2005-12-04

VOL. 3 ISSUE 49

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ST. JOHN’S, NEWFOUNDLAND AND LABRADOR — SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, DECEMBER 4-10, 2005

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OPINION PAGE 11

IN CAMERA 20-21

John Crosbie on Grit policies and health care

Senior editor Stephanie Porter and photo editor Paul Daly in Doha, Qatar

Renegotiate

Independent surveys find most Ontarians and Quebecers support reopening upper Churchill contract CLARE-MARIE GOSSE

T

wo surveys commissioned by The Independent show over 50 per cent of Ontarians and Quebecers believe the notorious upper Churchill contract between Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador should be renegotiated.

As for the potential lower Churchill, the majority of respondents in both provinces doubt Newfoundland and Labrador has the financial means to develop the project independently, believing the federal government should offer financial support.

The upper Churchill contract — signed in 1969 and set to expire in 2041 — awarded Hydro-Quebec Churchill Falls power at a low, fixed rate, without the benefit of an escalator clause. Since 1972, HydroQuebec has gathered an estimated $23.8 billion in revenues, compared to Newfoundland and Labrador’s $680 million (The Independent’s figures as of November, 2004).

The potential development of the much smaller lower Churchill hydroelectric project (2,824 megawatts compared to the upper Churchill’s 5,429 megawatts), billed as the most cost-effective undeveloped hydro site in North America, is currently under consideration. The province is examining outside expressions of interest, as well as the possibility of independent development.

The surveys, recently completed by St. John’s-based Telelink, asked a range of identical questions to a random sampling of residents in Ontario and Quebec. The polls focused on the two provinces’ perceptions of the people and economy of Newfoundland and Labrador, with a particular emphasis on hydroelectricity.

Circa 1969, the completion of the rock excavation of the Churchill Falls powerhouse more than 1,000 feet underground.

Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro

QUOTE OF THE WEEK “Beamed Smallwood: ‘Glory, hallelujah; praise God from whom all blessings flow!’ The $1.1 billion Churchill Falls project, he prophesied, would make Newfoundland ‘the most industrialized province in Canada.’”

—TIME Canada, Oct. 14, 1966

Marystown shipyard.

Paul Daly/The Independent

Cancer concerns Union leader at Marystown shipyard wants province to take second look at rate of disease

By Rick Seaward For The Independent

W

ayne Butler is convinced cancer rates among workers and former workers at the Marystown shipyard can be blamed on asbestos exposure.

The union leader has been a crusader since his first observations that many employees and former employees were developing the disease.

He says his eyes were opened when he attended a symposium on industrial disease put off in Toronto by the Canadian Auto Workers Union six years ago. So he began gathering

information on cancer rates at the shipyard.

“The more digging I did the more convinced I was there is a real problem in this area and the fact we had done so much work with little or no protection,” Butler tells The Independent.

He eventually identified 48 deaths among workers and former workers at the yard, of which 25 were cancer related.

Armed with the un-scientific information, Butler took his concerns to the provincial government, which set up a See “I’m still convinced,” page 2

OPINION 7

Ivan Morgan on differences between hydro and power SPORTS 32

Weightlifter Nick Roberts spys Commonwealth gold Life Story . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Paper Trail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Puzzles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

10 10 18 28

See “It can’t be,” pages 8-9 See related stories pages 8, 9, 23, 25

‘Surf and turf’

Energy experts advise province not to rule out any route to get lower Churchill power to market

By Clare-Marie Gosse The Independent

T

he question of which route is best to transfer power from a potential lower Churchill hydro project is secondary to the question of which province or state wants it most, according to two energy experts.

Ed Krapels and James O’Hagan of the Great Eastern Power Transmission Co., one of the unsuccessful respondents to the province’s call for proposals to develop the lower Churchill, tell The Independent current technology and high energy prices make any route — be it through Quebec, across the Strait of Belle Isle and down the island through to the Maritimes, or even underwater along the Gulf of St. Lawrence — viable.

“At the current prices of energy it’s extremely economic, even with the transmission costs put in,” says Krapels. “It’s more a question of will and a question of strategy, than it is a question of technical issues.”

Natural Resources Minister Ed Byrne couldn’t comment on the implications of any of the three potential power routes due to the ongoing provincial assessment process involving three proposals to develop the lower Churchill (Newfoundland and Labrador is also reserving the right to develop the project independently).

He did acknowledge that all routes are being considered.

“We have made no decisions on any option, whether it be the Atlantic route, or through Quebec or anywhere else,” Byrne says. “We’re keeping all our options open and we’ll determine in due course where we’re going to proceed and how.

“What I can say is that there’s interest across the country, given the market conditions.”

Krapels and O’Hagan, who spoke to The Independent via conference call, say Newfoundland and Labrador has multiple options and shouldn’t just consider one route.

“We coined a term — surf and turf — where the resource is large enough you could go both ways,” says Krapels, who’s also director of natural gas and power with the consulting firm, Energy Security Analysis Inc., in Massachusetts.

“You could develop 50 per cent to go overland, through Quebec, Ontario and you’re talking about a 2,000 megawatt resource … ultimately Newfoundland and Labrador would appear to be best served by being able to address both the Quebec market and Newfoundland’s own market and the Maritime provinces and, in fact, down into New England.

See “Extraordinary,” pages 8-9

2 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

DECEMBER 4, 2005

‘Rock and a hard place’ Access to royal commission transcripts denied unless consent given by all involved; names of participants won’t be released either

By Darcy MacRae The Independent The release of transcripts of roundtable discussions at the 2003 Royal Commission on Renewing and Strengthening Our Place in Canada is being blocked by a catch-22 situation.

According to Sandy Hounsell, executive director of the office of the province’s Information and Privacy Commissioner, interested parties have two options when it comes to getting their hands on the tapes.

The first is to accept a transcript of the tapes, minus any personal information on them.

“To be honest with you, that wouldn’t give you very much because if you were

to remove all the personal information — which would include all the views and opinions — you wouldn’t have a lot left,” Hounsell tells The Independent.

The second option, Hounsell says, is to seek the consent of the individuals who participated. If a person who attended the royal commission has since passed away, the consent of his/her estate is considered valid.

In short, a researcher is entitled to the comments of every person from which they have been granted consent, but will be denied access to comments made by all parties from which they fail to secure consent.

“The easiest and simplest way to proceed in this type of situation is to simply get the consent of the individuals the

information is about, which is a fairly straight forward procedure,” says Hounsell.

However, gaining access to the names of those who took part in various roundtable discussions could be difficult.

Doug Smith, an executive with Intergovernmental Affairs, says the names of those who took part in the royal commission cannot be released due to stipulations outlined in the Access to Information and Protection of Privacy Act. The same act prevented James McGrath from accessing a transcript of the late Gordon Winter’s comments during a round-table discussion entitled “Expectations” — as reported in last week’s edition of The Independent.

As to how an individual is to obtain the

consent of speakers before the commission if the names of those speakers cannot be released, Smith admits there is no easy answer.

“It’s a bit of a rock and a hard place situation,” Smith says. “Frankly, I really don’t know. I was not involved in the administration of the commission, we’re handling the requests because somebody had to.

“Certainly the people who participated know who was there. If they wish to pursue it along those lines, I’m sure they could.”

McGrath, a former lieutenant-governor and federal minister of Fisheries and Oceans, sat at the same round-table discussion as Winter, also a former lieutenant-governor. McGrath says along

with himself and Winter, speakers included Alec Hickman, John Crosbie, Grace Sparks (deceased), Kevin Berry, James Halley, Gus Etchegary, Noel Murphy (deceased), Louis Ayre, Aiden Maloney and Max House, who served as chairman.

McGrath says the transcripts of the round-table discussion are an important part of the province’s history and should be released to the public. Although his initial attempt to have the transcripts released was denied, he says he is now pursuing other avenues.

“I am now in the process of canvassing several people who participated,” says McGrath. “That was my plan B. I can’t afford to go to court.” darcy.macrae@theindependent.ca

‘I’m still convinced we have an ongoing problem’ From page 1

“light some fires under people and get things stirred up again.” formal study involving scientists from He says government wants to wait the University of Toronto. until 2007 to make a decision on Completed almost four years ago, the whether to do the follow-up study, but study found that of 876 men examined, the union is going to begin lobbying to 88 had developed cancer. The study’s move up that date. authors concluded there was no signifi“It’s an issue that’s not gone away cant difference in the and is getting worse in cancer rates at the my view.” yard and those in the A spokeswoman for general NewfoundGovernment Services “It’s an issue that’s land population. But Minister Diane Whelan their findings also says the decision to not gone away and exposed some areas proceed with a followof concern that led up study will be made is getting worse in them to recommend a by a special committee my view.” follow-up study in of labour, industry, five years. government and health For one thing representatives.

Wayne Butler “plant-based workTo date, she says no ers” were developing one has asked to move cancers at twice the up the study. “If the rate of office workers. For another, committee as a whole decide they want there were statistically significant can- to have a follow-up study then yes we cer rates among three categories of will go ahead with that and set it up and workers: carpenters, riggers and labour- follow the same procedures as we did ers, three groups most exposed to last time. But it would have to be a comasbestos. mittee as a whole decision.”

Butler accepted the report as “a fait She says five years have to pass accompli” at the time because he had no between studies because of the latency independent scientific expertise of his period of asbestos, the length of time own to challenge it. between exposure and the onset of the Still, he was bothered by what he saw disease. “We needed to wait five years as a flaw. Three of five burners or metal in order to ensure that all the symptoms cutters had developed cancer, some- that may occur are occurring.” thing the authors felt was “inconcluFor his part, Butler is frustrated. sive.”

“Years ago I was convinced there was a Butler says workers continue to problem and I’m still convinced we develop cancer at the yard — “I know have an ongoing problem and I don’t of three or four cases in the past few think the problem is being addressed weeks that’s got cancer. I know friends and I don’t think its being dealt with.” of mine that had operations in the past Butler is a member of the health and two weeks.” safety committee of the Canadian Auto Butler says one of the men with can- Workers’ Union and plans to ask for cer was a burner so that now makes four help. “I think this time we’ll take a difof the five burners who have been diag- ferent route.” nosed with cancer.

One possibility is to get the union to He says the report has been “gather- pay for expertise to study the reports ing dust” on a shelf in Confederation that have been done, and offer advice on Building and the time has come to how to proceed.

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 3

Know when to fold ’em RNC chief says poker games in bars illegal; police not actively looking for offenders DARCY MACRAE

B

ars hosting Texas holdem tournaments may have been told to put their cards away, but the games con-

tinue.

In early October, Royal Newfoundland Constabulary chief Richard Deering stated that regardless of whether money was exchanged, bars could not legally hold poker games or tournaments.

“I’m not sure that money is the only thing that can be considered a gain for the house,” Deering tells The Independent.

When Deering outlawed poker, it was not uncommon to see large neon signs outside bars promoting Texas holdem nights or weekend-long competitions. Many bar owners were confused as to the legality of hosting such events, which prompted Deering to speak out.

“We were getting all sorts of inquiries.

And I think what people, and legitimately so, were looking for was a level playing field,” he says. “Bar owner A was saying ‘Is it legal or illegal? Because if it’s legal we’re

going to do it too because clearly the guys who are holding the tournaments are getting all the people.’”

Despite Deering’s warning against holding such games, some bars still openly advertise Texas holdem tournaments.

Deering says he’s aware that some bars are still hosting tournaments.

“We are cautioning people not to do it. It’s happening, and we’re aware of that, but we’re not getting a lot of specific complaints.”

Before Deering dispatches officers to break up a card game, he says several steps have to be taken. First, a specific complaint has to be made, with information provided to police on where and when the game is going down.

“If someone says bar A is holding a tournament tomorrow night, we would have to either go in from an undercover perspective and participate in the tournament or we would go in, stand there and watch what’s going on and then talk to the person running it, and ask what’s going on here?” Deering says.

But if police don’t receive a specific complaint, chances are the Constabulary won’t be breaking down doors and dragging gam-

blers away in handcuffs.

“We’re not going to drive the streets of the northeast Avalon looking for Texas holdem tournaments when my resources are out looking for people committing robberies,” says Deering. “I’m not saying this isn’t an important issue, but it doesn’t rank in my view with the issues of armed robbery, break and enters, and the drug issues we have on our streets.”

Since Deering came out with his statement regarding the legality of Texas holdem tournaments, there haven’t been any charges laid against bar owners or poker players.

However, one complaint is currently under investigation and the possibility of charges does exist, says Deering.

“At the end of the day if the evidence is there, we’ll lay a charge. If it isn’t, we won’t.”

If charged and found guilty, Deering says a bar owner’s punishment would most likely be a stiff fine — although there could potentially be a much stiffer penalty.

“The other significant piece of this is if you’re convicted, there’s the potential for the liquor licensing people to take your licence away. And that certainly would have a negative financial impact.”

The police chief says he expects any bar owner charged with operating a gaming house to fight it. He says the misconception that Texas holdem is not illegal as long as money does not exchange hands will almost certainly one day be brought before the courts.

“The other side will say ‘Well we have a legal opinion that says if you make this modification to it, do this and do that, it’s legal.’

But we disagree,” says Deering. “I suppose at the end of the day this will be resolved in the courts and perhaps then in the appeal courts.”

Deering says poker tournaments weren’t an issue in years past because the game wasn’t that popular. He says the action has picked up considerably in the past six months, and he thinks he has a pretty good idea why.

“I think it’s linked to the smoking ban, but I don’t know that for certain,” says Deering.

“If I was a guessing may I’d say the bar owners are feeling the crunch when it comes to numbers because of the smoking ban so they’re trying other gimmicks to get people to come into their bars.” darcy.macrae@theindependent.ca

No benefits for Efford ALISHA MORRISSEY

M

P John Efford didn’t serve enough time in the House of Commons to draw a pension, although he does qualify for long-term disability.

Thing is, he won’t see a cent of disability after the upcoming federal election.

Efford was eligible to receive longterm disability benefits for about four months of his six-month hiatus from the House of Commons earlier this year. It’s not known whether the MP for Avalon actually drew disability benefits.

Efford likely chose not to apply for long-term disability — sticking instead

with his $213,500 annual salary before announcing his retirement from politics on Nov. 22. He didn’t return The Independent’s messages prior to the paper’s press deadline.

MPs qualify for their disability plan after 13 weeks of being off sick. The plan provides them with 70 per cent of their salary.

Members who don’t run in an election while on long-term disability have their benefits cut off the day before the polls open — meaning if Efford was on disability he will be cut off on midnight, Jan. 22.

Efford, who was recently hooked up to an insulin pump, has said his doctor told him he’s putting his health at risk by staying in politics. Long hours, travel and stress were said to be worsening his condition.

Efford sparked controversy in the national media recently when, after a six-month absence from cabinet, was photographed on vacation in Florida — despite claims he was too ill to travel to Ottawa.

In 2002, Efford won the federal byelection to replace Brian Tobin in the federal riding of Bonavista-TrinityConception, and was re-elected to the redrawn riding of Avalon in the June 2004 federal election. He’s served in the federal cabinet as Natural Resources minister since 2003.

After serving only three years in the Commons, Efford isn’t eligible for a pension. He does receive his provincial pension of an estimated $75,000 a year for serving in the provincial legislature between 1985 and 2000.

John Efford

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4 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

DECEMBER 4, 2005

Crying wolf False beacon alarms impacted emergency response to Melina and Keith II tragedy

By Alisha Morrissey The Independent

A

lmost every emergency signal transmitted by a marine beacon is a false alarm.

An Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacon (EPIRB) is either manually switched on, or automatically goes off when it gets wet and is designed to send out a distress signal when mariners get in trouble.

The problem with the beacons is they can be too reliable, says Cheryl Bertoia, principal operations officer for Cospas-Sarsat — the satellite system that picks up emergency beacons and assists search and rescue operations.

Statistically, 95 per cent of such alerts are false alarms.

As a result, when a beacon goes off Canadian Coast Guard officials are required to verify that the vessel is actually at sea before tasking resources.

In the case of the Melina and Keith II tragedy in September, eight fishermen stood on the overturned hull of their slowly sinking boat while coast guard officials took the time to confirm the vessel had gone down. Four of eight crewmembers died — raising concerns about the emergency response time. “If an EPIRB gets wet or an aircraft has a hard landing it might set off the beacon, but we do have a lower falsealarm rate than home alarm systems,�

Bertoia tells The Independent. “That is the case with just about any alert system. It’s just a problem with any device that’s automatically activated in situations.�

In Canada, every vessel more than eight-metres in length is mandated to have such a beacon on board and to register it with the Canadian Mission Control Centre. Registration must include vessel information and emergency contact numbers.

There are currently two types of

beacon picked up by search and rescue satellites.

One type, heard only on a 406megahertz frequency, was designed for the current satellite system and after 2009 will be the only signal responded to by Cospas-Sarsat. “The newer beacons have huge advantages,� Bertoia says. “They have a digital transmission, which means that we know that it’s this unique beacon.�

The 406 beacons, as they are commonly called, transmit an ID code that tells search and rescue operators the name of the vessel, its owner and emergency contact information. Phone numbers are called to verify that a boat is at sea, and not tied up.

The second type of beacon — an older type that puts out a frequency at 121.5 megahertz — has a much higher false-alarm rate.

One in 50 alerts from the older beacons is a real emergency, Bertoia says, adding since many new appliances —

including TVs, microwaves and even football scoreboards — run on the frequency they can be detected by satellite. “That’s the problem with the 121.5 beacons. They were never designed to be picked up by satellites,� Bertoia says. “When we detect something at 406 it’s almost certainly a distress beacon, nothing else in the world is allowed to transmit at 406.�

The Melina and Keith II — an 18metre fishing vessel — sank on Sept.

12 in calm seas.

Coast guard was alerted to the downed fishing boat when its 406 emergency beacon sounded, though calls to land were first made for about 40 minutes to verify the vessel was in trouble.

Federal Fisheries and Oceans critic Loyola Hearn says that’s unacceptable. “They called around to a number of people including the captain’s father when all they had to do ‌ was call

federal Fisheries because of the black box that the boats have to carry,� says the Conservative MP for St. John’s West. “Within a minute max they would have known instead of calling out to the community and other people to find out if the Melina and Keith was at sea and were they fishing. “The only thing is, you pay an awful price. We lost four lives. “I don’t think that’s an excuse. I have no problem with the fact that once the beacon goes off they are required to make calls to verify that it’s a false alarm,� he says, adding coast guard should automatically check the transponder to see if the vessel is at sea.

The first coast guard vessel to arrive on the scene of the Melina and Keith II sinking took more than nine hours to get there. The Gander-based Cormorant helicopter didn’t leave the tarmac for one hour and 55 minutes after the distress call was confirmed and the vessel’s position pinpointed.

How to stay in my good books

C

olumns by their nature are selfindulgent. You get a certain number of words to convey your own self-absorbed opinions, interests or gripes of the day to a trusting general public. Columnists use this small window of power for a variety of dubious purposes, showing-off, displaying literary talent or lack thereof and therapy (often done in the popular form of a purging rant).

I’m forever fuming over small, sometimes ridiculous things, so to help my silent seething or occasional screeches of fury in front of innocent bystanders, I’ve decided to be as self indulgent as the best of them and purge myself through the power of print.

Please find below a list of my major pet peeves (in no particular order).

CELEBRITY INSANITY Specifically, the importance society places on those people who happen to be richer, luckier, more talented than us, or just have a tendency to regularly appear on our screens. Sub-category peeves include celebrities giving their views on important world events (why do we care what P Diddy — or whatever his latest name happens to be — knows about politics?); celebrities, upon receiving awards/accolades, announcing they feel so “blessedâ€? (if I hear that insipid response one more time so help me God ‌); insane fans and audiences reacting to celebrities

taste for country music was instantly projected to loathing status.

CLARE-MARIE GOSSE Brazen

SINGERS ELONGATING NOTES Mariah Carey, Christina Aguilera, the next big Idol hopeful ‌ changing one note into a sloping series of 20 doesn’t mean you’re a good singer. It means you’re annoying.

with deafening shrieks of ecstasy.

Oprah is especially bad for this; a case in point is Jennifer Aniston’s recent appearance, post-Brad Pitt split. An alien visitor observing her walk onto stage would be forced to assume she was the Virgin Mary reincarnate, armed with a cure for cancer.

