under the Dexter government. Job growth has been dismal and the Nova Scotia population declined in 2012 (source: http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/91-002-...4/t002-eng.htm and http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/91-002-...4/t323-eng.htm). The HRM has done better but even the HRM hasn't seen strong job growth and the population growth rate is less than it was a few years ago.

[IanWatson]

I'm torn on the NDP too. On the one hand the bailing out of dying pulp mills and the relocation of provincial departments out of Halifax really pisses me off. It's pandering to the rural vote in a really shortsighted way that's going to harm this province as a whole down the road. That's not to say rural areas shouldn't be supported, but there are much better ways to do that.

On the other hand, I'm really pleased with the 12% land protection (admittedly some of this was the result of pulp mill bailouts that I'm not happy about) and I think they're on the right track in regards to energy. I really am scared about the promises the Liberals and Conservatives are making about energy. I know the popular thing is to want no rate increases ever, but the hard reality is that the grid needs investment and modernization. It's a bitter pill to swallow, but it's money we need to spend. If government puts off those necessary upgrades to win political points, it's going to come back and bite us HARD in five or ten years.

[scooby074]

Dexter's gone (hopefully). He's spent a bunch of money that we didnt have to keep a few jobs.. and in the process killed lots of jobs in the private sector who didn't recieve handouts. Here's an interesting and recent read on Dexter's brilliance.
http://www.thechronicleherald.ca/bus...thern-pulp-aid

Bare in mind that at one time Scott paper (aka Northern Pulp) had their own whole wood lot and massive chipper at the plant. They closed that down and sold off the gear and went to chips only, processed by private contractors, now they want to go back to chipping their own and cut out the contractors.. using government money!

Ive never seen a more flipy-floppy government in my time. The recent Parsons case illustrates that.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by scooby074

Ive never seen a more flipy-floppy government in my time. The recent Parsons case illustrates that.

The Parsons case is a shitshow of major proportions but we know very little in the way of facts here. It is more illustrative of the tsunami-like power of the masses using social media to charge herd-like into a certain position. That cannot be easily resisted even if the herd is dead wrong. I suspect the facts, when they are finally known in total, will be quite different from the way it has been portrayed in the media to date.

But in any event I do not consider their moves this week to be flip-flops, a very overused term anyway.

However they have been very quick to change direction on a number of other issues over the last while, from school closures to U-vints to insulin pumps. That is simply driven by election fever. I suspect if we were 3 years away from an election instead of 3 months or whatever, their positions on all these things would be very different.

[someone123]

I don't think the corporate welfare stuff can be fixed by voting for one party instead of another. There's a pervasive culture in NS of expecting the government to provide jobs.

I agree that the Parsons case seems like a disaster. A large number of people have already jumped to conclusions based on very little information. People always want to pin blame on somebody when they hear about a story like this and of course special interest groups see these things as opportunities to manipulate public anger to their own ends. We have a lot of deeply problematic and unjust laws that were created because of this phenomenon, and plenty of people have had their lives ruined by false allegations. We'll see what happens I guess.

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by fenwick16

I have mixed feeling about the provincial NDP. They have tried to keep the provincial deficit down, which is a plus, however the Nova Scotia economy has not done well under the Dexter government. Job growth has been dismal and the Nova Scotia population declined in 2012 (source: http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/91-002-...4/t002-eng.htm and http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/91-002-...4/t323-eng.htm). The HRM has done better but even the HRM hasn't seen strong job growth and the population growth rate is less than it was a few years ago.

And Nova Scotia has also performed poorly (and at times much worse) under the Liberals and under the Progressive Conservatives. Perhaps all the parties are more similar than they are different? And perhaps Nova Scotia is a difficult mess to work with?

I dislike how the NDP decentralised provincial jobs out of Halifax to small town Nova Scotia. But, despite that, I don't think I'm dissatisfied enough to vote for another party. The NDP has done well, relatively speaking.

Is anyone going to credit the NDP for aiding Nova Scotia's chances for winning the federal shipbuilding contract? Dexter arguably worked on winning the province that prize more than anything else during his time in office.

[scooby074]

My god... Dexter has done NOTHING for Nova Scotia jobs, especially rural Nova Scotia other then the ones through the pulp mills..

