Public anger
over the Premier’s handling of the severance issue endures. Yet, it is the
perversity of watching the Tory Opposition, engaging in filibuster as it dances
on Dwight Ball’s political grave, that gives dimension to the Liberals’
ineptitude. In a world of slightly more skilful people, Ball should be making
Davis squirm—the Tories having created our fiscal nightmare.
There is
always a cost when the Government is thrown into disarray and the Premier is
cannon fodder for dissent. That price is a worry, one distinct from the
singular question of the Premier’s integrity.
As always,
there are the political issues—e.g. how could he have been so naïve? But others
that are more fundamental relate to the budgetary mess, and to a plethora of
overdue policy changes needed to transform the processes of government. Chief
among them are initiatives to at least slow economic decline as megaprojects
wind down.
One of the
threads of public outcry, following the imposition of the gas tax and the
deficit levy, was that the Government failed to offer hope that the fiscal pain
would lead to some resolution of our difficulties. It had not laid out a
roadmap connecting spending retrenchment as a building block of a sustainable
economy.
 |
| Photo Credit: CBC |
When the
Premier engages in deception, the public should always worry. But the truth is,
it’s not just the Budget or Ed Martin’s severance that get people printing
posters. A bigger motivation is the ineptitude characterizing the Liberals’
first six months in Office.
Manifested,
since the November election, is an Administration unready and quite possibly
unable to govern effectively. It may simply be the case that the Liberals lack
the requisite intellectual heft and experience. Some certainly see Premier Ball
as an obstacle to change. Of course, we can eventually get rid of a single
Premier. We have already witnessed the unceremonious dumping of Dunderdale and
Davis. The worry is that the next one may be an amateur, too.
A Premier in
difficult times needs to step up to a crisis in ways that will uplift and even
inspire a legitimately nervous and angry body politic. He must be empathetic to
the effect that increased taxation will have on family budgets. But even more,
he must demonstrate his readiness to deal with the burden by exhibiting a
serious program of initiatives geared towards economic renewal.
Does the
Premier think that the public is unaware of the wind-up of the very same
megaprojects that so recently caused the economy to become white hot? Are governance issues no longer matters of
debate?
A Premier is
a coach, an instructor, a leader. Premiers should inspire, guide, educate,
argue, and even plead inside the Cabinet—and far moreso outside, with the
broader constituency—to bring about meaningful change.
A thoughtful
leader will articulate the challenges we face, lay out solutions and seek
consensus. At the end of the process the Premier, in concert with his
Ministers, will have a plan. It will be comprehensible, sensible, and
defensible. He and his Ministers will
sell it, and become unrelenting advocates of the whole deal—not just because it
is necessary for a province in dire straits, but because it represents the best
of who and what they are as politicians, and as a political party.
In the
current political climate, such a description of the fundamental role of this
new Government seems fanciful. If a larder of ideas or policy changes exists,
it remains top secret. The six months of this Government’s new mandate has
produced little more than an ill-conceived Budget.
It is not
difficult, therefore, to understand why the Premier is a catalyst: a lightning
rod for public dissent.
He is seen
merely as one of the facilitators of a huge money grab by a failed former
Nalcor CEO, a Premier wriggling out of responsibility for his missteps.
He governs
without moral authority, a fact that is underscored by the sustainability of
public protest. The public remembers only the broken promises that a deceptive
election campaign has produced. Ball has earned no plaudits with which to
counterbalance six months of bad judgement.
In place of
a Premier offering reassurance and inspiration, the public is suspended in a
political vacuum containing only negativism, anger and fear.
Political
strategists must be asking their partners to tie them to their desks. The
repetition of missed cues and opportunities would incite the laziest insider to
put glue on the Premier’s chair for fear that he might rush out to the media in
yet another unscripted moment.
Not all
Premiers bring professional management skills to the job or are multi-talented;
not all understand how ideas are translated into policy, either. Few manifest
knowledge of how a large and complex bureaucracy functions, or how it is prone
to skewer change and innovation.