CHAIN E-MAILS I know I’m not alone on this, but it’s not so much the standard chain mail that irritates me (if you don’t send this on to at least 10 people bad luck will be sure to follow), I can happily delete that and feel mild sympathy for the dimwitted, gullible fool who sent it on. It’s the spiritual/religious mails that really stoke my fury. They start by giving some sugary, sentimental anecdote to illustrate how truly loved we all are in the general scheme of things and proceed to tell you if you send this on to so many people you’ll receive an equal number of blessings. Who the hell gets on with this crap and who writes these? If you know me don’t ever, ever, ever send me one.

RUDENESS Plainly and simply, those who use a

SMALL TALK Don’t get me wrong, I can mingle and meet new people, but oh how I hate the niceties and banality that usually accompanies this experience ‌ perhaps this is a reflection of my own inability to ask interesting questions, you might think — maybe it is, I don’t care. I don’t claim to be overly interesting, which is why I try to surround myself with interesting people.

How could you hate this face?

talent for unnecessarily trampling over other people as a means to fill the void of emptiness in their lives.

OVERLY CHEERFUL PEOPLE An alternative means for filling that

void of emptiness ‌ people who interminably insist everything is just “wonderful, fantastic and absolutely incredible.â€? Sub category peeves include: people telling you to “smileâ€? when your face is simply relaxed (we’d all look pretty inane walking around like The Joker 24/7) and people (quite often aging men) who interject unfunny, pointless jokes into every single conversation, forcing listeners to make uncomfortable, half-laughing, fake grunts in response.

AMERICAN SPELLING I don’t care if this sounds snobbish.

We’re not in America; learn how to properly spell center (centre) and color (colour) for God’s sake — especially if you’re a business and the word “centre� happens to be in your company name.

COUNTRY MUSIC/BAD MUSIC IN GENERAL There was a time, recently, when a popular local broadcaster was on strike and I was forced to listen to another not-quite-so popular local broadcaster in the mornings. My already major dis-

DOG HATERS I’m always highly suspicious of people who don’t like dogs or animals in general. I can understand not wanting to own one, but not liking? What’s not to like?

I also have little patience for people who are afraid of dogs. I can understand if you’ve been bitten before and you’re a little hesitant, but when I’m walking my medium-sized husky on a secure leash and she’s practically emanating friendliness and a passing woman cowers away, whimpering she’s afraid of dogs, that makes me want to unclip the leash and yell “kill.� The same goes for the middleaged, heavy-set man we met on a trail one day when she was off leash. He practically ran away in the opposite direction, crying. Get some testicles.

Well I thought I’d feel better for ranting, but actually I just feel more irritated — alongside feeling self-indulgent.

To make up for things I’ll wrap with some interesting pet peeves I’ve collected from other people instead — including friends, family, co-workers and a saintly bartender: growing old; Nazis; black choirs (when used by white singers to make them appear cool); pee on the toilet seat; stupid people; not making it to the pub in time on a Friday night after working a 17-hour shift; when The Independent newsroom makes it to the pub just in time at 2:45 a.m. on a Friday night after a 17hour shift — and won’t leave.

GENERAL MANAGER John Moores AN INDEPENDENT VOICE FOR NEWFOUNDLAND & LABRADOR

P.O. Box 5891, Stn.C, St. John’s, Newfoundland & Labrador, A1C 5X4 Ph: 709-726-4639 • Fax: 709-726-8499 Website: www.theindependent.ca

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SALES MANAGER Gillian Fisher gillian.fisher@theindependent.ca

PRODUCTION MANAGER John Andrews john.andrews@theindependent.ca

sales@theindependent.ca • production@theindependent.ca • circulation@theindependent.ca

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DECEMBER 4, 2005

By Clare-Marie Gosse The Independent

B

esides facing almost 100 occupational health and safety orders issued in October, Her Majesty’s Penitentiary in St. John’s is dealing with security complaints from the union representing correctional officers.

Problems such as the personal safety of staff and contraband items (smuggled goods, including drugs) entering the prison were raised by NAPE (Newfoundland and Labrador Association for Public and Private Employees) in a September meeting with officials with the province’s Justice Department.

“We actually made some recommendations to the minister and government officials,” union president Carol Furlong tells The Independent. “I had received a letter back from the minister, it was a follow-up and he’s actually looking at the ability to implement the measures that we recommended.”

She says penitentiary staff are not always properly equipped with security tools such as collapsible batons, pepper spray and protective vests — and she would like to see visitors more closely monitored and tighter security implemented around the building’s outside parameters.

“There was a tower which was used some years ago, we’re looking at trying to get that installed … they’re looking at the feasibility of having that equipped again.”

The security concerns are a matter of penitentiary policy, separate from the non-negotiable occupation health and safety orders, which included three stopwork orders ranging from asbestos contamination and lack of training to improper furniture placement.

Furlong says the influx of inmates incarcerated for drug-related and violent offences, as well as the presence of drugs in the prison have changed the nature of the job for correctional staff. She points to the lockdowns that have occurred at the penitentiary in recent months. The last one was on Nov. 15 when homemade weapons were discovered for the second time this year. In August, officials stated that drugs were involved in a fight between eight inmates, which resulted in another lockdown.

“I would think that it’s a more difficult type of job now,” says Furlong.

“In the past, the pen housed inmates who were in for mainly minor offences.

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 5

‘All hell could break lose’ Union representing correctional officers at St. John’s penitentiary expresses security concerns

Paul Daly/The Independent

The prison was considered a mediumsecurity institution, but now offenders are there for more violent types of crimes. And drugs are a big issue.”

Furlong says the staff has concerns.

“You could be in a situation, for example, where you might be in a place by yourself and if something where to happen … anything could happen.

“The very nature of the job lends itself to aggressive situations and that’s why it’s such an important issue for us to try and ensure that security is a priority, because once you have drugs on the scene all hell could break lose in an environment like that.”

Justice Department officials wouldn’t comment on the security concerns.

Spokesman Billy Hickey says it’s a matter between the province and NAPE.

An evaluation of the future of the penitentiary — including the viability of a new building — is currently underway and Justice Minister Tom Marshall is expected to release the information during an upcoming cabinet meeting, “It’s still ongoing and while it’s ongoing we’ve been conducting repairs,” says Hickey. “We’ve made repairs to the roof in the centre block, we’ve installed a new camera system, we’ve almost finished doing that, and we’ve reinforced a piece of one of the exterior walls … any decision whether to make upgrades or eventually to build a new prison would, of course, have to go in the mix with all other infrastructure needs in the province.”

The additional health and safety orders are expected to be complete by

Party to decide whether to run candidates

T

he Newfoundland and Labrador First Party will decide Dec. 13 during a meeting of its executive council whether to run any candidates in the upcoming federal election.

Party president Tom Hickey says a number of people have expressed interest in running in the January race.

The federal party is not officially registered, meaning any candidates would have to run as independents.

“The fact that we’re not registered is not going to deter our candidates … from standing up and

saying I’m running for Newfoundland and Labrador First.”

Party registration applications must be submitted 60 days prior to an election call.

“We were banking on an election being called in February or March,” Hickey tells The Independent. “They pulled a fast one on us.”

The party was originally launched in the fall of 2004 during the height of the Atlantic Accord debate.

— Alisha Morrissey

SHIPPING NEWS Keeping an eye on the comings and goings of the ships in St. John’s Harbour. Information provided by the Coast Guard Traffic Centre.

MONDAY, NOV. 28 Vessels arrived: Atlantic Osprey, Canada, from White Rose; Maersk Dispatcher, Canada, from White Rose.

Vessels departed: Arnomedi, Spain, to Fishing; Atlantic Kingfisher, Canada, to Terra Nova.

TUESDAY, NOV. 29 Vessels arrived: ASL Sanderling, Canada, from Halifax.

Vessels departed: Atlantic Hawk, Canada, to White Rose; Maersk Nascopie, Canada, to Hibernia.

WEDNESDAY, NOV. 30 Vessels arrived: Fulmar, France, from St. Pierre;

Maersk Norseman, Canada, from Hibernia; Mathilda Desgagnes, Canada, from Pugwash; Atlantic Eagle, Canada, from Terra Nova; Maersk Chignecto, Canada, from White Rose.

Vessels departed: Panuke Sea, Canada, to Hibernia; Atlantic Eagle, Canada, to Terra Nova.

THURSDAY, DEC. 1 Vessels arrived: None.

Vessels departed: Maersk Chignecto, Canada, to White Rose Oil Field; Maersk Norseman, Canada, to Hibernia; Burin Sea, Canada, to Long Pond.

FRIDAY, DEC. 2 Vessels arrived: Seiko Maru #52, Japan, from Las Plamas; Atlantic Kingfisher, Canada, from Terra Nova; Cicero, Canada, from Montreal.

Vessels departed: None.

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May. Terry Carlson, executive director of the John Howard Society in St. John’s, an advocacy organization for inmates, is still pushing for a new prison, which he says would solve all the issues facing the facility. “(The need) becomes more evident to me every time I’ve visited the penitentiary,” says Carlson, who thinks the “piecemeal” construction of the building over the years since it was built in 1859 is compromising staff and inmates.

“All this leads to blind spots. “(A new prison) would take care of programming and security needs and it would provide that dignified type of respectful environment that benefits everybody, both the keepers and the kept.”

Carlson says ever since the building (which, due to its provincial status, is actually a prison — not a penitentiary) was constructed, there have been “costsaving reductions.

“It was built as a cost-saving reduction and the building was continuously reduced and somewhat compromised at the start.”

He says an architect originally quoted the construction price of 25,000 pounds sterling for a penitentiary in 1828. Three decades later the building was actually built for 16,000 pounds sterling.

“We ended up with a prison that was effective to meet our needs back in the mid-19th century, but those needs have changed dramatically and all these addons and tinkerings over the years … I just think it’s time for a real close look.”

6 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

DECEMBER 4, 2005

Going home — to Alberta A

young friend of ours dropped by one day last summer, quite unexpectedly, just as we were having dinner. Having grown up next door in a Newfoundland outport, and being the same age as our son, he became an accepted part of our family, so it was no surprise that he just pulled back a chair and joined in, same as if it was yesterday.

Fact is, Jack has been working in Alberta for the past 10 years. He started by obtaining his tractor-trailer licence and has since started his own business in Grand Prairie, bought a mobile home, married and has started raising a family.

It was good to see him and to know that he appeared to have his life on track, knowing the many pitfalls and temptations that confront youth today.

As he was leaving, he said something that has haunted me ever since.

“I’m going home next week,” he said, “so I’ll see you again before I leave!”

“Going home!” I thought, “to Alberta!”

That one simple sentence evokes such a maelstrom of emotions that I struggle where to start.

On the one hand I feel privileged to

DAVID BOYD Guest column have been among the last generation of outport youth with a childhood so inexorably linked to a little outport harbour, that no matter where one moved or lived or for how long, there was only one place in the world worthy of that sacred word — home!

For us home was our whole community — the woods where we cut our bonfire boughs and set our rabbit slips.

The ponds where we swam in summer and skated until dark in winter, when the thought of lamb chops smothered in gravy hurried us home, our feet icy in our frozen boots.

And the ocean — where we set our lobster traps after school on nice spring evenings and hurried home not to miss the evening codtrap haul. The house was just a place for gulping down your meals — there was so much to do in your outport home.

That great love for outport Newfoundland — immortalized in song

and in such worn phrases as “You can take the boy from the bay, but you can’t take the bay from the boy!” — was a product of an idyllic life of adventure, freedom and companionship seldom found, and the reason why Newfoundlanders have always found an irresistible tug at the heart strings to come back home.

Sadly, this will be no more, because the conditions that produced this emotional attachment no longer exist.

We can blame the government for allowing technology and corporate greed to vacuum our oceans and siphon the lifeblood of outport Newfoundland.

We can consider ourselves the victims of cultural genocide by a succession of federal regimes that has considered our resources bargaining tools for the benefit of central Canada.

Or we can blame ourselves for baring our flesh to the whips of those in authority from the fish merchants to politicians, more concerned about their careers than their constituents.

I prefer the latter because in spite of all the five-gallon plastic buckets on the chimneys of rural Newfoundland and in spite of all the heartache associated with the loss of a way of life,

our behaviour has not changed.

We are still doing an excellent job of educating our best and brightest youth to turn the wheels of industry, build their homes, raise their families and pay their taxes in other provinces.

FINAL LEVER We give quotas as the property of fish companies and leave communities at the mercy of corporations. We talk about overcapacity in harvesting and processing as if few large boats selling to two or three mega companies is a desirable goal, when in actual fact such a policy, perhaps already irreversible, will be the final lever to open the trap door that will leave rural Newfoundland gasping its final breath.

Our politicians speak of diversification and of assisting small business, but in actual fact have increased every fee imaginable over the past two years, reducing what little encouragement one might have for rural entrepreneurship.

One of rural Newfoundland’s biggest problems is that decisions affecting the lives of its people are made by those who choose to live elsewhere and have not a sound con-

nection to the land or the culture, but nevertheless know what’s best. When the cod collapsed, people said we should have listened to the fishermen!

Just this year fishermen had to resort to desperate measures in an attempt to have their views listened to. So what have we learned?

Maybe for some, Alberta has become more home than home itself.

Just think of the answer to this question: where will you see more Newfoundlanders out enjoying themselves among Newfoundland friends, money in their pockets on a Saturday night — Fort McMurray, Alta. or the community hall in Dildo Run? Personally, I’m presently restoring the old family house at my little home town of Tizzard’s Harbour, New World Island.

Most of the people I grew up with have moved or passed away, and as I work in the tranquility of the most beautiful harbour in the world, I throw out this question to the world.

What’s the answer?

David Boyd is a small boat fisherman who operates a fishing heritage centre, The Prime Berth, near the Twillingate causeway.

YOUR VOICE Independent knocks down myth number two Dear editor, Congratulations! You destroyed one myth with your six-part series in the fall of 2004 on Confederation’s balance sheet and now you have destroyed another.

The balance sheet showed we contribute a great deal more to Canada than we receive, which certainly was not the perception of most Canadians and, I might add, most Newfoundlanders and Labradorians.

The results of the poll you conducted in Ontario and Quebec, published in the Nov. 27-Dec. 3 edition of The Independent, destroyed the second myth that we are perceived as not being very industrious and too dependent on government handouts.

The results showed that Ontarians and Quebecers hold generally positive perceptions of this province and its people who they describe as friendly, hardworking and humourous.

That being said, I have to point out one glaring omission in your questionnaire where you asked the respondents to state what they considered to be the most important industry in the province. You then listed six industries to choose from and omitted what today may very well be the most important in terms of employment, importance to rural Newfoundland and Labrador, and to the province’s economy in general.

Here I am referring to the manufacturing industry. It is ironic that in a separate article (Business ‘bucket’) in the same issue by Claire-Marie Gosse comparing the various industries, manufacturing accounts for eight per cent direct employment and 14,000 full-time jobs. This is more than the oil and gas and the mining industries combined. Also for every job in manufacturing another three jobs are created to support it.

Other interesting statistics related to this industry: • There are over 800 manufacturers in this province producing over 10,000 products.

• Over 50 per cent of the manufacturing is in rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

• This province exports more per capita than any other province in Canada and three times the national average, with manufacturing accounting for a great deal of the exports In closing I would like to say how much I enjoyed Brian Dobbin’s article in the same issue (Power of perseverance) on the challenges facing entrepreneurs in this province. I can assure you that all 800 manufacturers in the province can relate to his experience.

Keep up the good work.

Burford Ploughman, St. John’s

Election woes Wired windbags wax, grate, exaggerate, boast, emote, begging for our vote; making promises they can’t, won’t keep; leeching, largesse-larded, corruption creep.

Eeny, meaney, miney, moe, take your pick, you won’t pass go; like Pierre, walk in the snow, win, or lose, or blow, “no show!”

It is your right to bite your lip, your tongue or hold your nose, and spit, in spite, of all that’s said and done; great fun, what?

No! It isn’t funny, to be bribed, bought, with your own money!

Wrestling, wrangling, carrot-jangling; bare-faced, lied, left us desperate, dangling; wrung, hung, by would-be wizards, wriggling, wafting, lending lizards; ever-preaching, prattling, buying buzzards.

Bob LeMessurier, Goulds

AN INDEPENDENT VOICE FOR NEWFOUNDLAND & LABRADOR

P.O. Box 5891, Stn.C, St. John’s, Newfoundland & Labrador, A1C 5X4 Ph: 709-726-4639 • Fax: 709-726-8499 www.theindependent.ca • editorial@theindependent.ca The Independent is published by The Sunday Independent, Inc. in St. John’s. It is an independent newspaper covering the news, issues and current affairs that affect the people of Newfoundland & Labrador.

PUBLISHER Brian Dobbin MANAGING EDITOR Ryan Cleary SENIOR EDITOR Stephanie Porter PICTURE EDITOR Paul Daly

All material in The Independent is copyrighted and the property of The Independent or the writers and photographers who produced the material. Any use or reproduction of this material without permission is prohibited under the Canadian Copyright Act. • © 2005 The Independent • Canada Post Agreement # 40871083

The Independent welcomes letters to the editor. Letters must be 300 words in length or less and include full name, mailing address and daytime contact numbers.

Letters may be edited for length, content and legal considerations. Send your letters in care of The Independent, P.O. Box 5891, Station C, St. John’s, NL, A1C 5X4 or e-mail us at editorial@theindependent.ca

Wasted wishes T

ake this to the bank: Danny Williams could have had anything he wanted this Christmas from the Government of Canada.

His wish was Paul Martin’s command after what happened last time around, when the PM tried to take back the present he slid under our election tree.

Martin and the two buckos he’s up against are prepared to give the premier anything, anything at all — all our Danny need do is ask. Name it … he’ll have it.

So it was quite a shock when the premier of our struggling but determined land used his first wish for handouts, more welfare, yet another federal program to get us through the long, cold winter.

What’s happened to Dapper Dan, our prize scrapper? Could the Accord fight have taken the good out of him? Maybe his legs have turned to rubber and he’s spent. Maybe he’s punch shy. Maybe he’s a big fat chicken. Maybe he had a Maple Leaf tattooed to his chest when he made buddy buddy with the PM. And maybe he did.

The first item on the wish list Danny mailed to Martin and the other two federal leaders on election eve was a request for Ottawa to go in on yet another early retirement program for fishery workers.

What’s that now — package No. 3, 4 or 5?

“Please Ottawa, may we have some more?”

Keep in mind the key words are go in on, the province is apparently willing to pick up a third of the bill this time around. But then Ottawa has paid enough for its sins, hasn’t it? More than $4 billion and counting in fish aid — that should be enough penance for standing by as trawler fleets clear-cut the Grand Banks. Oh right, scratch that, clear-cut is a forestry term. How about burned the ocean fields? No, too Prairie wheat. Better stick with the old reliables — raped and pillaged.

The Independent did a little math work in the fall of 2004, calculating that between 1992 and 2010, the collapse of

RYAN CLEARY

Fighting Newfoundlander the Newfoundland and Labrador groundfish fishery will have an overall $76-billion negative economic impact on the global fishing industry.

“Had the groundfish stocks off the East Coast of Canada been properly managed, the waters off this province could be providing a healthy, sustainable annual catch — and revenue — today.”

Danny’s problem is he has yet to turn a hand to the cause and continuation of the fishery crisis.

That’s what we wrote back then, and it makes just as much sense today. Think about it, how much is our economy losing out on because the cod is gone? And whose fault is that again?

No doubt a retirement package is a good thing — better than welfare, which comes from our own pockets (the news of the week was an economic update to say we owe $23,280 a piece in longterm debt).

Danny’s problem is he has yet to turn a hand to the cause and continuation of the fishery crisis.

First things first, Danny should sit down with scientists and have an open and frank discussion about why cod should be declared an endangered species. Don’t be so quick to rule it out, Mr. Premier. Politics and the fishery don’t exactly have a glorious history together. Species tend to vanish from the face of the earth when bureaucrats and politicians get their hands on them.

The second thing Danny and his crowd should do is carry out a full

review of the science branch of federal Fisheries, to see if it can do the job it’s mandated to do. Science is to cod what medicine is to man.

Then there’s the other topic that people are sick to death of hearing about: an end to foreign overfishing and custodial management (No. 3 on the premier’s list).

Danny has a fixation on the fishery as of late, no question, but that’s understandable given his most glaring failure to date — rural Newfoundland and Labrador.

The second item on Danny’s wish list is an interesting request: an allocation of northern shrimp for Harbour Breton and the Conne River Miawpukek First Nation.

A northern shrimp quota won’t mean any direct jobs (I’m sure the Icelanders and Norwegians would be happy enough to catch the quota for us in Canadian waters — the growing trend).

A shrimp quota would at least mean a few extra dollars, a guaranteed income for Harbour Breton and Conne River to keep a scattered street light on so the seniors can find their way home from church.