And the shipping contract, why are we subsidizing private enterprise on the taxpayers backs to the tune of hundreds of millions? Especially the Irvings, who have billions in (offshore) banks.

[Phalanx]

Ship building, not shipping, but why? Because that investment of millions to a company will contribute to an investment of billions coming back to businesses located or operating in the province. The full value of the $25 billion projected to be spent on the combat ships (the contract Irving won, as opposed to the $8-10 billion non-combat ship contract that went to BC) won't come to NS, obviously, but the lion's share of the work is going to be done here, so even seeing a fraction of that total come back as investment in businesses here seems like a fair return.

[scooby074]

Originally Posted by Phalanx

Ship building, not shipping, but why? Because that investment of millions to a company will contribute to an investment of billions coming back to businesses located or operating in the province. The full value of the $25 billion projected to be spent on the combat ships (the contract Irving won, as opposed to the $8-10 billion non-combat ship contract that went to BC) won't come to NS, obviously, but the lion's share of the work is going to be done here, so even seeing a fraction of that total come back as investment in businesses here seems like a fair return.

Irving DOESN'T need this province's taxpayers money.

When all is said and done, I'd love to see the final accounting and what money went where (this includes to what country/province). Irving could have afforded to pay for any improvements that the shipyard needed with the change in ole' JD's couch. But why bother, when you can "blackmail" dumb old Nova Scotia into picking up the tab.

[Drybrain]

Agreed on the pandering to rural NS--a line has to be drawn between supporting rural communities and propping them up in perpetuity. The government has crossed that line a few times.

But, the NDP has managed to deliver a pretty responsible budget, without going wild on spending cuts/austerity, which is quite an achievement. Even if, as some have argued, it's not a "true" balanced budget, it's pretty close--much closer than most other provinces. (It's too bad that elections tend to be referendums on the economy at one moment in time anyway. In Alberta, Alison Redford is in serious trouble due to a $2 billion deficit that has more to do with global uncertainty around oil than it does with her leadership. Meanwhile, a basket-case economic know-nothing like Ralph Klein was deified simply because his time in office coincided with a boom.)

We also had that recent good job news, being the only province last month to add rather than lose jobs, and I'm glad to see the commitment toward conservation and renewable energy, even though it'd be easy to scale back those initiatives in the face of opposition. Those are the kind of long-term projects that can be unpopular with voters but which pay off down the road, so there's some vision.

We also have the second-lowest debt-per-capita east of Manitoba. (PEI is a bit lower.) It's growing, but at least more slowly than most other provinces. And the unemployment rate has gone down, if only slightly. (New Brunswick's, under the PCs, has gone up substantially.)

It hasn't been perfect, but I'm inclined to think they've earned another mandate.

[q12]

Dexter before the last election: We won't raise the HST.

Dexter after the election: We are raising the HST.

Enough said.

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by scooby074

My god... Dexter has done NOTHING for Nova Scotia jobs, especially rural Nova Scotia other then the ones through the pulp mills..

And the shipping contract, why are we subsidizing private enterprise on the taxpayers backs to the tune of hundreds of millions? Especially the Irvings, who have billions in (offshore) banks.

Rural Nova Scotia?... Umm, alright -- it's not as though Dexter can hold private businesses at gun point and demand that they invest in rural Nova Scotia. Let's face it: Neither people nor companies have a desire to establish themselves in small towns. Cities are the municipality of choice across the entire country, and across most of the world.

I actually think Dexter has done too much for rural Nova Scotia. He shouldn't be subsidising pulp mills, just like he shouldn't be moving provincial jobs out of Halifax to rural Nova Scotia. Neither decision will show a return on investment. As a province, we need to stop giving free money to dying industries, and we need to stop giving free money to dying towns and villages. If we continue, then we are compromising our ability to invest in areas that will have the capacity to grow.

At one point in our car-dependent history, small towns were sustainable. With inflation outpacing wages many times over, and with the trend to use public transit instead of personally owning a car -- this translates into small towns being in low demand.

And finally: the criticism of the NDP acting like they're the Progressive Conservatives by their decision to use taxpayer dollars to subsidise an already high-profit company -- Irving -- is legitimate.

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by q12

Dexter before the last election: We won't raise the HST.

Dexter after the election: We are raising the HST.