Most
Premiers—though not those of the past decade—know their limitations. They seek
out people of expertise, in politics, policy and bureaucracy; individuals who
help refine ideas, and generate new ones befitting the economic or social
circumstance. They help work through the mounds of data and analysis. They save
the Premier precious time, and help him make sound and timely decisions. This
is an essential part of the arduous process of change and the relentless
struggle against private agendas, whether of bureaucracy, business, or unions.
Once upon a
time, prior to the election of Danny Williams, a Planning and Priorities
(P&P) Committee, composed of senior members of Cabinet, held enormous
influence. It offered judgement, and sometimes professional advice, depending
upon Ministers’ expertise. The Committee would be called together in a crisis
and on a regular basis.
Williams got
rid of it choosing, instead, to aggregate power over public policy creation to
himself.
One can
easily imagine that the competence of the former Nalcor CEO would have been a
prominent item on the P&P agenda. Muskrat Falls might not have occurred if
an uncorrupted process of review had been permitted, and if capable Ministers
had no fear of rebuke if they stared down the Premier. The severance issue,
too, might have been handled differently.
No amount of
analysis or argument is a certain safeguard against a cunning Premier’s hubris.
But a skilful Premier will bulwark against failure with the best people he can
find.
This Premier
could not so much as replace the senior bureaucratic incumbents in the key
government departments of Finance, Natural Resources, and the Cabinet Office.
In short,
the first six months of Ball Governance ought to have exhibited frenzied
change. They were anything but.
First on the
agenda ought to have been the remediation of the governance issues that gave
the Tories a black eye. As the Muskrat saga continues to unfold, does
anyone—including the Liberals—not understand the cost of secretive government?
David
Vardy’s article entitled “Time To Take Control of Nalcor" contains a
treasure trove of policy initiatives dealing with a crown corporation that has
become a law unto itself. Do the Liberals not think that Nalcor’s mandate,
energy legislation, oversight, or the corrupted processes that gave sanction to
the Muskrat Falls project, should be refashioned? Are we to sink into a veritable “quicksand”
(to use Vardy’s word) otherwise known as Williams’ “energy warehouse”?
Where is the
Government’s plan for the Marystown Shipyard? Is it so fearful of “big labour”
that it would rather leave the facility dormant?
Does it have
a plan for the Bull Arm Site? The Hebron production platform will be heading
out a year from now. Is dormancy the only remedy?
What about
the Husky GBS project in Argentia? What is the status of the benefits agreement
if they fail to proceed?
Should we
continue to invest in preparations for the Gull Island power pipe dream, as
Nalcor persists in doing?
________________________________________________________________________
Related to this Post:
________________________________________________________________________
Will
Government continue to invest in equity stakes in the offshore, from which any
return on investment is doubtful?
Of far less
financial consequence, but critical to the integrity of government, where is
the public inquiry into the Humber Valley Paving affair—that epitome of Tory
cronyism?
Those
measures, taken together, are a mere sampling of the items that should be high
on the government’s agenda—matters on which every report is overdue. Each
serves a flagstaff: proof that Ball is a Premier not prepared to deal with even
the normal demands of big government, let alone a full-blown financial crisis.
Who will
step up if we get rid of Ball? The Finance Minister whose ties to the failed
Muskrat Falls project are given comprehension with an almost goofy Budget? John
Haggie, Andrew Parsons or Perry Trimper, none having distinguished themselves
(at least not yet)?
Ball may
think Government a pharmacy, the perfect default to a former career. But, alas,
it is not a place where remedies are dispensed one at a time. Government, and
the issues with which it must deal, are too complex and multifaceted to
accommodate so much tedium.
Premier Ball
is a worrisome problem. He can argue that the province won’t default. But until he can offer change, even in its
most minimal manifestation, the public will be tempted to give Paul Davis and
the Tory Opposition credibility they don’t deserve.
That would
be a tragedy all of us should want to avoid.