In fact, and I counted, the first five items on Danny’s wish list are fishery related — even ahead of the lower Churchill and a new Gander weather office. There are 16 categories all told, ending with a commitment from the feds on waste management.

Knowing the way Danny works, he’s dead serious about the early retirement package, the other 15 wishes are likely pie in the sky — filler on the demand page. Danny, the businessman, walks in with a list as long as his arm in hopes of walking out with the one or two things he’s really after.

My question is this: why should we settle for any less than exactly what we have coming? Where’s your backbone Danny? At what point did you learn to settle?

Ryan Cleary is managing editor of The Independent. ryan.cleary@theindependent.ca

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 7

Power to the people Y

ears ago I wrote a rant about Newfoundland Power executives and their habit of always fixing their problems by raising our rates. The publication I worked for mistakenly added a Newfoundland Hydro logo as a graphic to accompany my column. A few days later I got a dry little email from then-Newfoundland Hydro president Bill Wells asking that my problem with Newfoundland Power executives notwithstanding, why was his company’s logo so prominently displayed with my column?

Why indeed. In that case it was because, like most people, the overworked graphic artist tasked with layout did not have a clear understanding of the difference between Newfoundland Hydro and Newfoundland Power.

Stay with me here while I take a stab at explaining it. Newfoundland Power or Hydro executives can take time from whatever it is they do to order their communications people to write in and correct me if they see fit.

Newfoundland Power, which is owned by Fortis (a private company), buys its electricity from a company you

IVAN MORGAN

Rant & reason and I own — the Crown corporation Newfoundland Hydro — and sells it back to us so it can make money for the people who own Fortis, so they can get rich. So in effect we own a company that makes electricity, which it has to sell to Fortis so they can sell it to us. At rates they set. So they can make a profit, which we are told is good. I assume they mean good for them.

I always think it’s the little things that tell you the most about organizations and the people who run them. If you read Newfoundland Power’s press — the stuff they generate about themselves, you will be filled with a warm fuzzy feeling. That’s because they spend a lot of your money hiring marketing and communications types to convince you how wonderful they are. What you won’t learn — and what isn’t so warm and fuzzy — is that they have changed

YOUR VOICE ‘Pity’ the Liberal candidates Dear editor, A lot has happened since the 2004 federal election. A lot has changed. It’s oddly comforting to know, as we enter this sentimental season, that certain things never change. For instance, despite all his other inconsistencies, Paul Martin has indeed shown consistency in one area from start to finish: he has consistently embarrassed just about every federal Liberal candidate to run in this province.

Back when Martin’s crowd tossed the recommendations of Vic Young’s royal commission for a new offshore revenue arrangement in the trash can, Loyola Hearn and Norm Doyle were on their feet in the House of Commons in support of the very kind of arrangement sought by both Roger Grimes and Danny Williams.

On Aug. 7, 2003, as reported in Ocean Resources magazine, Stephen Harper stood in agreement with them.

Martin still said no.

By spring of 2004, Martin’s position hadn’t changed.

Still, we saw some brave people put their names forward for the federal Liberal nomination. When asked about the Atlantic Accord, they sputtered platitudes or followed John Efford’s lead and said it was “too important to talk about during an election.” When Doyle and Hearn were asked about it, they pointed to Harper’s written commitment. NDP candidates did the same with Layton’s written commitment. Siobhan Coady and company must have blushed yet again.

But wait, it gets better. Midway through the very election where Efford and Coady and company were alternating between platitudes and scoldings to explain their leader’s lack of interest in this province’s demands, Martin makes a deathbed conversion on the Atlantic Accord! All is saved! Of course, by the time he hopped a plane to Halifax right after his announcement, Martin was already dithering on his own promise.

Even after his promise, Martin put this province though eight months of unnecessary painful dental work as he tried to vary and lessen the arrangement. Efford came to town in December and scolded provincial Liberals and Tories alike for daring to stand up for this province.

Hearn and Doyle tried at every stage to fast track the agreement. Martin held it hostage another two months in order to keep power. He then tried to create a mini melodramatic scene and blamed the two St. John’s MPs for “jeopardizing” the new Accord arrangement. Given that the opposition party leaders had committed to at least as good a deal as him, in writing, before he did, there was only one way to interpret his words: Martin, in a majority situation, would either have let our Accord drop off the screen or repealed it.

I pity Coady, Paul Antle and the rest of the federal Liberal contingents. They realize that voters have many other options that would be better than voting for the embarrassment they stand for.

Liam O’Brien, St. John’s

their payment policy. Newfoundland Power no longer has a payment office in their building. You can only pay them in person if you have exact change.

Now, to pay your bill with cash, you have to go to your bank or to Dominion’s Smoke Shop.

I have always liked the idea of paying my utilities in cash. Yes, I am a wing nut, but I don’t want those people getting access to my bank account, and why should the bank make money because I need electricity? As well, I often have to pay in cash because I have to pay at the very last minute. That’s because people often wait ’til the last minute to pay me. So over the years I have often found myself in a line with others at the Newfoundland Power offices, clutching an old bill and a wad of hard-won cash. I always found this comforting. Why? Because there was a steady stream of us. One of the big things about being broke is that you can feel awfully embattled and alone.

Standing in the line up at Newfoundland Power would clear up this notion fast.

Whenever I went to pay my bill, I could be assured of a few laughs and a conver-

sation or two with the many seniors, single moms and other types who for one reason or another were forced to come pay in cash.

I especially liked the line-up at Newfoundland Power because I hoped that their executives might — just maybe — accidentally catch a glimpse of us in our long lines as they dash from their cars to their offices. I thought it might be instructive for them.

Now they have been deprived of this opportunity. Newfoundland Power, a Fortis-owned company, has decided it doesn’t want to have to deal with its own customers in person. It has decided to “save money” by laying off the kind and patient cashiers who worked in their offices. By save money I don’t mean so they can reduce the rates they charge us, I mean so they can make more money for the shareholders of Fortis. Make more money from selling us our own power. Am I getting repetitive?

So can you complain? There was once a fellow named Dennis Browne who, as our consumer advocate, pointed out the inefficiency of allowing Fortis to sell our electricity back to us for a prof-

CONSERVATIVE NOMINATION

it. Their solution to the problems Mr. Browne made public appears to have been to get rid of Mr. Browne. Now the consumer advocate is someone named Johnson from whom we hear not one peep. Another problem solved.

Except for you and me. We are always being lectured about the benefits of business. Our Danny is always thumping that particular tub. And I agree with him. I heat my house with wood, and I buy my wood from a businessman. He owns a woodlot. Because firewood sales is a very competitive business, he is obliged to watch his costs, stay streamlined in his daily work, be civil and accommodating to me, and only as an absolute last resort raise his prices. And he cheerfully takes my cash. That’s because the business environment demands it.

Man, could he teach the executives at Fortis, Newfoundland Power and Newfoundland Hydro a trick or two!

That is, of course, if they were to ever become a business.

Ivan Morgan can be reached at ivan.morgan@gmail.com

YOUR VOICE Simply the Bestie

MHA Fabian Manning (PC-Placentia and St. Mary’s) is expected to announce his run for the Conservative nomination in the federal riding of St. John’s East during a 3 p.m. news conference Sunday (Dec. 4) at the Royal Canadian Legion in Holyrood.

Outport home Just a valley in the broken hills that run down to the sea.

Not much to cause a second glance the place that’s home to me.

No tall buildings touch the sky no crowds upon the street.

No sirens in the silent night no cops out on the beat.

Just the lapping of the gentle waves upon an empty shore.

Just the broken backs of empty shacks where laughter rings no more.

No shouting of the village boys

at their evening game of ball.

And the Lone Ranger rides no more cross the screen at the Orange Hall!

No soft laughter of the women as they labour on the flakes.

No more the scent of drying hay, fresh tossed with prong and rake.

And far beyond the distant point, where the grey cliffs meet the sea.

No more the sound of a motor boat, The way it used to be.

David Boyd, Twillingate

Dear editor, As Muhammad Ali is to boxing, Tiger Woods to golf and Wayne Gretkzy to hockey, so it is then George Best is a legend to soccer football.

On Saturday (Dec. 3) George Best was to have been laid to rest in his native Belfast and the outpouring of tributes have continued from all over the world. The tabloids have highlighted his self-destructive lifestyle with his lifetime problems with alcohol. I didn’t know George Best and I don’t think anybody did. However, I did see him play in his early days at Manchester United and I also saw him play in a number of World Cup qualifier games for Northern Ireland.

During the mid-1960s I attended college in Belfast at the same time as 17-year-old George Best (Bestie, as he came to be known) made his debut for United.

In April 1964 Best made his home debut for Northern Ireland in a friendly game at Windsor Park against Uruguay. All the action was on Best, who made a lifetime impression as he set one of the goals in that game. With his long hair and jersey down to his knees he was easily recognizable and when he touched the ball all the home fans roared and we knew something magical could happen even at that early stage of his short-lived career in top-class football.

On Oct. 3, 1965 a star-studded England came to Belfast.

I was one of the lucky 15,000 fans who attended the game.

England jumped into a four-goal lead at half time and the game seemed over only for the Irish keeper Pat Jennings and then in the second half George Best.

The second half was amazing as Northern Ireland fought back with Bestie running rings around the English defense and even though he didn’t score he set up three dream goals and England was lucky to escape with a narrow win. Best with his ball control and precision-point passes had arrived as a superstar.

I have many memories watching on TV as Manchester United was the first English team to win the European Cup in 1968 and Best was named European player of the year.

Just as Daryl Sittler once scored 10 points in a game for the Maple Leafs, Best scored a record breaking six goals in a famous FA cup game against Northampton.

The terms legend and the greatest are often loosely bandied around by sportscasters but the term applies to Best’s football heroics. Let it be said Best got along well with everyone but he was no saint. He only had the one enemy — alcoholism — and that conquered him in the end. His erratic playboy lifestyle contrasted with his wizardry on the soccer field. He lost a lot of public support when he returned to drinking after a liver transplant and it was most ironic he died on the day drinking hours in England were extended. He never lost his self-deprecatory humour in often quoted: “I spent 90 per cent of my money on women, drink, and fast cars. The rest I squandered.”

Best is the ultimate tragic hero and perhaps the greatest tragedy is that we never got to know how great a footballer he was.

Micheal Boyle, St. John’s

Installation dates still available

before Christmas

DECEMBER 4, 2005

DECEMBER 4, 2005

8 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

By Clare-Marie Gosse The Independent

D

anny Williams has made no secret of the fact the development of the lower Churchill project in Labrador is perhaps the most important initiative in his mandate as premier. In an October editorial meeting with The Independent, he said securing the potential project could sway his decision to run again in the next election.

During the hour-long interview, Williams talked about issues concerning Quebec and the upper and lower Churchill developments, as well as his intention to seek assistance from the federal government.

“The prime minister has already said to me that he sees this as a national project.

“So he (Paul Martin) has got an interest in this project … I had him on the phone with me last month or so, and he mentioned the lower Churchill again.”

Last week, the province issued a letter to the three federal parties requesting feedback on where each one stands on a host of Newfoundland and Labrador issues. The lower Churchill — as the largest undeveloped hydro site in North America — was one of the topics raised.

In the letter, Williams outlined that the lower Churchill (2,824 megawatts of energy from Gull Island and Muskrat Falls) was of “national significance,” representing five per cent of Canada’s total greenhouse emission reduction commitments under Kyoto and that it “would significantly strengthen the national electricity grid.

“Does your party support efforts to develop the hydro-power resources of the lower Churchill River system for the primary benefit of Newfoundland and Labrador, including the provision of a federal government guarantee to proceed with the project?” the letter read.

The province is currently in what it calls “phase two” of the lower Churchill assessment process. Phase one ended in March, with the announcement that three proposals — as well as an option for independent, in-province development — were under consideration. Now the province is conducting a feasibility study.

Natural Resources Minister Ed Byrne says there’s no specific time line in place for reaching a decision regarding the shortlisted proposals (although government has previously indicated the entire assessment process should be complete by the end of 2006).

“We’ve engaged a different process than

From page 1 “That decision is going to be made in the next year or so. It’s a decision pregnant with implications for Canada and to a lesser extent for the U.S. states.”

O’Hagan says Great Eastern Power Transmission was originally formed to respond to the current provincial government’s interest in developing the lower Churchill. The company had entered its proposal, along with 24 other parties, during the recent worldwide call for expressions of interest, but didn’t make the final cut.

Krapels commends the province’s expressions of interest process and says the three proposals the government is now assessing are “excellent choices.” He describes all the current and potential Churchill River developments as being

From page 1 Results of the surveys are being released as part of The Independent’s three-part series, Power and perception, which began last week. Relevant articles and analysis accompany the weekly data and a complete overview of the polls will be printed in the Dec. 11 edition.

A little over 800 respondents were polled in two separate surveys — half in Ontario and half in Quebec — between Nov. 12 and 20 and findings are considered accurate to within +/-4.8 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

The results show Ontarians and Quebecers are relatively uninformed when it comes to the issue of hydroelectric power generated from Labrador’s Churchill River. Only 32.8 per cent of respondents in Ontario and 24.6 per cent

INDEPENDENTNEWS • 9

‘This is a national project’ Williams says PM has eye on lower Churchill development

has ever been tried before (internationally advertising for expressions of interest),” he says. “We’ve made no decisions; we’ve held a very extensive and very broad initial public consultation in Labrador, to be followed again by other public consultations.”

A far as potentially pursuing renegotiations on the lopsided upper Churchill contract with Quebec, Byrne refused comment.

In his October interview with The Independent, Williams, however, said if Quebec doesn’t end up being a partner in the lower Churchill project, then the upper Churchill becomes a separate issue.

“If they (Hydro-Quebec) are part of the lower Churchill, which they likely could be in some form or another … then the question is, what do we do for redress on the upper Churchill and how far do we go? Do we completely compromise the deal by asking for everything back? Or … perhaps the redress on the upper Churchill could be a much sweeter lower Churchill deal.”

Williams said he expects to approach the federal government when and if the issue of placing a transmission line through Quebec comes up. Current power lines are said to be at maximum capacity.

Previous negotiations between this province and Quebec regarding Newfoundland and Labrador transmitting power across that territory have failed and to date the federal government has refused to intervene and force the issue.

“Some of that power is going to have to go through Quebec,” says Williams. “So the question then is does the federal government force it to happen and help make it happen by financing it when the premier of Quebec has already stated publicly and privately to me that he doesn’t want the federal government involved in any east west transmission grid?”

IN THE RUNNING Potential developers of the lower Churchill project under consideration by the province:

Paul Daly/The Independent

POWER PLAY like Newfoundland and Labrador’s “retirement account.

“What I admire about what the government is doing is they’re asking the same questions as a sensible household. Do I invest everything into one asset, let’s say the Quebec market, or, am I better off investing in three or four assets?

“Every investment advisor will tell you, don’t put your eggs in one basket, diversify.”

Krapels says he hopes his company may yet have a part to play in any future transmission projects, adding “there are so few people in the world that do this.”

Officials with Great Eastern Power Transmission are currently working on a high-profile project to lay 70 miles of underwater cable from New Jersey to Long Island, the largest of its type under construction in the United States.

in Quebec have any knowledge of a potential lower Churchill development.

Ontarians showed slightly more understanding than their Quebec counterparts when questioned about the lopsided upper Churchill contract. In Ontario, 71.4 per cent of the respondents, claiming to have knowledge of the upper Churchill, thought Quebec had received more benefits from the deal. In Quebec, only 52.5 per cent thought their province had come out on top.

Cindy Roma, CEO of Telelink, says the figures are “surprising.

“I thought it was interesting that they, in Ontario, overwhelmingly got that Quebec had a good deal there,” she says.

“Surprised in Quebec that 20 per cent thought Newfoundland and Labrador was getting a good deal — they obviously don’t really know much about it, or they

‘Extraordinary project’ Krapels and O’Hagan say all three potential routes — Quebec, the Gulf and Atlantic route — have their pros and cons in terms of price and delivery of power.

The Quebec route — the subject of much contention in the past between that province and Newfoundland and Labrador — is the most direct path on a geographic level. Current Hydro-Quebec transmission lines from the upper Churchill (which already supply the U.S. market) are said to be running at full capacity, so new ones would have to be built and terms negotiated.

The alternative Atlantic route would pass from Labrador, east across to the island and on down across the Cabot Strait

to Nova Scotia, potentially supplying every province along the way, including Prince Edward Island. Then the power would move on down through Maine.

The so-called Gulf route would mean sending transmission lines out through the southern tip of Labrador, down under water along the Gulf of St. Lawrence and possibly into the Gaspe Peninsula. Or it could bypass Quebec altogether and enter Prince Edward Island and continue on over the fixed link. That would solve any contentious territory issues concerning Quebec — despite the fact the cable would be running along that province’s coast line.

“The federal government has jurisdiction over navigable water so the province’s

‘It can’t be any more cut and dried than that’ wouldn’t be able to say that.”

Out of the 71.4 per cent of respondents in Ontario and 52.5 per cent in Quebec who showed some understanding of the upper Churchill contract, 57 per cent and 50.9 per cent respectively thought Quebec should renegotiate the deal.

Meanwhile, 18.8 per cent in Ontario and 11.4 per cent in Quebec were on the fence or undecided, suggesting the two provinces are somewhat sympathetic to Newfoundland and Labrador’s position.

Part of the problem Newfoundland and

Labrador has experienced over the development of the Churchill River stems from Quebec’s refusal to allow a power corridor through its territory — as well as the federal government’s past refusal to intervene and force the issue.

Only 11.2 per cent of Ontarians thought Quebec should have the exclusive right to make decisions concerning the transmission of power through that province and 83.3 per cent thought the feds should intervene if an agreement couldn’t be reached.

In Quebec, 55.4 per cent of respondents

• Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

• A consortium including Hydro-Quebec, Ontario Energy Financing and engineering firm SNC Lavalin.

• Calgary-based TransCanada Corporation.

• Tshiaskueshish Group, a consortium including Macquarie North America Ltd, Innu Development Limited Partnership, Peter Kiewit Sons Co. and Innu Kiewit Constructors.

territory generally ends at the high-water mark,” says Krapels, “so in Canada that would become a federal jurisdictional regulatory issue.”

He says the Gulf route would be an “extraordinary project in terms of length,” but by no means one of a kind. In the mid 1970s Norway undertook a similar-scale development of underwater cables to Denmark, in order to bypass the problem of travelling across Sweden. And Krapels says the Gulf route would be a much smaller undertaking than the world’s largest undersea route to date, which runs from Australia to Tasmania.

Some underwater areas within both the Atlantic and Gulf routes would need to be buried (as opposed to the cheaper method of simply laying them on the ocean floor), due to hazards such as icebergs. In his opinion, Krapels says the best overall route

from a cable perspective would be the Atlantic one — from Labrador, to Newfoundland, to Nova Scotia, to New Brunswick and onwards.

O’Hagan says the costs of a land route and an undersea route can be easily comparable and similarly unpredictable.

“What a lot of overland lines run into is environmental opposition, concern about electromagnetic field emissions,” he says.

“And where you need to bury an overland cable, and sometimes you do need to bury it, it becomes extremely expensive.

“The sub-sea route can be considerably more expensive if you bury it, but you really have two cost issues. Can you just lay the cable on the ocean floor? Then you’re talking about something that’s somewhat more expensive than an overhead line, but it could be a lot cheaper than a land line that you have to bury.”

thought their province should have the exclusive right to make decisions on the transmission of power and 55.7 per cent felt the feds should intervene in the absence of an agreement.

“Ontario was a clear no and Quebec was a clear yes, it can’t be any more cut and dried than that,” says Roma. “But … if that was Newfoundland and Labrador, we’d also feel that we’d want to say we had the right to negotiate our own terms.

I don’t think that’s a bad thing.”

Quebecers had a little more faith in Newfoundland and Labrador’s finances than Ontario, with 29.4 per cent believing the province could fund its own lower Churchill development; in Ontario, the response was 19.7 per cent.

An overwhelming 85.6 per cent of Ontarians thought the federal Government of Canada should step up with funding

and 68.6 per cent of Quebecers agreed. “(It’s) really interesting that they didn’t think we had the money for the project and they didn’t mind if the federal government supported it,” says Roma. “Great.

I’m pleased they feel that way, but I’m surprised. I thought it would be much higher on the no side.”

As for the obvious lack of knowledge the general public in Ontario and Quebec have regarding the power flowing from the upper Churchill into mainland grids en route to market, Roma says it’s hardly surprising. (29.6 per cent of Ontarians were familiar with the upper Churchill Falls hydroelectric power development and only 25.6 per cent of Quebecers.)