Enough said.

The PCs promised this in New Brunswick as well -- but similar to Nova Scotia, New Brunswick's economy isn't doing well -- so it's a promise that had to be broken.

[Phalanx]

Originally Posted by scooby074

Irving DOESN'T need this province's taxpayers money.

When all is said and done, I'd love to see the final accounting and what money went where (this includes to what country/province). Irving could have afforded to pay for any improvements that the shipyard needed with the change in ole' JD's couch. But why bother, when you can "blackmail" dumb old Nova Scotia into picking up the tab.

I agree that it didn't need to be spent, Irving should have and probably would have paid out of pocket.

I think the the spending was largely for the sake of appearances. It was a guarantee that it would get done. Possibly the difference between the $25 and $8 billion contracts. Who knows.

But what's done is done. In the end, the bulk of the work (and money) will be coming here, and the province will walk away in the black (assuming the shipbuilding contract doesn't get cancelled in the meantime..)

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by Phalanx

In the end, the bulk of the work (and money) will be coming here, and the province will walk away in the black (assuming the shipbuilding contract doesn't get cancelled in the meantime..)

It's unlikely the shipbuilding contract will be killed. Lawsuits aside... Halifax loves the contract, and Halifax also tends to be a federal NDP stronghold. I don't think any of Canada's political parties have spoken against the need to replace Canada's aging fleet of navy vessels.

If anything were to be cancelled or scaled back, I'd expect Vancouver to get hit with that. Icebreaker ships will be less important in the coming decades. The Northwest Passage will be completely ice free, even during winters.

[someone123]

The funding to Irving is in the form of a forgiveable loan. If Irving's payroll doesn't hit the target ($3B), they will have to repay at least part of the money. If they do hit the target the province will recoup its money through taxes.

It's hard to predict what the economy will be like in the future but I have a feeling things will pick up in 2013 and 2014 in NS. In 2011 and 2012 there were a lot of announcements for things like the shipbuilding contract and offshore exploration but these take years to get going. Blackberry seems to be doing better and IBM has just opened offices in Halifax as well. Smaller cities in particular tend to have ups and downs and I think 2012 was more of a "down" year than a sign of permanent trends.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by scooby074

My god... Dexter has done NOTHING for Nova Scotia jobs, especially rural Nova Scotia other then the ones through the pulp mills..

And the shipping contract, why are we subsidizing private enterprise on the taxpayers backs to the tune of hundreds of millions? Especially the Irvings, who have billions in (offshore) banks.

I am not a NDP supporter, but this is simply wrong. The paper mills were a no-win situation but he at least saved some jobs in Port Hawkesbury and the Bowater situation ended up not costing much in the end and we did at least get some land in return. The shipbuilding thing is a classic red herring - it only costs money if the jobs get created and when you take it over the life of the project it is peanuts.

The NDP has considerable baggage in terms of its relationships with unions, and the relocation of civil service jobs to rural NS is asinine and expensive. They can be rightfully criticized for that, but these other things are not bad as you claim.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by q12

Dexter before the last election: We won't raise the HST.

Dexter after the election: We are raising the HST.

Enough said.

Blame that on Rodney. His pissing away of a billion dollars or so during 07/08 left the province broke. ANY govt would have needed to pay that back by raising taxes. You sound like there is a printing press for $100 bills in the basement of Province House to magically rid ourselves of debt. Hint: there isn't.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by scooby074

Irving DOESN'T need this province's taxpayers money.

Perhaps. But that doesn't mean they will risk their own money on every opportunity that presents itself. It amazes me how people can fail to see this elementary concept.

[scooby074]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

I am not a NDP supporter, but this is simply wrong. The paper mills were a no-win situation but he at least saved some jobs in Port Hawkesbury and the Bowater situation ended up not costing much in the end and we did at least get some land in return. The shipbuilding thing is a classic red herring - it only costs money if the jobs get created and when you take it over the life of the project it is peanuts.

The NDP has considerable baggage in terms of its relationships with unions, and the relocation of civil service jobs to rural NS is asinine and expensive. They can be rightfully criticized for that, but these other things are not bad as you claim.

Oh they are as bad as I claim.. Im living it now.

They've thrown millions at things like DSME, that employ basically nobody today, yet small business can get nothing.