“I don’t think that’s surprising. If somebody asked me about the wheat in Saskatchewan I wouldn’t necessarily have an opinion on it either.”

SURVEY RESULTS Are you aware there is significant undeveloped hydroelectric potential in Labrador on the lower Churchill River?

ONTARIO

Yes No

32.8% 67.2%

QUEBEC

Yes No

24.6% 75.4%

Do you think the province of Quebec should have the exclusive right to set its own terms for transmitting this power across Quebec for sales to North America?

ONTARIO

QUEBEC

Yes No No opinion Should negotiate

11.2% 80.8% 6.5% 1.5%

Yes No No opinion Should negotiate

55.4% 26.3% 14.7% 3.5%

If Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador could not agree on such a contract, should the Federal Government intervene to facilitate an agreement?

ONTARIO

Yes No No opinion

83.3% 9.0% 7.7%

QUEBEC

Yes No No opinion

55.7% 34.4% 9.4%

Do you think the government of Newfoundland and Labrador has the resources to independently finance the development of the lower Churchill project?

Do you think the Government of Canada should financially support Newfoundland and Labrador in developing the lower Churchill?

Which province benefits more from the upper Churchill contract between Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador?

This contract is scheduled to expire in 2041. Do you think that Quebec should agree to renegotiate the contract now?

ONTARIO

ONTARIO

ONTARIO

Yes No Depends No opinion

57.6% 23.5% 5.9% 12.9%

QUEBEC

Yes No Depends No opinion

50.9% 37.7% 5.7% 5.7%

QUEBEC

Yes No No opinion

85.6% 6.7% 7.7%

Yes No No opinion

68.6% 23.3% 8.1%

Are you aware of the upper Churchill Falls hydroelectric power development that currently exists in Labrador?

ONTARIO

Yes No

29.6%* 70.4%

Yes No

25.6%* 74.4%

ONTARIO

Yes No No opinion

19.7% 57.0% 23.4%

QUEBEC

QUEBEC

Yes No No opinion

29.4% 49.9% 20.8%

* The following question was asked only to those answering “yes.” (119 in Ontario and 101 in Quebec.)

QUEBEC

Quebec Newfoundland and Labrador About the same No opinion Quebec Newfoundland and Labrador About the same No opinion

71.4%**

12.6% 2.5% 13.4%

52.5%**

20.8% 16.8% 9.9%

** The following question was asked only to those answering “Quebec.” (85 in Ontario and 53 in Quebec.)

Data was collected between Nov. 12 and 20, 2005

by Telelink and is considered accurate within +/- 4.8 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.

Meredith Hall

Christianne Rushton

David Pomeroy

Calvin Powell

Handel’s Messiah Friday & Saturday, December 9 & 10, 2005 Basilica of St. John the Baptist – 8pm

Douglas Dunsmore conductor Meredith Hall soprano Christianne Rushton mezzo-soprano David Pomeroy tenor Calvin Powell baritone Philharmonic Choir of the NSO

A traditional way to begin the Christmas season—a performance of Handel’s Messiah in the magnificent setting of the Basilica.

Mezzo-soprano Christianne Rushton joins Newfoundlanders Meredith Hall, David Pomeroy, and Calvin Powell for this ever popular oratorio.

Tickets: $25/$21; $20/$17; $13/$11 Not available at the door.

Available at: NSO Office 722-4441 Bennington Gate, Churchill Sq. 576-6600 Jungle Jims, Torbay Rd. 722-0261 Jungle Jims, Topsail Rd. 745-6060 Fred’s Records, Duckworth St. 753-9191 Provincial Music, Campbell Ave. 579-2641 The Guv’nor, Elizabeth Ave. 726-0092 Sponsored by

Peter Gardner General & Artistic Director Principal Conductor Marc David

DECEMBER 4, 2005

10 • INDEPENDENTNEWS

LIFE STORY

‘Keen interest in politics’ Former lieutenant-governor Gordon Winter was one of six signatories to the Terms of Union GORDON WINTER 1912-2003

By Darcy MacRae The Independent

W From The Independent, Vol. 1, No. 3

FROM THE BAY “The snow-dotted Southside Hills with Fort Amherst in the foreground and the freshly fallen snow on the roofs of homes and stores at the Battery presented a picture to thrill any artist and Mr. Maunder was lucky enough to get the complete scene within the range of his camera. Recently, the well-known British firm of S.H. Elkes and Sons Ltd. … was so impressed with the unusual scene that their advertising department has chosen it to reproduce in colour on one of its tins of fancy biscuits prepared for Christmas trade.”

— The Family Fireside, November 1954 YEARS PAST “To revert to the subject of prohibition let me say that, no matter how you regard it, man is in every way better without he use of intoxicating drink.

“Far more generally, while weakening the will and exacting the lower propensities, it blunts the moral sense also, and the wretched victim becomes so completely the slave of his tyrannical appetite for drink that he is ready to gratify it at all cost or sacrifice.”

— The Daily Star, Nov. 1, 1915 AROUND THE WORLD “Vancouver now has the busiest airport in Canada. In the five years between 1951 and 1956, passenger traffic increased 72 per cent when aircraft movements increased only 28 per cent — because more people carried on fewer, larger planes.”

— The Stephenville News, Dec. 14, 1957 EDITORIAL STAND “The (National) Convention was proving one

thing, Newfoundlanders were a new people.

A crime against the nation was a crime high against the very haven of their ideals. It would not go unpunished in the roll call of reckoning. The men of the Convention had a choice, they could be Newfoundland’s Men of Munich; they could be arbiters of her destiny. They could not be both.”

— Sunday Herald, Sept. 22, 1946 LETTER TO THE EDITOR “It used to be there are no appeal from a referee’s decision, which was exactly as it should be, not only for the orderly conduct of the game, but the safe conduct of the official. Next thing you know, fans will be carrying knives and guns into stadiums and arenas, as they do in soccer-crazed parts of South America and Europe, and violence would be the acceptable pattern protesting calls that don’t favour the home team.”

— Daily News Dec. 17, 1983 QUOTE OF THE WEEK “It is the curse of this country that even in good times the result of four months labour must keep the people throughout an entire year. Newfoundland needs winter employment for her men, and work similar for women and boys all the year round.”

— Editor of the Evening Mercury, Feb. 9, 1885

Warm up to the pink, white and green...

hen most people hear the name Gordon Winter, they recall the former lieutenant-governor’s contribution to Newfoundland and Labrador. But to his family and friends, there was much more to the man.

For starters, he took great pleasure in dusting off his golf clubs each spring and hitting the links at Bally Haly golf course in St. John’s. His daughter, Linda Barrett, says her father’s enthusiasm towards the game was reflected in his scores.

“Dad was a lovely golfer,” Barrett tells The Independent. “He loved it and he was good at it. He was a club champion at Bally Haly.

He could play in the 70s on a good day.”

Winter was not only an avid golf player, but also a big fan of the sport, says his daughter. She remembers sitting with her father watching golf tournaments on television, and recalls Winter raving about the play of the world’s top golfers. In the years prior to his death in 2003, Winter was particularly taken back by the play of the game’s next big thing.

“When Tiger (Woods) came on the scene, Dad was absolutely fascinated with how good he was at such a young age,” Barrett says.

Given his busy political life, Winter often had to find time to enjoy extracurricular activities.

Clearly golf was one such aspect of his life he took pride in away from the office, but it wasn’t the only thing Winter took pleasure in.

“He loved salmon fishing,” says Barrett. “He did a lot of salmon fishing out in the Codroy Valley on the Little Codroy River.

“Sometimes it was a family vacation (with his

wife Millicent, and daughters Linda and Valda Tiller, who passed away in 2001). He also had friends he fished with. They’d go off on fishing trips, sometimes to Bay du Nord (wilderness area).”

Even while on a fishing trip or on a golf course, politics were never too far from Winter’s thoughts.

He loved to discuss the latest happenings in provincial, national and international affairs.

“Dad and I were always talking about politics,” says Barrett. “Dad always had a very keen interest in politics, right up until he died. He’d be glued to it now watching what’s going on in politics, with the election coming.

“He was very interested in England’s government too. Dad was brought up in a Scottish boarding school, so he was very interested in things British and events on the other side. But he would have been fascinated with today’s American politics.”

Winter’s reputation in politics was well earned. He has been credited with playing a vital role in Newfoundland’s union with Canada and was one of six signatories to the final Terms of Union.

When Newfoundland became Canada’s 10th province in 1949, Premier Joey Smallwood appointed Winter the province’s first Finance minister.

From 1968 to 1974, Winter was chairman of Memorial University’s Board of Regents. He was the province’s lieutenant-governor from 19741981.

Winter was also quite active in two of the biggest inquiries in the province’s history, serving as co-chair of the royal commission into the sinking of the Ocean Ranger and as chair of the Roman Catholic church-appointed commission of inquiry into allegations of sexual abuse by clergy.

Winter was also appointed an Officer of the Order of Canada. darcy.macrae@theindependent.ca

Meals on Wheels thrives on volunteers; more needed

By Darcy MacRae The Independent

C

hristmas is often called the season of giving, and Barbara Lawlor hopes more people decide to give their time to the Victorian Order of Nurses’ Meals on Wheels program this holiday season.

“We’re always in need of volunteers, because a lot of our volunteers are becoming older seniors themselves,” Lawlor tells The Independent. “It’s hard to get volunteers at any time, but the volunteers I have now … you couldn’t ask for any better.”

Lawlor is co-ordinator of the east end St. John’s office of Meals on Wheels, a program that serves 140 clients a hot dinner at lunch time, with some recipients receiving up to five meals a week.

Clients are primarily senior citizens and range in age from 57 to 95, says Lawlor. However, she adds meals are available to younger people unable to cook for themselves, including the convalescent, the physically challenged and new mothers.

“It’s open to anyone who is in need of this service,” Lawlor says.

Currently, more than 100 volunteer drivers deliver the meals, which consist of soup, a dinner roll, main entrée (consisting of mashed potato, vegetable of the day and meat — either chicken, turkey, ham or beef) and desert. Some drivers take to the road daily, while others offer their services once a month.

But with many of the volunteers getting up in age, new blood is needed to help keep Meals on Wheels going.

“The service depends on volunteers,” Lawlor says. “We’re a non-profit, charitable organization.

How could we continue on without volunteers?”

Lawlor adds that for those who are debating whether to come on board, they should consider that volunteering their efforts wouldn’t take much time.

“The delivery service to these households … you’re looking at the most an hour and a half — an hour usually,” she says. “It’s just coming here, picking up the meals, and delivering to the homes of the seniors.”

Lawlor says Meals on Wheels not only provides a hot lunch to seniors in the St. John’s area, it also gives elderly people some much appreciated time to sit and have a quick chat with a familiar face.

“They (the seniors) thoroughly enjoy that service because it gives them a few minutes of social contact,” she says, “which for some of them, is all the social contact they have in a day.”

Although the holidays are considered a joyous time for most, Lawlor says they can be quite lonely for some senior citizens, especially those whose spouses have passed away and children live away.

Having a smiling face greet them with a nice lunch may help the situation.

“Christmas is a happy time, but when you’re all alone … it can be quite lonely,” Lawlor says.

“Having a visitor every day can make things a lot better.”

Recipients of Meals on Wheels pay $6 per meal, with the proceeds going toward funding the program. Lawlor says the clients feel the price is more than reasonable.

“It’s an excellent price when you look at the price of food at a restaurant,” she says.

The Meals on Wheels dinners are prepared at two locations in St. John’s — the Holyes Home, serving the east end, and at the Agnes Pratt Home in the west end. darcy.macrae@theindependent.ca

INDEPENDENTWORLD

SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, DECEMBER 4-10, 2005 — PAGE 11

Conservative leader Stephen Harper.

By Linwood Barclay Torstar wire service

T

oday, we bring you some more exciting episodes of Stephen Harper: The Early Years.

It seemed like every time the neighbours looked over at the Harper house, there was young Stephen, now in his late teens, washing his orange Pacer.

It was the boy’s first car, and he sure did keep it clean. Almost any time you looked over there, he was washing that car, waxing it, vacuuming out the inside. You had to keep the interior tidy because the Pacer had so much glass — it was like a fishbowl — everyone could look inside. It was the shiniest Pacer anywhere, that was for sure.

One day, the man from next door happened to walk by as Stephen was using a toothbrush to clean out the little grooves in the hubcaps, and the man said, “I must say, Stephen, you sure do love that car.”

Stephen, expressionless, looked at the man, and said, “I certainly believe the invention of the automobile has changed the way we live, that using fossil fuels to power a gas combustible engine is a great stride forward in the industrial revolution, and having access to such a vehicle contributes to my sense of independence.”

“Anyway,” said the man, “I’ll see ya.”

Stephen Harper often hung out at his friend Billy’s house. Stephen would make Billy play “think tank,” where the two of them would sit in a refrigerator carton and conduct research into things like how candy

REUTERS/Chris Wattie

Love means never having to say you’re Stephen was actually good for you. Billy often bailed when it came to making graphs and pie charts.

Billy’s mom was a great cook, and she would bake cookies and cakes through the day, filling the house with wonderful smells.

If Stephen happened to be around as the dinner hour approached, Billy’s mom might extend an invitation for him to stay.

One day, Billy’s mom was beaming as

Stephen chowed down on some of her meatloaf and mashed potatoes, and she said, “You sure do love my cooking, don’t you Stevie?” It was so obvious, she hardly needed to ask.

Stephen replied, “I find that it does meet my nutritional needs, that its combination of spices and other ingredients makes it very palatable, and that you play a major role as the homemaker in this household and that we should all recognize your efforts in this

regard.”

It was the last time young Stephen was invited to stay for dinner.

When he was even younger, Stephen was a Star Trek fan. He always watched the adventures of Kirk, Spock and McCoy. He would save up money from his paper route, and when he had enough, he’d go to the store and buy Star Trek toys. He had a model of the Enterprise, a Klingon ship, a phaser and a communicator. He also had a complete collection of Star Trek action figures.

He spent hours up in his room with those figures, which he played with even more than his collection of Diefenbaker cabinet member action figures.

“Shields up!” he’d say, shaking the Kirk figure in his left hand.

“Captain, they’re not responding,” he’d say, shaking the Spock figure in his right hand.

One day, his mother poked her head in and said, “You sure do love those Star Trek figures!”

And Stephen said, “I would have to concede that these plastic representations of fictitious television characters are excellent at meeting my play needs, that they stimulate my imagination, and that assuming the roles of various characters allows me to act out favourite episodes, all of which is very healthy for a young boy’s development.”

“OK,” said his mother.

Stephen gazed down at the Spock figure in his right hand. Spock, the Vulcan without any emotions.

How Stephen loved him.

Grit policies a straight jacket on health care

A

nd so it goes we’ll have an election forced by a non-confidence vote, although our political leaders are still ventilating hypocritical fears about the horror of an election called during the Christmas season. This, despite the Liberal-NDP precedent just 26 years ago in December 1979, when the Clark government was defeated by the Liberals and NDP on Dec.13, causing an election to be held Feb. 18, 1980.

It’s apparent there is no true change in the attitude of or arrogance of the Martin Liberal government. In spite of the evidence produced before and conclusions reached in Volume 1 of the Gomery commission report about the sponsorship scandals. The reaction

JOHN CROSBIE

The old curmudgeon of Paul Martin following publication revealed him to be unchanged and unrepentant but still venting crocodile tears. Martin, at a closed-door caucus meeting, rather than urging Liberals to become humble, urged them to appear humble, all as part of preparations to mislead the electorate again.

The Liberal Party of Canada is now in its 12th year of government. Having had power for 55 of the 70 years since 1935 has led the prime minister and

the Liberal leadership to consider they are entitled to be there forever and to do whatever they wish.

Have Martin or his members exhibited the slightest degree of humbleness or respect for the country and Canadians in concocting a mini-budget as the election approaches, one in which they promise many billions of dollars to be spent in tax reductions and improved programs and services?

Not when the billions will be used out of surpluses not yet earned and perhaps never earned by the government.

If there is any scary political leader, it’s the one who concocts a mini-budget proclaiming huge and serendipitous surpluses for the indefinite future which may never occur, with tax

reductions and new programs and services which may never happen, and who promotes two-tier fear campaigns to prevent reasonable debate about the present lamentable state of the Canadian health system.

The health system with its long waiting lists and the need for the provinces, constitutionally responsible for health matters, to control burgeoning health care costs is our most serious problem.

In the recent Supreme Court of Canada Chaoulli decision a majority of four judges concluded that the ban on private health insurance in Quebec was contrary to Section 1 of the Quebec Charter of Rights. Thus the ban is invalid in Quebec. The Quebec

See “Forced,” page 12

Simply fill out this form and mail to Walter Andrews, 5 Dartmouth Place St. John’s, NL, A1B 2W1

Ê

Looking for the perfect gift from home to send away?

government has to deal with the Chaoulli judgment and must deal with the place of private health care in the public system now. This election will give Canadians the opportunity to replace the federal Liberal government so that provinces such as Quebec will have an opportunity to devise creative solutions to our urgent health care problems.

Quebec Health Minister Philippe Couillard has reaffirmed the commitment of the Jean Charest government to comply with the ruling, stating there is a place for private health care in the public system. The Quebec government will table a white paper soon

Name: ________________________________________ Street Address: _________________________________ City/Town: _____________________________________ Area Code: _____________ Phone: ________________

Authored by Walter Andrews and Illustrated by Boyd Chubbs • Where Once They Stood is a unique Newfoundland & Labrador chronology presented as a beautiful poster.

• An accumulation and cataloguing of our history and cultural development, the material is presented in a continuum of time from the ice age to the Twentieth Century, supplemented by sidebars of interesting information and statistics.

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DECEMBER 4, 2005

12 • INDEPENDENTWORLD

Union officials confront Martin

PM vows he’ll examine help for laid-off workers; country lacks industry strategy, Conservative says OTTAWA

By Les Whittington Torstar wire service

P

rime Minister Paul Martin, who has been trumpeting Canada’s economic good times, got an earful in Cornwall, Ont. from union representatives about the 900 jobs that have disappeared with the closing of the Domtar paper mill.

“We presented the absolute devastation for the City of Cornwall from the loss of Domtar,” says Bob Huget, who along with two other union officials elbowed his way into a planned consultation between the Liberal leader and local authorities about the plant shutdown.

Martin scheduled the private meeting when his election campaign pulled into the eastern Ontario city a day after Domtar announced it was eliminating an industrial operation that has been an anchor of the local economy for decades.

Laid-off employees are angry that the federal and provincial governments didn’t step in a long time ago to try to prevent the plant closing, says Huget, an administrative vice-president of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada.

“What happened in Cornwall was a tragedy — it didn’t need to happen at all,” Huget says in an interview. “This industry is in crisis and needs government intervention.”

Martin, 67, listened sympathetically and prom-

ised to consider ways to help laid-off local workers and bolster the pulp and paper industry, Huget says. Among the options discussed was enlisting the federal and Ontario governments to provide financial and other assistance to reactivate the unused Domtar facility under different ownership to produce specialty paper products, he says.

In a public event later at a local high school, Martin tried to offer hope to the hard-hit community, saying that Canada’s social and economic support programs are intended to be of assistance when employees suffer a blow like the one felt here.

“You’re going to hear a lot of talk over the course of the next couple of months about just how strong the Canadian economy is,” he told hundreds of students. “And yet, we just heard ... here that one of the major employers is shutting down.”

But “even in good times, there are parts of the country — or there are industries — that have trouble.” Martin said being a Canadian is never more important “than when one part of the country is hurting while others are doing well.

“The fact is that the country is reaching out to you. The country is saying that Cornwall and, in fact, the whole region does not stand alone.”

He says Ottawa has earmarked $1.5 billion to help the forestry industry, plus millions more to help retrain laid-off workers. Martin also expressed interest in a local plan to bring in tourist

Paul Martin

Rhonda Hayward/The Independent

dollars by reopening an old canal that runs through Cornwall. “That is an immense tourist opportunity,” he told the students.

Conservative campaign co-chair John Reynolds, who was in Cornwall, says the Liberal government has been lax in developing an international competitive strategy to keep Canadian

industry healthy.

Reynolds also says a better tax structure is needed to help companies compete globally.

“Right now, they’re being taxed to death,” says Reynolds, who was campaigning with Gary Lauzon, the Tory incumbent in the riding of Stormont-Dundas-South Glengarry.

Later, after a question-and-answer session with students, Martin said he was impressed that they weren’t fixated on the Domtar shutdown, and that they also asked about such issues as foreign development assistance and fighting the global AIDS epidemic.

With a touch of emotion, Martin says the questions showed the depth of social conscience in Canada.

Despite Cornwall’s problems, “you talked about what you can do for other people,” he said.

Cornwall Mayor Phil Poirier, who met privately with Martin, says it might have helped if the federal and provincial governments had provided the kind of support here that they did for the automotive industry in other parts of Ontario. But he says the mill closed due to a variety of cost and trade issues.

Poirier says he was encouraged by Martin’s commitment to help Cornwall with federal support. Asked why, he says the Liberal leader had kept his promise to assist Canada’s cities with gas tax money. “I’m convinced that, when he said that he’s going to help us, he will help us.”

Liberals lead in Atlantic Canada Harper continues to be a liability to Tories in region: pollster

By Carl Davies Telegraph-Journal

A

new poll indicates that Stephen Harper continues to hang like a millstone around the neck of the Conservative Party in Atlantic Canada.

The poll from Corporate Research Associates released last week shows the Liberals enjoy a wide lead over the Conservatives in the region, 46 to 27 per cent, almost identical to the numbers in a pre-election poll in May, 2004.

Support for the New Democrats is also about the same, at 18 per cent.

The number of undecided voters sat at 16 per cent, down from 22 per cent in 2004.

Prime Minister Paul Martin has increased his approval rating over that period to 41 from 39 per cent, while Harper remains stuck at 19 per cent. The NDP’s Jack Layton has gained some, from 13 per cent in 2004 to 17 per cent, while 11 per cent opted for none of the above as their choice for prime minister. Another 12 per cent were undecided on the leader question.

The same survey shows that Liberal support has decreased in New Brunswick but only slightly. Forty-five per cent of those surveyed in the province say they would vote Liberal, compared to 48 per cent in 2004.

The Conservatives jumped from 27 per cent to 30 per cent support, while the New Democrats went from 13 per cent in the 2004 survey to 16 per cent in this poll.

The numbers from the 2004 poll closely reflected the final results from that election that saw the Liberals taking 45 per cent of the vote, the Conservatives 31 per cent, and the NDP 20 per cent. That translated into seven Liberal, two Conservative, and one NDP seat in New Brunswick. Don Mills, president and CEO of CRA, says he expects not a lot of change in Atlantic Canada between now and voting day.

“It’s very hard to get people to switch,” Mills says.

In spite of the scandal exposed by the Gomery Inquiry, the Liberal government continues to enjoy a high approval rating in the region with 47 per cent of people either completely or mostly satisfied with the Martin Liberals, up from 41 per cent in 2004.

At the same time, 45 per cent of people are either mostly or completely dissatisfied with the Liberal government.

In New Brunswick, more people are dissatisfied (48 per cent) with the Liberals than satisfied (43 per cent).

The poll predicts that while the Liberals will gain three seats in Atlantic Canada, the numbers will be exactly the same in New Brunswick.

“There’s not much change at all,” Mr. Mills says.

He also doesn’t believe there is much the Conservatives can do over the coming weeks to change that.

“That’s what the outcome is going to show.”

More than 1,504 Atlantic Canadians were surveyed from Nov. 15 to 30.

The results are accurate within plus or minus 2.5 percentage points 95 times out of 100.

Forced into debate From page 11 providing for a full public debate on these issues.

The minister has said the risks are well known to giving unregulated and unlimited access to private care, which no one suggests, and that their task will be to take these factors into consideration and act to avoid those risks. A very sensible position.

The federal Liberal government has not put forward any workable alternatives to deal with the present health crisis.

Our health care system is ranked 30th in the world by the World Health Organization (WHO).

No other nation in the world is attempting to copy the Canadian health care system of which the Liberal and NDP parties are so proud.

The U.S. has a largely private system ranked just 37th in the world but no one suggests that we should fix our system by copying one worse than our own. It is in Europe and Australia, where they have a blend of public and private health care, that the health systems work far more effectively than ours.

The Liberal two-tier fear propagandists must now be forced into a factual and reasoned debate about health system policy.

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENTWORLD • 13

VOICE FROM AWAY

REUTERS photo/Andy Clark

Keeping it fun

By Stephanie Porter The Independent

W

hile some Newfoundland clubs across Canada are struggling to retain members — in Ottawa, for example — the Newfoundland and Labrador Heritage Society in British Columbia is going strong.

The paid membership is holding steady, with a grand total of 76 this year.

There are about four annual membership meetings, and at least that many social events. Their mandate is two-fold, says current president Blanche Houston — to have fun and to raise money for charity and a scholarship fund.

Houston, from Harbour Breton, moved to Toronto at age 20.

“I would say I wanted to move and experience life in a big city so myself and my friend went to Toronto,” she says.

“From there I went to England, from England back to Toronto, and from there on to B.C.”

That was 1979. Houston had moved West with her first husband, who was working in the area. She still has family in Newfoundland and Labrador, in Baie Verte and Corner Brook, and returns to visit regularly.

Now married to a “B.C. boy,” Houston says they may yet move back East. “He loves it out there, loves the coast,” she says. “And for myself, it’s the ocean that attracts me — on either side of the country.”

Meantime, Houston enjoys getting together with others from home, to keep the connection strong. The society was created, she says, by a group of friends in the early 1990s. They wrote — and still abide by — a detailed constitution, and have since been approved by the B.C. government as a registered non-profit organization.

Houston’s introduction to the society came in 1998, when she accompanied one of her friends to a picnic. She was delighted to run into another ex-pat from Harbour Breton there, and within a year

Society for Newfoundlanders and Labradorians in British Columbia raises money for scholarships and food banks — and has ton of fun

was a member of the group’s executive.

It was about that time the organization started the Ed Norman Memorial Scholarship — named for a late member of the organization. The annual $500 scholarship is given to a student from Newfoundland and Labrador designated by the College of the North Atlantic.

This year for the first time, two scholarships were awarded.

“The scholarship fund is a separate entity of the society,” Houston says. “We have membership fees, do fundraisers, we have social events and any money that comes into our society is used to do other events and if we have a lump sum we then donate to the scholarship fund.

“That’s why we were able to give two this time.”

Every year, they also donate $250 to a food bank in Newfoundland, and $250 to one in Surrey (a suburb of Vancouver).

They have also donated to the cancer society in the name of a society member, and set up trust funds for specific people.

“We do something every year,”

Houston says, “but it’s always related to someone from Newfoundland.”

It’s not all about raising money, of course. Houston lists of a series of social events: backyard picnics and barbeques, pub nights, darts, cards, cribbage, music, lobster dinners and the ever popular annual Christmas social — with a Newfoundland band.

“Some of our members have left Newfoundland a long time ago and they’re reconnecting with people,” she says. “You want to connect with roots and … it’s getting Newfoundlanders in and socializing, having common traditions or feelings of home that we enjoy.”

Spouses and other non-Newfoundlanders are invited too, of course — according to the constitution, the society can include up to 25 per cent nonNewfoundland membership. But nonEast Coasters can’t vote or be members of the executive.

Houston admits the membership fluctuates — sometimes long-time members move back home, sometimes people drift

away if there are too many meetings.

“It depends if there’s fun activities or not,” she says. “Some years we have a meeting every month and we don’t get a lot of people out then … since I’ve been on the executive, I’ve really tried to get more social events, so the membership is going well.”

Over the years, Houston says she’s met some people from Newfoundland and Labrador who have lost touch with their home.

“When people move away from the province, it’s usually to do with work, and sometimes they forget what’s going on back there,” she says. “It’s not a priority for them. Maybe some of them are not aware as much; it’s a choice to maybe do a new life and not be so interested.

“We’re here so that doesn’t happen.”

For more, visit www.nfldsocietybc.com Do you know a Newfoundlander or Labradoian living away? Please e-mail editorial@theindependent.ca.

Guidelines on morning-after pill raise concerns from women’s health groups

By Elaine Carey Torstar wire service

C

anadian pharmacists are being advised to collect a woman’s name, address, phone number and sensitive details about her sexual activity before dispensing the so-called morning-after pill.

The guidelines, put out by the Canadian Pharmacists Association, have drawn concern from women’s health groups, which say the rules are discriminatory and raise privacy issues.

Anne Rochon Ford, coordinator of Women and Health Protection, a coalition of groups concerned about drug safety and funded by Health Canada, says she’s not aware of any other behindthe-counter drug where pharmacists are asked to gather data before dispensing it, which “makes (the drug) look suspect and very loaded.”

But Janet Cooper, senior director of professional affairs for the pharmacists’ association, says the information is necessary to determine whether the pill will be used appropriately and effectively, since it doesn’t work if taken more than three days after intercourse.

She says the information is to be kept in the pharmacy’s computer “so that if she came in a month later for another one, that would mean she probably needs to be advised to get better contraception.”

“We’ve been concerned about this since day one,” says Abby Lippman, chair of the Canadian Women’s Health Council and an epidemiologist at McGill University. “I think it’s an invasion of privacy — why should women have to go through this?”

Pharmacists are also charging a “counselling fee” of about $20 on top of $20 for the pill, putting it out of reach for

many women, she says. The fee is government-paid only in Quebec, Saskatchewan and British Columbia.

Health Canada moved the emergency contraceptive Levonorgestrel, or Plan B, from being a prescription to a behindthe-counter drug in April, making it available to women of any age. A woman is required to ask the pharmacist for it so she can be counselled about its use.

The pharmacists’ association immediately posted guidelines on its website.

They include giving women a screening form to fill out that asks for personal identification, the time when they last had unprotected sex, the number of times they have had unprotected sex since their last menstrual period, and what form of birth control they use. The information should be stored in the pharmacy’s computer, the guidelines state.

“These are highly personal, interrogative questions, and it’s disturbing,” Ford

says. Women taking this pill are already under stress, and “the last thing they need is this kind of interrogation.

“We are a bit stumped why they have gone to this degree,” she says. “This is just so over the top, unnecessary and unproductive.”

Most pharmacies don’t have a private place to counsel women, so it must be done in public.

It should be up to the woman to ask for advice about taking it, Ford says.

The working group and the Canadian Women’s Health Network are advocating that the drug be taken off the drug schedule completely so it could be made available at grocery and variety stores. That has the support of the Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and other groups, Ford says.

Cooper says the guidelines aren’t mandatory but “this is considered best practice. As an association, we can give

guidelines but we can’t dictate. If a woman actually did not want to provide this information, a lot of pharmacists are going to use their best judgment.

“If a woman was really uncomfortable, the first thing I would do was tell her that there is a code of privacy and the pharmacist has to keep it absolutely private,” Cooper says, adding the goal is to make the drug available without a prescription but at the same time allow women to get advice from pharmacists.

While pharmacists have a privacy code, “nothing is private anymore” when information goes into a computer, says the health council’s Lippman. “It’s not a drug people are going to be abusing; it’s not regularly used and it’s not harmful if it’s taken too late and she’s already pregnant. The side effects are nausea and vomiting — nobody would want to take it regularly. There’s just no reason for this.”

Aliant delivers over $50,000 worth of school supplies to children in need Over the past two months, Aliant Pioneer Volunteers have been busy delivering over $50,000 worth of backpacks and school supplies to children in need.

The donation comes from our customers and employees who generously donated supplies; as well as a $10 contribution by Aliant from the sale of every PC purchase plan sold in August and September.

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www.aliant.net

DECEMBER 4, 2005

14 • INDEPENDENTWORLD

Tax pledge good politics, bad policy

By Chantal Hebert Torstar wire service

S

tephen Harper obviously feels that chipping away at the most hated piece of the Mulroney legacy will do more for the Conservative party in this election than tearing the Liberal record to shreds.

The two-point cut to the GST he promised last week is the biggest item in the Conservative election platform.

It was rushed on to the scene at the very start of Harper’s first campaign foray on the crucial battleground of Ontario, packaged very much as a Christmas infomercial rather than as the pronouncement of a leader who

trained as an economist.

Voters for instance will have to wait to find out exactly where the GST cut fits in the larger Conservative picture and what trade-offs it would involve.

On that score, the so-called backgrounder handed out by the party last week gave sketchiness a new meaning.

But that also means there was very little for the other parties to use to move the focus away from Harper’s core announcement.

In any event, Harper’s GST promise will ultimately stand or fall not on its policy merits but on its populist appeal.

There is little that the Conservative leader could say to outweigh the impressive body of economic analysis

that finds little or no policy value to a cut in the GST. But he is betting that voters will look past the talking heads to embrace a popular reduction in the tax they most love to hate.

Once a Tory nemesis, the sheer visibility of the GST is the Conservatives’ biggest asset in their quest to score popularity points by cutting it.

Harper is also betting that the Liberals, whose own credibility on the GST is questionable, will not be overly keen to poke at his biggest promise.

To do so would be to court the boomerang effect of reminding voters of their own controversial retreat from the GST front a decade ago.

For now, the promise has allowed

Harper to seize the initiative in the campaign.

The other two national party leaders spent last week dancing to the tune of the Conservative GST announcement.

In fact, for better but also for worse, Harper has largely set the agenda of the first week of the campaign.

For worse because many Tories groaned in despair at the sight of his headline-grabbing first-day foray into the same-sex marriage minefield.

Arguably it was an early bonus to the Liberals, a reminder straight from the horse’s mouth of the social conservative credentials that have curtailed the party’s growth in central Canada.

But if Harper had not taken the same-

sex bull by the horns, his opponents would have red-flagged the issue sooner rather than later and he then would have looked like he was running away from his record.

As it happens, the Conservatives have taken the strategic decision to run on their agenda rather than on the Liberal record and it does include revisiting same-sex marriage.

By the same token, they seem to have found a rather radical remedy to the foot-in-mouth disease that cost the party so many campaign days in the last election.

This week the Conservatives put a virtual one-man show on the road.

On Wednesday, Harper treated his Quebec City candidates as mere props for a policy announcement, not even bothering to introduce them by name.

At a time when many doubt his capacity to elect a single MP in Quebec he forewent a rare opportunity to showcase one or two who could have a fighting chance of winning a seat on Jan. 23.

Deputy leader Peter MacKay — who ironically is more versed in justice matters than his leader, be it only because of his past as a crown attorney — was clearly out of the loop on the promise to appoint a special federal prosecutor to oversee future investigations into allegations of federal wrongdoing.

On Nov. 30, leader and deputy leader offered contrary interpretations of the promise.

Then on Dec. 1 in Mississauga, the GST cut was unveiled with the local Conservative candidate in attendance but in the absence of the finance heavyweights of the Tory caucus.

In the last election the Conservatives had trouble singing from the same hymnbook. This year, it is Harper’s determination to sing solo that may cause false notes to surface.

Black ice detectors pave way for drivers

By Mike Funston Torstar wire service

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ed alert .... an early warning system for potentially dangerous driving conditions such as black ice is being tested on some Greater Toronto roads this winter.

Hockey-puck sized sensors that turn red at 0 C are being implanted in some roads as part of a pilot project aimed at saving money as well as improving safety.

Toronto, Peel Region and Whitby are involved in the project locally, along with Windsor, Niagara and Waterloo regions, Wellington and Norfolk counties, Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg, and the B.C. Interior Roads and Saskatchewan Highways departments.

“Statistics have shown that during the winter, road travel risks increase about 15 times,” says Louis Zidar, Peel’s project manager.

The sensors will alert works crews of freezing temperatures on the roads and the need for salt, says Zidar.

He noted that pavement and air temperatures may differ greatly at times, especially in late fall, early winter and spring.

Bridges are especially susceptible to such variations.

If the system is adopted for widespread use, the markers could also serve as an early warning system for drivers, he said.

In addition, the environment will benefit from reduced salt use.

The sensors contain a grey dye that starts to change colour when the temperature drops to 3 C and becomes bright red at 0 C. Clusters of them will be spaced out based on the speed limit.

Asked if the devices will be ripped up by snow plows, Zidar says: “We’re going to find out,” but noted that shouldn’t happen because they are embedded flat with the road surface.

Installation involves drilling only a shallow hole for the half-inch thick pucks and gluing them in place.

The sensors being tested cost about $10 to $20 each and are made of a durable plastic. The manufacturer, Traction Technologies of Kamloops, B.C., has supplied them at no charge for the pilot project.

The devices, which have a two-to three-year lifespan, are inexpensive compared to high-tech sensors in the $5,000 range and portable infra-red thermometers at $700-$1,500 each, Zidar says.

The pucks also can be calibrated to change colour at different temperatures.

When the thermometer hits —9 C straight salt brine is no longer effective, for instance, so road crews would know when to switch to a chemically spiked version.

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENTWORLD • 15

Death of a salesman

‘Passion of the prophets’

By Michelle Shephard and Debra Black Torstar wire service

T

here are some who experience an epiphany, a moment when their convictions become clear and their passion defined.

Then there are those like Toronto peace activist James Loney, who seemed to be born with a unique drive and an ingrained sense of knowing right from wrong.

His mother Claudette fondly remembers him as a quiet toddler who decided to walk earlier than most infants. “It was almost like he thought, I’ve got to get going here,” she recalls in an interview from her home in Sault Ste. Marie.

By the time he was in Grade 9, Loney’s father Patrick began noticing his eldest son’s need to help those less fortunate. He remembered last week that cold winter afternoon when Loney gave his bike away to someone who needed it, then walked the five kilometres home.

When he was attending university in Windsor, it was the new winter jacket that was conspicuously missing during a visit home for the holidays.

“I asked him about the new jacket

we gave him because he came home wearing that old one.

“He just said, ‘well, you know I had to give it to somebody,’” recalls his mother Claudette. Chuckling, she added: “It was really hard to know what to give him for Christmas because you know he’s not going to use it for himself, it’s going to go somewhere else.”

Since Loney and three other humanitarian workers were kidnapped near Umm al-Qura mosque in western Baghdad on Nov. 26, stories about the 41-year-old peace activist have overwhelmed his family.

Testimonies from former friends and neighbours fill a local newspaper website. He was modest, his sister Kathleen says, so the family was only now learning about much of the work he did.

Loney was in Iraq for his third trip with the Christian Peacemaker Teams, a 20-year-old organization opposed to violence and dedicated to spreading peace. He was ambushed alongside another Canadian citizen, 32-year-old Harmeet Singh Sooden, American Tom Fox, 54, and Briton Norman Kember, 74.

Sooden obtained his Canadian citizenship when he lived in Montreal as a

student, then moved to New Zealand in 2003. His sister pleaded for his release last week, telling reporters in New Zealand that she would travel to Iraq herself if she thought it would help.

The four peace activists were seized in the same area where Italian journalist Giuliana Sgrena was abducted last February. Sgrena was released after a month in captivity and handed over to three Italian security agents.

As they drove her to the Baghdad airport they came under fire by U.S. soldiers, who said they mistook them for insurgents. Nicola Calipari, an Italian intelligence agent, was killed and Sgrena injured.

Few journalists or aid workers in Baghdad now venture outside the fortified area known as the Green Zone.

“It’s a balancing act for humanitarian organizations to make. The basic issue is there’s an awful lot of work for us to do in Iraq. There’s a lot of assistance that NGOs need to provide in Iraq and it’s really difficult for us not to do that,” says Human Rights Watch’s Mark Garlasco, a senior military analyst who was in Iraq in 2003.

So what drives people to work in such dangerous situations?

Ted Schmidt, editor of the Catholic

New Times, where Loney was a columnist for the past eight years, believes Loney had Dorothy Day as a spiritual mentor.

Day, along with Peter Maurin, started the U.S. Catholic Worker movement in 1933. She and Maurin set up a house of hospitality for the poor in the Bowery on New York’s east side. She lived and ate along side the poor, as did other workers.

The movement believes in “the Godgiven dignity of every human person,” according to its website. There are 185 Catholic Worker communities worldwide that are all committed to non-violence, voluntary poverty, prayer and hospitality for the homeless. Loney cofounded one of them, Zacchaeus House in Toronto.

The message behind Day’s movement is one of absolute pacifism and personal responsibility for helping the poor.

“Jim is right out of that Catholic Worker vision,” says Schmidt. “These people model Jesus better than anyone.

They walk the walk.”

Loney took that message to heart, living and working with the poor and working for social justice, Schmidt says. He “burns with the passion of the prophets.”

A

North York car salesman was shot to death by one of two men who burst into a dealership looking to settle a score with another employee last week.

The 7:20 p.m. shooting was Toronto’s 50th gun slaying of the year and 74th homicide.

Richard Avanes, a mechanic who works at Genniva Motors on Steeles Ave. W. at Signet Dr. says the victim — one of two brothers who work as salesmen in their uncle’s business — was a friendly man who never had trouble.

“It’s like they say — bad things happen to good people,” Avanes adds.

“Two persons came into the dealership making an inquiry as to a person.

It was indicated that the person wasn’t here,” says Insp. Tom Fitzgerald. He says the two argued with staff and the dispute “spilled into the parking lot.”

One gunshot was fired, striking the mid-20s salesman in the chest. He was pronounced dead at Sunnybrook hospital. The suspects got into a black compact car, believed to be a Pontiac Sunfire and sped away from the dealership.

— Torstar wire service

DECEMBER 4, 2005

16 • INDEPENDENTWORLD

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SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, DECEMBER 4-10, 2005 — PAGE 17

Rhonda Hayward/The Independent

Chef Bill Scott of Restaurant 21 in St. John’s.

Ready, set, cook

New TV show pits chefs across Canada against each other in a competition to determine the next great one

By Pam Pardy Ghent For The Independent

B

ill Scott has been involved in culinary competitions in the past, but this is the first time the 24-year-old chef has had to wear makeup in the kitchen.

“I’m not sure if the lights and makeup took away from what I was doing or added to it,” he says of his performance on The Next Great Chef, an 11-part reality TV series that was to air on Global starting Dec. 2, “but doing it for the cameras was a different animal than restaurant cooking.”

Scott, who works at Restaurant 21 in downtown St. John’s, was one of two chefs from the province to compete in the competition, which documents a cooking challenge involving 20 chefs across Canada under the age of 26.

Each week two chefs represent-

ing their home province compete to win over the judges, and of course the hearts and tummies of the television audience in the Junior Culinary Challenge, an annual competition hosted by the Canadian Culinary Federation. In this province, Scott competed against Robert Piercey, 23, a chef at the St. Jude Hotel in Clarenville. The competition took place at the College of the North Atlantic in St. John’s.

Of course, it’s a secret who won and moved on to cook off in the nationals in Vancouver. The Newfoundland cook-off is scheduled to air Dec. 16.

The competition involves each chef preparing, within a set timeframe, an appetizer, entrée and dessert.

“I still did my thing,” Piercey says of the competition. “The only difference was they were filming me.” He says he had so much going on in his

head during the competition that he forgot about everything else going on around him, although he’s a little nervous now.

“I haven’t seen the finished product and it’s something I’m stressing over,” he admits, adding he can’t remember a lot of what was said while the cameras rolled. His parents, who were also interviewed, are also wondering how they’ll be portrayed.

“The whole nation can pick apart what you do in the kitchen,” Piercey says with a laugh. “It can help or hinder your career.”

Not that Piercey, who hails from Hopeall, Trinity Bay, wants to wander far from home; he plans to stay right here in the province.

“I grew up in a town with 200 people, so Clarenville is just my size.”

The Next Great Chef is described as an intensely competitive series

that showcases the skills of two chefs per province each episode.

The series is made up of 10 halfhour provincial competitions and a one-hour finale.

The show features a judging panel made up from some of Canada’s most accomplished chefs. The judging is done blindly and promises to provide viewers with “an insightful glace into the world of culinary competition.” Not only are the chef’s abilities in the kitchen scrutinized, but they are also judged on taste and presentation. The Next Great Chef is not just a show about cooking, but a program about dreams, success and, of course, failure.

“This was a different experience,” says Scott, “but not in a bad way. To see how television chefs do it, to take a live role like that was great.”

But being TV stars won’t change these home grown chefs. “The fact

that I was on TV doesn’t change who I am,” Piercey says. “I just want to earn a living.”

Piercey’s brother Brian, also a chef, his boss and his roommate, won’t let success go to his brother’s head. “I always knew I wanted to be a chef and he just decided and followed me after my first year,” Brian says of his little brother whose culinary experiences — prior to becoming a chef — amounted to burnt toast.

And what if the crown of The Next Great Chef goes to his younger brother? “My soups are still better,” Brian jokes.

Whether he’s preparing local suckling pig or lamb bourguignonne for customers at Restaurant 21 or Kraft Dinner and grill cheese sandwiches for his daughter Hannah, Scott just enjoys his time in the kitchen. To his five-year-old, he is already a great chef.

LIVYER

‘Something to have pride in’ David Brazil left Bell Island 25 years ago, but remains loyal to his boyhood home

By Darcy MacRae The Independent

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David Brazil

Rhonda Hayward/The Independent

e may have moved from his childhood home a quarter of a century ago, but a piece of David Brazil’s heart has always remained on Bell Island. The 42-yearold volunteers with several economic and social development projects on Bell Island each year, but he’s best known as head coach of the island’s entry in the St. John’s Junior Hockey League.

Together with Scott Kent, Pat Rose and Gary Lawrence, Brazil was a founding member of the Bell Island Junior Blues hockey team in 1995. He has been the club’s head coach from

day one, leading them to two league titles and a pair of Veitch Trophies as provincial junior champions.

Along the way he has also coached more games than any coach in the league’s 26-year history (he’s closing in on his 300th game behind the bench), a fact not lost on the easygoing Brazil.

“It’s a little bit of an ego boost,” Brazil says with a chuckle.

Brazil lives in St. John’s with his wife Alice and daughters Jillian, 14, and Kelsey, 10, but makes the trip to Bell Island for each of the Blues’ home games.

Considering it’s a 20-minute ferry ride each way, and the games can often take up to three hours, it can make for

a long evening. Over the years friends and family have asked Brazil why he doesn’t coach a team closer to his current home, but he says giving the residents of Bell Island a team to call their own keeps him going back to his boyhood home.

“Somebody once told me that since the mines closed, this has been the most positive thing to happen to Bell Island,” says Brazil. “For two reasons — locals have something to have pride in and those who left have reason to come home and have pride.”

The pride of which Brazil speaks was very much evident after the Blues won their first league title in 1987.

See “Bridge,” page 19

DECEMBER 4, 2005

18 • INDEPENDENTLIFE

GALLERYPROFILE

ELAINE DAVIS Bead Art

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laine Davis’ room/studio is brimming with evidence of her art. Bags, vials and boxes of beads in hundreds of colours and shapes are stacked around the room and organized into drawers. Her winter coat has a series of beaded people in multicultural dress down the front.

And everywhere are faces — of Hollywood actors, local musicians, family members — all in beads.

Davis says tackling portraits has been a sudden but natural evolution for her. She became interested in sewing as young as age six; a few years later she began drawing and embroidery.

“At 14 I started stitching stuff to my jeans, I used to put studs on clothes, and it just kind of went on from there,” she says.

She walks to her closet and pulls out a colourful, jangly coat she decorated a dozen years ago, when she was 18.

“So I was doing embroidery, drawing, and I did beadwork on my clothes, and then I just kind of combined all three — it just kind of happened.”

Davis says she’s self-taught, “but it took a long time” to get where she is today. She constantly researches beadwork and techniques, and buys magazines devoted to the craft. So far, she has only come across one other artist, in the United States, doing work similar to her own.

Some of Davis’ early portraits are of teenage crushes: River Phoenix and Alex Winter (“The guy from Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure everyone forgot about”). There’s a stunning rendition of her mother, and pictures of local artists Duane Andrews, Jenny Gear, Patrick Boyle and Sara and Kamila.

“Sometimes I work from a photograph,” she says. “Sometimes I have people in to sit once; I’ll draw them, and then guess from there.”

For folk singing sisters Sara and Kamila, Davis worked from a black and white photograph. “I had to develop all the colours,” she laughs, “which is probably what took me so long.” An average piece can take between two

weeks and three months to pull together.

Most of the portraits are of people Davis especially likes or admires, whether she knows them personally or not. Lately, though, she’s landed a series of commissions, enough to keep her busy until next spring — a huge relief, she says.

“I was really disillusioned a month ago, I was going to quit … I mean, it’s like breathing for me, being creative like this, but I was putting so much time into it and I have to find a balance …

“I sent out an e-mail to a bunch of friends about it and I got lots of response … I can do this full time now.

I’m getting fairly paid … it’s expensive, but that’s what the work is worth,

it takes weeks to do one.”

A woman in Palm Beach, Fla. visited St. John’s recently, saw Davis’ work and commissioned five portraits of family members. It’ll be a different challenge, Davis says, to work on the faces of strangers, but she’s excited for it.

“It’s more like a business now, I don’t really feel like my soul is in it as much, which is really important to me, that when I do art my soul comes out,” she says. “It’s a challenge to keep that.”

Contact Elaine Davis’ Pink Moon Bead Art at pinkmoonxox@hotmail.com.

— Stephanie Porter

The Gallery is a regular feature in The Independent. For information, or to submit proposals, please call (709) 726-4639, or e-mail editorial@theindependent.ca

POET’S CORNER

EVENTS

Dark Cove

DECEMBER 4 • Christmas Dinner and Party for the Independent Living Resource Centre, Fairmont Hotel, 6-10 p.m., 722-4031.

• Elevation Madness Boys Basketball Tournament, old gym, Memorial University, championship games, 1 p.m. and 2:30 p.m. 753-2544.

Here the tides seep in And lick at every Cove, With the regularity Of birth and death.

And drawn to conclusions No one can fully understand.

Here the waves slap up To the very fingerprint, Any more and the lines would break And fall under.

Tweed skies surrender to the deep Dead winter lanes echo the silence loudly, rhythms of land and rhyme of sea The heart hears but will not rest in its lea.

Here the storms cough up.

There Harbour is iron anchored,

A poem from the 1985 book Beginnings by Robert Burt.

DECEMBER 5 • Are We There Yet? musical comedy, the Majestic Theatre, 7 p.m. until Dec. 7, $51.50, 579-3023.

• Annual General Meeting of the Open Book Literacy Council, St. John’s campus College of the North Atlantic, 7:30 p.m., 753-7287.

DECEMBER 6 • No Mummers Allowed In at the LSPU Hall, running Dec. 6 – 18, 8 p.m. nightly with 2 p.m. matinees on Sundays, 753-4531.

• Mary Magdalene And Adventures in Sobriety, written and performed by Berni Stapleton, at the Rabbittown

Theatre, running Dec. 6-11, 7:30 p.m. nightly, 739-8220.

• Listen To Your Heart an information session for seniors on heart disease and new risk factors presented by Dr. Karl K. Misik, 1 p.m., The Fluvarium, 1866- 590-0914 to RSVP. DECEMBER 7 • Kevin Major will read from, The House of Wooden Santas, Level 2, Theatre at The Rooms 7 – 9:30 p.m.

• Scrooge, St. John’s Arts and Culture Centre, until Dec. 10, 729-3900.

DECEMBER 8 • Museum Association of Newfoundland annual wreath auction, Fairmont Hotel, 6 p.m., $20, 722-9035.

DECEMBER 9 • Sarah Slean at the LSPU Hall, continues Dec. 10, 753-4531.

DECEMBER 10 • Beni Malone and Marian Frances

White will sign copies of The Sights Before Christmas, 2:30-4:30 p.m. at Granny Bates Book Store.

• Handel’s Messiah, Basilica, 8 p.m., 722-4441.

IN THE GALLERIES: • Comfort and Joy, annual exhibit and sale of special creations celebrating the festive season, Devon House Gallery, Nov. 28 – Dec. 18.

• Eastern Edge Gallery’s Annual Members’ Exhibit, Nov 19 – Dec. 20, all mediums, 739-1882.

• The Limestone Barrens Project at The Rooms, is a major international exhibition of visual art, music and writing based on limestone barrens of Newfoundland and Labrador’s Great Northern Peninsula, the Bruce Peninsula in Ontario and The Burren in Co. Clare, Ireland. Running from September 17, 2005 to January 8, 2005.

• Christmas at the gallery with new work from 16 artists, opens 2-5 p.m., Red Ochre Gallery.

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENTLIFE • 19

Worth a look Tim Conway says Rent has problems, with its share of saving graces Rent Starring Anthony Rapp, Adam Pascal, Rosario Dawson and Jessie L. Martin 135 minutes (out of four)

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en years ago, Rent exploded onto Broadway, and within a year the Tony- and Pulitzer Prize-winning stage play was an established cultural phenomenon. A decade later, one can easily find testimonials from self-proclaimed “Rentheads” who claim to have seen the production dozens of times. It has obviously struck a chord with numerous audience members, for one reason or another. With the release of a big-screen adaptation, those of us who haven’t caught a live performance of Rent on stage now have the opportunity to see what all the fuss is about.

If it were that simple … it’s taken two screenings, and hours of research so that I can get my bearings on this movie. Slightly longer than Moulin Rouge! and 15 minutes longer than Chicago, Rent, at first viewing, seems to run longer than the two of them combined. This comes as no surprise, for director Chris Columbus (Bicentennial Man, the first two Harry Potter films) has no trouble moving things around on the screen, but seems incapable of moving a story along. By the end, one gets the feeling that there’s something seriously absent from the whole shebang, that there should be more to this than great performers singing tunes of varying appeal.

First of all, the original play is a rock opera adapted from Puccinni’s La Boheme. The film leans more towards musical drama, with characters delivering lines that would have been sung on stage. By doing this, when the occasional piece of material is sung, it comes across as a song, and we regard it as such rather than the normal course of conversation, the way it was origi-

TIM CONWAY Film Score nally written. Consequently, we evaluate this as we would a song, when its purpose is no different than that of normal speech. There seems to be no reason why certain lines are spoken while others are sung, nor any pattern to suggest why.

More important, however, is the film’s inadequacy to address the essence of the play, what it’s trying to do. Rent originally set out to present a slice of life in New York’s East Village.

The anti-Seinfeld show, it focused on eight young people in their early 20s, trying to make a go of it in New York with little or no money during the height of the AIDS epidemic. Set between Christmas Eve of 1989 and the same day a year later, their lives and experiences during the ensuing 12 months are intended to identify a generation.

The motion picture, however, calls upon most of the original cast members to reprise their roles, a full 10 years after their debut on stage. Under the close scrutiny of the camera, combined with Columbus’ fondness for close-ups, we get a film featuring individuals who are obviously old enough, technically, to be the parents of the characters in the play. There’s a world of difference between our perceptions of a group of 30-somethings in this situation, and how we would respond to those in their early 20s, especially as the calendar rolls towards the last decade of the millennium.

Armed with this in mind, a second viewing reinforces these notions and explains the nagging questions following the first encounter with the film.

The much older cast members, benefiting from years of experience, deliver

‘Bridge that gap’ From page 17 After the deciding game, played on Bell Island, young kids asked the hockey players for their autographs and adults wanted to shake their hands. As Brazil made his way to the locker room, he came across a woman and her children. Brazil knew the woman was not well off financially, and that a night at the hockey game was probably one of the few social gatherings she enjoyed in the run of a year.

Upon recognizing Brazil as the club’s head coach, she offered her congratulations and helped Brazil realize how much the championship meant to the people of Bell Island.

“She congratulated me, and I shook her hand and said ‘Thank you.’ Then she gave me a hug and said ‘No, thank you for giving me an opportunity to do something with my kids.’ That brought it home. I realized this is bigger than just a game of hockey.”

Brazil also remembers how 420 Bell Islanders followed the team to Gander that same year to watch the provincial junior championships.

When the team returned home with the Veitch Trophy, Bell Islanders were in the mood to celebrate.

“After that it was about a four-day party.

It was about community pride,” says Brazil.

“People ask ‘Why do you do it?’ How could I not do it? I know there are kids over there waiting for the day they can play for the Blues.”

Rosario Dawson stars in Rent.

powerful and polished performances that, in isolation, make us sit up and take notice, but at the expense of the overall raw emotion required by the story.

A second look also helps us more clearly discern what material is meant to be regarded as songs, which helps add a bit of perspective to things. This additional comfort level allows us to better appreciate them, and while the first viewing leaves us with a tune or two stuck in our heads, a subsequent visit easily adds a few more to our men-

Although the on-ice success has been fun, Brazil says the greatest reward of coaching on Bell Island has been the relationships he developed with the 287 kids he has coached.

Many keep in contact with him today, and many more are close friends.

“I’ve been asked to MC 14 different players’ weddings,” Brazil says. “And one of the players even asked me to be in the wedding party.”

Despite the good times he’s had with the junior team, Brazil admits his time with the club may be coming to an end. That doesn’t mean he’ll stop coaching on Bell Island.

“In two years we’ll be trying to set up a

tal repertoire, where they’re bound to stick for days.

In the transition from the rock opera on stage to the musical drama on film, something is certainly lost. The focus here is on set design, and the performers delivering the songs well. Any meaning behind any of this seems lost, exacerbating our perplexity with what plays out on the screen.

What is more baffling, however, is how often Hollywood seeks out a young film director with a student film and a couple of music videos under his

senior team,” he says. “Bell Island hasn’t had a Herder in 71 years, it would be nice to bridge that gap.”

With a family, a full-time job, and his coaching commitments, Brazil admits he doesn’t have much free time at any point in the year. He’d like to have more time to work on his golf game, but given how much he enjoys what he does, he’s perfectly content to wait a while yet before slowing down.

“When I retire, I’m going to retire from everything,” Brazil says. “That’s when you’ll find me on the golf course.” darcy.macrae@theindependent.ca

belt to helm motion pictures that are better suited to the experience of a Chris Columbus. A young hotshot with a fire down below and a cast of contemporaries could have taken Rent from stage to screen perfectly.

Still, it’s worth a look, and even a second look, and you just might wind up shopping for the soundtrack CD as an early stocking stuffer for yourself.

Tim Conway operates Capital Video in Rawlin’s Cross, St. John’s. His column returns Dec. 18.

DECEMBER 4, 2005

20 • INDEPENDENTLIFE

IN CAMERA

By the bay There are more than 150 Newfoundlanders and Labradorians living in Doha, capital of Qatar, working for the College of the North Atlantic’s first campus in the Middle East.

Photo editor Paul Daly and senior editor Stephanie Porter travelled to Qatar for the campus’ inauguration ceremonies — and met more than a few friendly faces.

DOHA, QATAR

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ate last night, the fog rolled in, thick as pea soup. Most mornings the view over the tropical blue of the Persian Gulf is sunny and clear — save a little smog. The majority of the buildings around the water are visible, built of white or beige concrete, as one might expect in the desert.

There are fishing boats and yachts, palm trees and beaches. And cranes, hundreds of cranes, building all sorts of new skyscrapers and sports facilities, tearing down the old.

And none of it can be seen at the moment.

In the past few days, much has been made here of the links and similarities between Qatar and Newfoundland and Labrador, as all involved gear up for the grand opening of the College of the North Atlantic’s campus in Doha.

Speeches at the formal inauguration events mention the shared ties to the ocean — Qatar used to be best known for its fishing and pearl divers — and the new oil and natural gas booms, driving both economies.

Comparisons are made between the hospitality of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, and that of the always-gracious Qatari citizens. And there’s the community of Canadians that has popped up in the staff housing near campus, bringing house parties and hockey games along for the ride.

But it’s the sight of dense, grey fog that is the strongest reminder of home so far. That, and a

visit to Murphy’s Pub.

••• Tish Murphy and Mike Long live in the compound of villas known as Al-Jazeera Land (literally “the island”), occupied almost entirely by instructors and staff of the college’s Qatar campus. The duplexes are modestly sized, but more than enough for two people, and nicely furnished.

At the centre of the compound is a corner store, pool, gym and recreation centre.

Murphy and Long left Newfoundland about three years ago, and both have been teaching on campus.

“Living in Qatar has been a deadly experience, it’s been wicked,” Murphy sums up. As the hostess of a healthy party — lots of fellow ex-pats are in the house, yard and street — she’s in an especially good mood on this evening.

“Whenever I’ve travelled before, lived overseas, you look to get into the experience, the culture, to meet new people,” she says.

“It’s difficult here to meet people on a personal level, it’s not the same socially or culturally … we’ve been really lucky that we’ve had a big Newfoundland community and a Canadian community to connect with.”

In all, the college has over 300 employees in Qatar, virtually all from outside the Middle East. About 60 per cent are Newfoundlanders and Labradorians. Most are drawn to the jobs in Qatar by the adventure, the weather — and the salaries. (An instructor at the College makes

about 25 per cent more than he or she would at home, and is provided furnished housing, a transportation allowance and a per diem to live on.)

Long stands on the front step, looking over the gathering. It’s the last day in November and there are about 50 folks milling about in Tshirts, shorts, and other light clothing, beers in hand. One person is wearing a FREE NFLD. shirt, another sports a Ron Hynes image on his chest. There’s a Pink, White and Green flag on the wall. There’s lots of chatter and plenty of laughing.

“I’d say about 80 per cent of the people here now are from Newfoundland or Labrador,” estimates Long. “It’s a bit surreal when you think about it.”

One of the main attractions of this particular villa is a solid, dark wood bar Long built outdoors in his carport, with all the fixings you’d expect from a place affectionately known as Murphy’s Pub.

The only official bars or clubs in Qatar are in hotels; Islamic culture forbids drinking.

Residents have to purchase individual alcohol licenses to be allowed to buy beer or spirits.

“Murphy’s Pub was built to normalize as best we could, to create something that was a home environment,” says Murphy. “People can come up, put their arms up, belly up to the bar and have a few pints and that’s the beauty of it.

“We’ve had some great times there.”

••• A few hours before the Murphy’s Pub party got underway, a large crowd gathered at the City Centre Mall in Doha to watch the College of the North Atlantic’s hockey team take on “the world” — a team made up of ex-pats working elsewhere in the city and a couple of media representatives from Newfoundland.

The ice surface, smaller and rounder than the traditional hockey rink, is on the ground floor of the mall, with four stories of stores and balconies overlooking it. The media atten-

DECEMBER 4, 2005

tion got the crowds out, and the game became even more of a draw than the regular Doha rec league games.

There were Canadian flags, Newfoundland flags, spectators of all nationalities and ages. The end of the 50-minute game (14-7 for the college) brought a rousing O Canada and plenty of cheers from Qataris and westerners alike.

“It’s a bit of an odd sight,” says spectator Ken Mills, a St. John’s native now working in the college’s IT department. “But it’s great for that.”

••• Qatar is in the midst of an incredible period of growth. With massive oil and gas reserves (15.2 billion barrels and 900 trillion cubic feet respectively), the country has one of

INDEPENDENTLIFE • 21

the fastest growing economies and highest per capita incomes in the world.

With only 750,000 people, expected to rise to 1.2 million by 2008, the wealth is, some say, being shared — at least among Qatari citizens. Nationals make up less than a quarter of the population of the country, and they are reportedly given healthy living allowances by the ruling Emir and his government.

There are hundreds of thousands of immigrant workers from India, Pakistan, Nepal and elsewhere — but, say locals, all make a living wage, have a roof over their heads, and access to health care.

The explosion of wealth has really emerged in the past decade, when the current ruler stepped into power.

The population, traffic and con-

struction booms have come along with it.

Built on desert and surrounded by desert, Doha has the feeling of being a force in spite of its surroundings. All trees, shrubs and flowers are imported; any vegetation is planted over a careful maze of irrigation hoses. There are large manicured lawns, a golf course, flower gardens, and palm trees by the thousands.

It may only rain a couple of days a year, but everything is kept green by water from the Gulf, desalinated in a massive facility and pumped around town. (Reports say 25 per cent of the city’s water feeds the golf course alone.)

Just a few minutes’ boat ride from the shores of Doha is Palm Tree Island, an artificial island built as a children’s park. There are plans afoot to build a new airport on new land to be extended into the Gulf; in other areas lagoons have been made by dredging away land.

Everything seems to be being rebuilt — office buildings, skyscrapers, homes and roads, all pushing back against the massive expanse of sand dunes. But the traditions live on, in the outlying areas, in the markets (souks) and in the religion, clothing, music and culture of the people.

••• Newfoundlanders and Labradorians — and other Canadians working at the college — offer mixed reports about their time here. Some love the place, others have trouble adjusting to a slower pace and different social norms.

Some admit they find it difficult their students may be paid more to attend school than they do to teach — 80 per cent of the college’s student population are sponsored by employers or the government — and laugh when they talk about the Porches and Land Rovers that fill the student parking spaces.

The college’s Qatar campus is the first co-ed educational institution ever in the region, and while classes are mixed, there are separate cafeterias, gyms and swimming pools for male and female students.

As such, many teachers face the challenge of divided classes — men on one side, women on the other, with never a glance exchanged.

“The first year was really strange, going through the stages with the students,” says Murphy. “But the men and women gradually came together, I was proud of that, to see some sort of integration.

“And the students loved it.”

Teachers must become attuned to their female students, many of

whom wear the traditional abayas, including a black headscarf and veil over the face. Although only the eyes may be visible, instructors learn to read expressions and personalities in a whole new way.

Accounting instructor Guy Penney has been in Qatar four months, after years at the College of the North Atlantic campus on Prince Phillip Drive, St. John’s. Away from his usual hobbies and other business interests, he’s finding Qatar life “relaxing,” and tries to fill his time with volunteer work, social dinners and getting to know the city.

The fog has long since burned off and Penney is standing on the top of his apartment building, pointing out landmarks around town, counting cranes working in the near and far distance. He admits he misses pork and Labbatt Lite, and the heat in the summer’s a bit much (50 C at times) — but he’s happy with his choice.

If all goes as planned, his wife will probably move from Newfoundland within the next year, and he’ll work through his three-year contract.

“This might be a really good way to retire,” he says. “It’s a great adventure for me … already, it would be a shock to go back home right now … I look forward to it, but for now I intend to enjoy this to the fullest.”

DECEMBER 4, 2005

22 • INDEPENDENTLIFE

Is a poet a painter?

Book reviewer Mark Callanan attempts to answer that question through the work of Christopher Pratt A Painter’s Poems, Christopher Pratt Breakwater Books, 2005, 64 pages

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have often heard the phrase applied, in describing a poet’s output, that he or she has “a painter’s eye,” or more specifically, “a painter’s eye for detail”; poems are considered “painterly” if they effectively evoke the visual.

That there is a relationship between the two forms there is no doubt, but what relationship exactly? Is a painting a direct correlative to a poem? Is a poet just a painter who can’t afford oils? Christopher Pratt’s A Painter’s Poems may offer a few answers.

Best known for his extensive contribution to visual art in this country (a contribution for which he has been made a Companion of the Order of Canada and bestowed with several honourary degrees), Pratt attempts to bridge the gap between two mediums in this collection: painting, the focus of his professional career up until now; and poetry, a form with which he has dabbled over the years. A Painter’s Poems covers 50 years worth of writing, and while at only 59 pages of poetry this may prove a slim sampling, it is enough to get a sense of the author’s aesthetic and methods.

October is the ocean’s spring, his first poem (like many in this collection, it employs its first line as its title) begins: it feeds the sea, cuts the carcass from tidewater flats and fires my winter whims.

The three stanzas that follow proceed through the months of March and April, arriving, in the final stanza, at the promise of summer: “At peace I watch the ravens gorge/and sing of summer running down the rocks.” Pratt is fond of such juxtapositions — the grotesque image of ravens that “gorge” themselves on their dinner (not exactly the picture of dainty eating) paired with the sweetly musical song of summer fast approaching.

Light versus dark — in both literal and symbolic sense — is another recurrent dualism.

This leads us into Pratt’s primary concern: the brief trajectory of life, how it is played out, how it must always end. His book comprises reflections on the natural world, on the world of the personal and on the intersection of the two, each haunted by the obvious impermanence of life, the inevitable fact of death. “When I see my friends asleep/I must acknowledge death’s proximity” Pratt writes

MARK CALLANAN On the shelf in the closing stanza of When I See My Friends.

Similarly, the final poem in the collection, The Eider Ducks, closes in morbid premonition: “but when the eider ducks fly down the river I will die.”

For a collection that meditates largely on death, the death of self seems a fitting note on which to end.

The numerous references to colour spattered throughout the collection (I lost count after the 50th occurrence) would indicate just how much the visual sense rules imagery in Pratt’s poems. Yet there is a laziness in this reliance. In one poem, flake white snow, “skies of indigo,” “salt-white pickets,” and “talc-white linens” are sprayed across the page as if by recording the world’s pallet alone Pratt has bestowed insight deeper than could be had by staring at sample cards from Benjamin Moore.

There are other faults besides. How Soon When the Day is White parrots Dylan Thomas in style and sentiment. You can almost hear the Welsh poet’s church organ of a voice delivering such phrases as “the seaweedsmelling fog,” “the wind-eyed boys have fled the Friday hills” and “trees bleached white as lambs’ bones by the wind.” Pratt is just as likely to mar his canvas with a few poorly chosen words — the sound of wind blowing through dry grass, “the friction of one dehydrated shaft/against another,” is described as “a million little slaps.”

Yet many of the poems here prove more than apprentice pieces or half-baked attempts.

The simplicity of their language is strangely compelling. As Pratt himself suggests in a prefatory note, compared to the all-illuminating “foyer chandelier” that is some poetry, his own is “a single bulb in a porch.”

There is beauty in seeing the world by that feeble, naked light. But does that answer any of our musings? Is a poet in fact a painter? Sometimes.

And vice-versa? If he learns that language is an altogether different beast from what he’s used to.

Pratt has by no means mastered his second tongue, but he employs it well enough to make A Painter’s Poems interesting reading.

Mark Callanan is a writer and reviewer living in Rocky Harbour. His column returns Dec. 18.

the GIFT with a lasting impression

Jacob Pratt, 14, Claire Pratt, 12, and Eva Davenport, 12, perform with other members of the Kids Players in Letters to St. Father Claus.

Rhonda Hayward/The Independent

Dysfunctional letters to Santa Young actors get into character by writing jolly old Elf

By Alisha Morrissey The Independent

T

hese aren’t your average Santa letters. The Kids Players, a group of about 24 actors in their early teens from around St. John’s, recently wrote a Christmas play based on letters written by fictional characters — which they portray in the upcoming Letters to St. Father Claus.

The story was conceived when director Chris Driedzic asked his young class of actors to each form a character and, while in that character’s voice, write a letter to Santa.

Eight actors will perform as characters dealing with various problems in their lives. The letters to Santa are read aloud as a monologue in the second act.

“The twist is … Santa Claus writes back and gives them this advice on how they could change,” Driedzic tells The Independent. “Sort of takes their lists that they have sent and twists it around and gives them new lists. Kind of improvement-oriented Christmas lists.”

A bully in the play, Jacob Pratt says he knew when he was asked to write the letter what he wanted his character to be.

“My character is basically a bully. Not the best background, he was neglected by his parents and just takes it out on the kids around him … sort of this tough guy with a New Yorker accent,” he says.

Claire Pratt, Jacob’s sister, says her character began as an outrageous French actress, a materialistic snob, but toned the character down to more of a popular, conceited-type girl — a girl you could meet anywhere.

Eva Davenport plays a mad scientist who spreads a terrible computer virus.

The letter writing allowed the kids to learn about developing real-life characters, Driedzic says. From the acting perspective, the kids — who have worked on several comedies — are learning how to do more serious plays.

“The scenes take place in a very undefined space. We learn little bits and pieces of what they’re like as opposed to all of it being very obvious,” he says.

“This one (play), there’s a lot of stillness and they’re forced to be there in the space … and that’s difficult for an actor — to have that focus.”

Reading the letters on stage is also part of the learning curve because as the actors deliver the lines they need to hold the audience’s attention, says Driedzic.

A third learning experience is provided in the final scene, which is basically improvisational — though well practiced.

While Eva, Claire and Jacob are all students at Brother Rice Junior High School, the Kids Players is completely independent from schools and has young actors from all around the capital city region.

“With all the shows, they (the kids) have high stakes in whatever we put on … and I think the bar, artistically, is pretty high,” Driedzic says.

“Like I expect a lot from you guys and they give a lot. They’re all very professional.

“I think as they get older we just raise the bar.”

Eva, Jacob and Claire all say working on the play has been hard work (they’ve been rehearsing Saturdays since early fall), they say they prefer this play to the standard Scrooge and Grinch stories.

“I guess you use more imagination when you do a play and you make them up,” Eva says.

“It’s not something that you know how it’s going to end when you go in there because it’s not something that’s really popular, so you just go in there and find out what happens,” Claire says.

Driedzic says the community at large would be interested in the play, though the audience will mainly include friends and family.

“It’s not about a show to sell out the arts and culture centre or make a million bucks or whatever, it’s about these kids developing their theatre and creative skills so this piece in particular … let’s make them try to have a character that could be real, like you could run into out there.”

Letters to St. Father Claus will be presented by the Kids Players at the Basement Theatre of the St. John’s Arts and Culture Centre Dec. 10 and 11.

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INDEPENDENTBUSINESS

SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, DECEMBER 4-10, 2005 — PAGE 23

Bruce Hollett (above) is acting president of the College of the North Atlantic. The college’s Qatar campus, consisting of 21 buildings, is designed to hold 3,000 students and was originally expected to cost $500 million over 10 years, although that figure has since been revised upward to $1 billion. The campus was officially opened last week, complete with entertainment in the form of a hockey game and a performance by the Palmer Sisters (right). A model of the new campus (bottom right) is viewed by Her Highness Sheikha Mozah Bint Nasser AlMissned and dignitaries.

Paul Daly/The Independent

‘Million-dollar students’ Newest campus of College of the North Atlantic opens in Qatar; spares no expense

By Stephanie Porter The Independent

F

ive years ago, the College of the North Atlantic was awarded the “biggest educational contract that’s ever been done in Canada,” according to acting president Bruce Hollett.

Last week, that contract reached one of its first major milestones: the grand opening of a 42-hectare new campus in the middle eastern country Qatar — on time and on budget, according to reports.

Construction alone for the new campus cost about 400 million Qatari rial (QAR), or about $130 million Cdn. Add in program development and equipment, and the price tag is estimated at $1 billion QAR ($330 million Cdn).

Of course, there’s still a ways to go: 12 of 22 buildings are open; there are currently 1,200 students out of a planned 3,000. New residences for staff are in the midst of construction — and employees are constantly being recruited.

But the buildings and grounds completed are modern in design and content — and opened with a flourish Dec.1.

“I’m not sure how recognized this success story is out in the public in Newfoundland,” says Hollett, in Qatar for the inauguration ceremonies.

Classes are already available in engineering technology, information technology, health sciences and business.

All are focused on experiential, techni-

cal learning, tailored to the specifics of Qatari industries — specifically in natural gas — and emerging needs.

“This is the same stuff we’re doing at home,” says Hollett. “The same programs, same classes, some Newfoundland accents in front of the class … except the industry applications here, just by their very nature, are different than they are in Newfoundland.”

There are some 150 Newfoundlanders and Labradorians working on campus, as instructors and administrators.

“But it’s not like someone from the Prince Phillip Drive campus (in St. John’s) taking a transfer to the Gander campus,” Hollett adds with a laugh.

Not only are there significant and obvious cultural differences between the Islamic country and Canada, but the Qatar facilities have had the benefit of hefty government funding — and with dream equipment selected, and sometimes designed, by college staff.

“We didn’t buy teaching aids off the shelf,” says Harald Jorch, president of College of the North Atlantic — Qatar.

“If there is a gold ring around the part in the real world, there will be one here in the lab as well,” he says, looking at workstations set up in an engineering lab. “It’s all about readying students to move immediately into the work force.”

Heavy investment has also gone into developing health sciences courses — some of the labs contain simulation equipment not yet used anywhere in

Canada.

“Sometimes, only one or two students may be registered for a course,” says Jorch. “But we would never consider canceling it … so we, quite literally, will end up with million-dollar students.”

The budget for the CAN-Q operations, including about 300 staff, is creeping close to what the College of

the North Atlantic has in entirety — for 17 campuses and 1,500 staff around the province, he says.

As one of the wealthiest countries and fastest-growing economies in the world, Qatar is seemingly sparing little expense in developing the technical school they want for their citizens.

Annual tuition for an unsponsored student would be about $7,000 Cdn — but

about 80 per cent of those who attend classes are sponsored by their employer and/or the government.

Hollett maintains “public education isn’t usually done as a money-making venture,” but the college in Qatar has, he says, brought money back to Newfoundland soil.

make the change.

“This falls within the clear literal reading of the legislation, it falls within the purpose of the legislation, so in heaven’s name, why not?” Hearn asks.

“This part of our Canadian Constitution was designed to give us this authority and if it doesn’t (do that), what does it do?”

Premier Danny Williams and Natural Resources Minister Ed Byrne have both said they are looking at all options when it comes to increasing revenues from Churchill Falls power. Williams and Byrne are both aware of the constitutional provision and are including it on their list of options. Virtually every provincial government since former premier Joey Smallwood, who negotiated

the deal, has tried to reopen or renegotiate the upper Churchill agreement. The issue has been dragged repeatedly through the courts, costing the province untold millions.

“You pay sales tax when you buy something so I’m suggesting a hydroelectric tax on top of whatever you pay,” Hearn says, admitting there are those who disagree with his legal opinion.

“There’s no way, when people are talking about the effects of legislation, that you can predict with absolute certainly what the legal result will be.”

Hearn began his fascination with the upper Churchill when he worked a summer job as a labourer on the construction

See “Priceless,” page 24

Missed opportunity Lawyer says province can tax upper Churchill power

By Alisha Morrissey The Independent

N

ewfoundland and Labrador may be losing out on an estimated $1 billion a year in profit from the upper Churchill contract, but a lawyer who worked on trying to overturn the deal says the province may yet get some satisfaction in the form of tax.

A small tax on hydroelectricity could bring millions of dollars to the province annually from Churchill Falls power, says lawyer Ed Hearn.

Under the 1982 revised Canadian Constitution (section 92a), Hearn says provinces are given the authority to tax

hydroelectricity — along with other exported natural resources.

He tells The Independent that a tax of less than a penny per kilowatt hour on upper Churchill power sold to HydroQuebec could see up to $33 million a year pour into the province’s coffers.

The upper Churchill agreement, signed in 1969, is seen as hugely lopsided in favour of Hydro-Quebec, which rakes in huge profits from Labrador-generated electricity. This province sees next to nothing in return.

Once a member of former-premier Brian Peckford’s legal-dream team — commissioned to find ways to overturn

the upper Churchill contract — Hearn says such a tax would not impact the original deal and could be passed by a simple vote of the House of Assembly.

“It (a tax) would have a substantial impact if applied to the energy exported from Churchill Falls and a very modest tax would result in net revenue to the province in excess of $300 million,” Hearn tells The Independent. “I think it’s an opportunity being missed.”

The catch, Hearn says, would be a small increase on power bills in homes in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The new section of the Constitution was almost tailored to the Churchill Falls situation, Hearn says. He should know — Hearn was one of the lawyers who lobbied the federal government to

See “An atrocious,” page 24

24 • INDEPENDENTBUSINESS

By Clare-Marie Gosse The Independent

C

hristmas is approaching and officials with the SPCA (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) in St. John’s say they’re seeing more abandoned animals than ever.

Executive director Debbie Powers tells The Independent she’s concerned about pet stores in St. John’s selling animals during the holiday season, particularly as Pets Unlimited is about to open a new store in Mount Pearl later this week.

“The SPCA is seeing far, far too many animals here, period,” she tells The Independent. “I mean, this morning there was another dog dumped in the porch … I thought we had made a difference, and we did, but it’s reversing right back to what it was when I started 30 years ago.”

Kevin Sheppard, provincial manager for Pets Unlimited, says his company is dedicated to preventing people from making rash, Christmas purchases of animals, including dogs and cats. He adds the new store in Mount Pearl will be significantly smaller than the current box version on Stavanger Drive in east end St. John’s and will only stock pet supplies and smaller animals such as fish and hamsters — no dogs or cats.

Sheppard says most people are stocking up on Christmas gifts for their pets, rather than buying pets.

“We actually bring in less (animals) during the Christmas season,” he says.

“First off flying, there’s more limitations on what can come in (through the airlines), and we don’t really promote people buying stuff around Christmas, we really promote buying gift cards … it’s probably the worst time to have a new pet in the household, with all the commotion going on.”

Bob Godden, who supervises air cargo for Air Canada in St. John’s, confirms there is a restriction on animal cargo in the run up to Christmas.

“Christmastime is a very busy time for us,” he says, “shipping live animals … there’s an embargo on shipping any cats and dogs during the Christmas period because it just takes up so much room.”

Sheppard says Pets Unlimited would

DECEMBER 4, 2005

Pet peeves

Animal sales are business, but SPCA warns not to buy cats and dogs as presents

Rhonda Hayward /The Independent

usually stop selling animals at least four days before Christmas.

The SPCA is careful too. Powers says if they get the impression someone wants to pick up a dog or cat for a gift, they’ll be refused.

Powers says the SPCA has already received unwanted animals purchased from a local pet store and later abandoned.

“It’s a commodity; they sell it, and we’ve already had three to four of their animals here,” she says. “What bothers me is the careless disregard of putting out that credit card and putting, you know, $800, $900 on these animals without any thought sometimes.”

The most expensive puppy carried by Pets Unlimited sells for $1,900.

Sheppard says all dogs see a vet at least twice between leaving a breeder and being purchased by a customer.

He adds the company tries to take back any unwanted animals — “We’ve got a miniature pug out there and that’s been purchased twice already and it’s been brought back both times.” And if a puppy is slow to sell, the store keeps reducing the price as time goes by until someone purchases it.

Sheppard says the company does everything it can to ensure their suppliers are following ethical practices. Pet stores are often criticized for procuring

their dogs from puppy mills or backyard breeders. Puppy mill is a term used to describe irresponsible and inhumane breeding practices on a large scale; back yard breeding is a smaller scale version.

Sheppard says Pets Unlimited get their animals, for the most part, from breeders they have come to know and trust, many of whom supply the company exclusively.

He adds local breeders in Newfoundland and Labrador are always welcomed, although most dogs come from Moncton, Halifax, Fredericton and north eastern Quebec.

They’re flown in on an as-needed basis

(usually two to four pups at a time on various airlines, depending on the quickest flights to reduce anxiety) and there is always a staff member available to check on the animals at airports during any layovers or delays.

Sheppard says Pets Unlimited has come across bad breeders in the past.

“They were working, more so, just to get a fast dollar, so we stopped dealing with those breeders and we’re really cautious with it.”

He says they keep track of the history of the animals, as well as their progress after being purchased.

Customers have to go through an hourlong information session before taking any dogs home.

Powers says Pets Unlimited is trying to follow a good practice (she says vets and representatives of the Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council are supposed to be conducting staff seminars in the near future), but, “it’s buyer beware.

“It’s so frightening … to give them their due, they’re trying, but I hate it.”

Sheppard is a board member with the Pet Industry Advisory Council of Canada, a branch of the world’s largest pet-trade association. The organization was formed to represent all areas of the pet industry, as well as to educate the public and address governmental issues and offer certification.

“The Canadian pet industry and really the pet industry across the world is unsanctioned,” he says, “there’s really no governing rules to it.

“There’s a lot of people that have misperceptions and there’s lots of bad stores … that give a bad name to the whole industry.”

Sheppard says it can be tough dealing with criticism from animal groups and the general public. He adds he is always happy to talk to anyone who may have questions about Pets Unlimited.

“A lot of people, when we first opened up, they were coming in and just making the most slanderous, out-of-nowhere comments I’ve ever heard in my whole entire life.

“I don’t get annoyed, I get frustrated with it, but I understand where they’re coming from. I consider myself an animal lover so I can understand people who are extremely concerned about it.”

Priceless education From page 23 The college makes money based on a management fee, and “that percentage comes home,” says Hollett. “The college has been able to do things with some of the money they’ve received from the project.”

As well as an admitted financial benefit, Hollett says those involved with the college in Canada are enjoying improvements in skills and knowledge because of the work abroad.

“Technical programs are constantly evolving,” he says. “Because there is so much interchange between faculty here and in Newfoundland, curriculum (on both sides) are developed and updated …” It’s especially an advantage, he adds, in the ever-growing petroleum industry in Newfoundland and Labrador — and may be for a future natural gas business.

“In terms of project management, administrative and leadership, the skills the people have learned out of this are priceless.”

‘An atrocious deal’ From page 23 site.

“It was a remarkable time,” Hearn says. “It was a pretty upbeat and lively time. The project itself was really quite amazing.”

Just because the project was interesting doesn’t mean the deal was appealing.

“Anybody with half a brain realized it (was a bad deal) before it was signed.

“At the time it should have been obvious to anyone with a calculator that this was not just a bad deal, but an atrocious deal.

“There’s probably no other area where you could say that there’s scope for us to get a reasonable rate of return on the resources and, it doesn’t take very much, when you start talking Churchill Falls, where you could be talking about hundreds of millions of dollars.”

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENTBUSINESS • 25

Tracking the Churchill deal T

he upper Churchill contract is known as Newfoundland’s greatest giveaways. But how much attention and scrutiny did the deal get — at least in the media — leading up to the signing in May 1969. North American magazines and newspapers in the 1960s covered the upper Churchill deal with little intensity and little insight, although coverage did pick up in later years.

The following are a few excerpts: The Atlantic Advocate, June 1963 • “It was Smallwood’s oft repeated assertion that the hydro of the Hamilton Falls (later renamed Churchill Falls) will someday drive the subway trains of New York … Newfoundland gets first call on all power with the surplus available for first call by Quebec.”

TIME Canada, Oct. 14, 1966 • “All afternoon St. John’s cab drivers and Cabinet ministers, businessmen and housewives hovered near radio and TV sets as if the fate of Newfoundland hung in the balance, fretting over the reports that Quebec’s Union Nationale government was seriously divided on whether to buy the potential 4.6 million kw. of power from Labrador’s Churchill Falls.”

• “At 8:20 p.m. the bulletin QUEBEC AGREES TO SIGN was flashed to St. John’s and Newfoundlanders went on a

jubilant jag, toasting Quebec, Churchill Falls, each other and most often of all the man who wasn’t there — Joseph Roberts Smallwood.”

• “Beamed Smallwood: ‘Glory hallelujah; praise God from whom all blessings flow!’ The $1.1 billion Churchill Falls project, he prophesied, would make Newfoundland ‘the most industrialized province in Canada.’”

• “Churchill Falls is the centerpiece of Operation Bootstrap that Joey considers no less than ‘a matter of life and death to us.’ Aside from the direct employment, Newfoundland will collect $20 million annually in royalties from the power — equal to one tenth the province’s present revenues.”

The Evening Telegram, May 13, 1969 (Canadian Press copy from Montreal) • “Churchill power deal signed by Quebec,” read the headline. “An agreement was signed Monday under which Hydro-Quebec will purchase electricity from the giant hydroelectric development at Churchill Falls in central Labrador.”

• “The contract will enable HydroQuebec to purchase almost all the power from the Churchill Falls development at a price lower than that of any alternate source.”

The Evening Telegram, May 14, 1969 (Canadian Press copy from Quebec) • “Quebec paying $5 billion for Churchill Falls power,” read the headline. “Quebec finance Minister Paul Dozois Tuesday night described HydroQuebec’s $5,000,000,000 contract … as ‘the biggest power contract ever signed in the world.’”

• “Mr. Dozois described that contract as ‘frighteningly complicated.’ It had ‘enormous advantages’ which he didn’t explain.”

• “In its annual report, tabled Tuesday in the Legislature, Hydro-Quebec estimates the maximum total annual payments for energy will range from $93,000,000 to $80,000,000 until 2016.”

The Evening Telegram, May 30, 1969 • “Churchill Falls deal: Everyone’s a winner,” read the headline. “Fears that Newfoundland came out on the short end of the stick appear to be unnecessary. In fact, Newfoundland seems to have fared very well under the agreement, although on the surface it might appear otherwise.”

• “The attitudes of both Newfoundland and Quebec government leaders and such statements as escaping ‘the clutches of Quebec,’ by Mr. Smallwood and ‘Mr. Smallwood can entertain in his head all the lovely plans he likes,’ by Mr. Lesage, did nothing to speed up the

development and can be partially blamed for the increased cost from $700 million to $950 million.”

• “Quebec had originally argued that the price of the power was too high: it wanted the falls expropriated, elimination of BRINCO and reduction of power costs by eliminating certain taxes; use of Quebec’s workers and exclusive use of Quebec materials on the project. Quebec also wanted the power delivered inside Quebec and changes to the Newfoundland-Quebec border in Labrador. The boundary had been defined in 1927 by the Privy Council but never accepted by Quebec.”

• “Newfoundland retains a small portion of the power — 2,362 billion kilowatt hours per year, gets $27 million a year in royalties and taxes and does not risk holding the financial bag if something goes wrong.”

The Financial Post, April 10, 1976 • “Newfoundland’s return was to be approximately $600 million — less than $10 million annually. There was no escalator clause to permit upgrading of these royalties.”

• “Quebec acknowledges that Newfoundland is interested in an attempt at renegotiating terms of the ‘giveaway’ contract … (Quebec is) not interested in giving away any of its advantages unless there was some new quid pro quo, perhaps a deal involving

control over rivers The very suggestion has already raised hackles locally where it is recalled that during the original Churchill Falls negotiations premier Joseph Roberts Smallwood and Premier Jean Lesage of Quebec had been seriously considering a ‘swap’ of territory involving the contentious QuebecLabrador boundary.”

The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 24, 1980 • “Brian Peckford, premier of Newfoundland, told a group of U.S. journalists last week that ‘after years of grabbing away all our resources we are trying to grab them back.”

The New York Times, Nov. 23, 1980 • “The Newfoundland government introduced legislation today that would allow it to seize the water rights to the giant upper Churchill Falls generating complex in Labrador, a move certain to worsen an already bitter conflict between it and the province of Quebec over the sale and transmission of power from the shared project.”

• “If the province does gain rights to Churchill Falls’ power, it apparently already has two almost certain customers to buy it. The New York State Power Authority has signed a letter of intent … (and) a Norwegian has expressed interest in building (an aluminum smelter) at Goose Bay.” — Alisha Morrissey

‘Anybody and his dog agreed with it’ Infamous upper Churchill contract didn’t generate much debate; question remains whether Smallwood knew significance of escalator clause

By Alisha Morrissey The Independent

T

hirty-six years after the signing of the upper Churchill contract, debates still rage over whether the government of the day understood the meaning of an escalator clause.

“I don’t think they knew very much about anything,” says Ambrose Peddle, a Tory MHA during the reign of the late premier Joey Smallwood.

Meantime, former premier Brian Peckford, who tried to overturn the infamous deal on several occasions, says Smallwood’s government knew all about inflation and simply didn’t bother.

The infamous contract, seen by many as the greatest giveaway in Newfoundland history, has been criticized for the absence of an escalator clause, which means Hydro-Quebec buys power from Newfoundland and Labrador at the same rate set when the deal was signed in 1969.

As the price of electricity rises, so do Quebec’s revenues — which stand at between $800 million and $1 billion per year.

The deal doesn’t expire until 2041.

Peddle, who sat in opposition the day Smallwood brought the upper Churchill development deal to the House of Assembly, says everyone was so overjoyed about having a deal they didn’t even argue.

In fact, he says, Smallwood said there would be no debate.

“We (opposition members) were in our office waiting for the afternoon session and who but Mr. Smallwood should come up to visit us and he said ‘Gentlemen, I have a proposition. I have a deal on for Churchill Falls, but it’s going to call for a quick agreement from the opposition, no fooling around,’” Peddle tells The Independent. “And there wasn’t a man there that didn’t approve of it.

“Almost anybody and his dog agreed with it.”

Peckford says the fact there wasn’t much debate was

half the problem.

“I once debated Mr. Smallwood … I think one of the phrases that I used at the time was that the Greeks knew about inflation,” Peckford says. “It wasn’t a new concept and the long and the short of it is that the people who negotiated the upper Churchill contract got bamboozled, you know.”

After becoming premier in 1979, Peckford says he had people scour the world to find a similar energy deal without an escalator clause or a “re-opener” to allow future negotiations.

“And we couldn’t find anywhere a contract, even half as big in this field, that didn’t have a re-opener or an inflation clause or something in it,” he says. “That sort of puts

Former premier Joey Smallwood

the lie to it … that would be the first thing that would come to a Grade 8, you know, ‘So, is there anymore around like this?’”

Peckford hired a team of lawyers who spent two years looking at ways to overturn the deal and then tried unsuccessfully —

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twice, under two different acts — to get the deal overturned by the courts.

While Peckford’s government did eventually begin renegotiations with Quebec, he says, that province only played games and wasted time.

Looking ahead to the future, he says any deal negotiated on the lower Churchill must include some sort of re-opener for the upper Churchill.

Meantime, Peddle says he’s not sure if the deal will ever be overturned.

“I think we made a mistake. If we had had the present premier (Danny Williams) in then — no way,” he says. “Mr. Smallwood made it quite clear that … it was a great deal and that if we didn’t agree with it we’d loose it and taken on the spur of the moment, we did it. I think it was a mistake now.”

26 • INDEPENDENT SPECIAL SECTION

DECEMBER 4, 2005

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENT SPECIAL SECTION • 27

28 • INDEPENDENTBUSINESS

DECEMBER 4, 2005

WEEKLY DIVERSIONS Solution on page 31 ACROSS 1 Roman 1900 4 Quebec power source: ___ Bay 9 Apron top 12 Musical study piece 14 Early Italian astronomer 16 Egg-shaped 19 Nuisances 20 Partly coincide (of two things) 21 Busybody (sl.)

22 Annoy 23 Zimbabwe’s capital 25 Neuter 27 Indian lentil 28 Gator’s cousin 30 Banting and ___ 31 Central part 32 Drop dramatically 33 “With ice cream” 35 Betrayal 37 Wordless agreement 38 Love in Lyon 40 Small island 41 Goes against 45 Ability to hit a target 46 Skill and diplomacy 50 Peel 51 N.W.T. hamlet, in brief 53 Butt of jokes?

55 Rat 56 Pod prefix 57 Belgian river

59 Vous ___ fou?

60 Baseball stat.

61 Expert ending?

62 Hockey violation 64 Fuss 65 Slit made by a saw 66 Tank 68 Fleur de ___ 70 Alice Munro’s 2004 book 73 French wheat 74 Small nails 76 Kind of bean 77 Hallmark 80 Canadian heavyweight who fought Ali 84 Sask.’s animal emblem: white-tailed ___ 85 Pine’s fruit 86 Dutch South African 87 First Canadian doctor in China 89 Circle part 90 ___-a-lug 91 Angel 93 Recline 94 It may be pledged 96 Revoke 98 Watery fruit 100 High spot 101 Infuriates 102 Hard cash?

103 Condensed moisture 104 Clocked 105 Ship’s dir.

DOWN 1 Insect repellent developed by Charles Coll of N.S. 2 Winnipeg summer time 3 Coordinate 4 Indonesian waters 5 On the ball 6 Quicksand 7 Building extension 8 Sailor 9 Guitarist Liona 10 I have 11 Our first woman in space 12 Vast 13 ___ cotta 14 Pierced with horns 15 Soap or horse follower 17 European country 18 Thinhorn sheep of B.C. 24 Residence 26 Canadian inventor of music synthesizer 29 Canadian ___ Museum (Peterborough) 31 Sandwich leftover 32 French festival 34 Dec. and Jan. 35 You, to Eugénie 36 Some people can’t take them 39 Canadian scientist

who identified T-cell receptor 41 Of the eye 42 Follower of Zoroaster 43 Is nosy 44 Beer mug 46 Stench 47 Peter Robertson’s 1908 invention 48 Native-born Israeli 49 Enlighten 52 Buffet table container 54 P.E.I.’s tree: northern ___ oak 57 Word on a triangle 58 Nfld. rum 63 Stare angrily 64 Inquire 65 Inuit craft 67 Skier’s pick-me-up?

69 Ewww!

71 Seize (another’s position) 72 Poppy mo.

74 Go off on a ___ 75 Looked down on 77 A Fox 78 Tape 79 Poet Erin ___ (Search Procedures) 81 ___ or tails?

82 Toronto-born actress, “Funniest Woman in the World” (1894-1989) 83 Kitchen tearjerker

84 Courting outing 86 Neutral colour 88 “___ du pays, c’est

votre tour ...”

(Vigneault) 90 Masticate

91 Swindle 92 Canadian navy letters 95 Bind

97 ___ Lanka 99 Greek dawn goddess

WEEKLY STARS ARIES - MAR 21/APR 20 This week you'll likely lose yourself in your work, Aries. It is a peak time for presentations or discussions. The work will be interesting and will put you in a positive light for supervisors.

TAURUS - APR 21/MAY 21 You'll fail to take the advice of a close associate whose word you trust. It'll put a rift between this person and yourself, Taurus. It could be the end of a friendship.

GEMINI - MAY 22/JUN 21 Keep an eye on your finances this week, Gemini. Now's not the time to make frivolous expenditures. Double-check your money situation each time you take out your wallet.

CANCER - JUN 22/JUL 22 This will be a thought-provoking week for you, Cancer. You'll finally make decisions you've been putting off for some time

now. Spend much time alone for reflection.

LEO - JUL 23/AUG 23 A high-level executive has formed a favorable opinion of you, Leo. This will work to your advantage come year-end performance reviews and the opportunity for a salary increase.

VIRGO - AUG 24/SEPT 22 Think about your financial future, Virgo. Stop spending at every whim and sock away some savings for a rainy day. Make a firm budget plan for next year.

LIBRA - SEPT 23/OCT 23 Everyone around you seems offcenter, Libra, but you're a rock of stability. Expect others to lean on you for support in the days to come. You'll be charming and magnetic.

SCORPIO - OCT 24/NOV 22 You will be calm and focused this

week, Scorpio, so put these traits to good use by completing a work project or helping out an associate with a troubling situation.

SAGITTARIUS - NOV 23/DEC 21 You're confident and articulate this week, Sagittarius. This is especially advantageous if you'll be the center of attention during a birthday celebration.

CAPRICORN - DEC 22/JAN 20 This week will be marked by time spent with friends and family, Capricorn. Put other social engagements aside, and spend precious moments with the ones you love.

AQUARIUS - JAN 21/FEB 18 Try to wrap up important work early in the week, because a situation will make you utterly ineffective at getting things done afterward. Mercury in retrograde plays a role.

PISCES - FEB 19/MAR20 This will be a creative week for you and a chance to let your artistic side shine, Pisces. Enjoy the respite from more uniform work.

FAMOUS BIRTHDAYS DECEMBER 4 Marisa Tomei, actress (41) DECEMBER 5 Frankie Muniz, actor (20) DECEMBER 6 Janine Turner, actress (43) DECEMBER 7 Aaron Carter, singer (18) DECEMBER 8 Teri Hatcher, actress (41) DECEMBER 9 Judi Dench, actress (71) DECEMBER 10

Fill in the grid so that each row of nine squares, each column of nine and each section of nine (three squares by three) contains the numbers 1 through 9 in any order.

There is only one solution to each puzzle. Solutions, tips and computer program available at www.sudoko.com SOLUTION ON PAGE 31

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENTSPORTS • 29

Raptors spinning out of control

By Dave Feschuk Torstar wire service

A

sked recently if he has found himself looking over his shoulder for a man carrying a pink slip, Sam Mitchell, coach of the ever-struggling Toronto Raptors, shot back with the usual venom.

“I can’t worry about that,” was his response. “Those things I can’t control.”

Frankly, it’d be hilarious to hear the explanation from up top if Mitchell were to be fired in the throes of the ongoing futility. The second-year bench boss hasn’t convinced anyone he’s a strategic virtuoso or a motivational giant, but it’s tough to blame the coach when your roster is as thin as this one. That said, the spin-savvy management team that told you Alonzo Mourning wasn’t healthy enough to play for the Raptors — yes, the same Alonzo Mourning who’s leading the league in blocks — would have no trouble concocting a storyline.

But it’s still interesting to listen to the coach attempt to talk his way around 14 losses in the team’s first 15 games. Where does a fan take solace? The Raptors are one of the league’s five worst rebounding teams, but Mitchell says he can’t coach rebounding. They’re the worst defensive team in the league as measured by opponents’ field-goal percentage, but Mitchell says defenders are born, not made.

CAN’T MAKE SHOTS On nights the Raptors shoot poorly, Mitchell is wont to say something to the effect of, “I can’t go out there and make the shots.” So with shooting, defending and rebounding under the auspices of the Almighty, what’s left for a coach to do?

Certainly not tinker down the stretch of close games. Chris Young’s blog on thestar.com last week recounted Toronto’s substitution pattern in the fourth quarter of their game on Nov. 28.

In short, there was no pattern.

Mitchell stuck with Jose Calderon, Mike James, Morris Peterson, Matt Bonner and Chris Bosh for the final 5 1/2 minutes. Not that the coach is spoiled for off-the-bench choice.

“We’re losing on the little things,” Mitchell said after the game.

Burns bravely battles on

By Rosie Dimanno Torstar wire service

C

Toronto Raptors Chris Bosh watches from the bench during the fourth quarter of his team's loss against the Memphis Grizzlies Nov. 30. REUTERS/Mike Cassese

But little things stick in your mind.

In last week’s loss to the Clippers, for instance, James went to the line with Toronto down by three and five seconds to play, which meant he had to purposely miss his second free throw. Yet Mitchell left Jalen Rose on the floor as one of the Raptors’ low-block rebounders, this with arguably their best offensive rebounder, Charlie Villanueva, on the bench.

HAD HIS MOMENTS Mitchell has had his moments. The play on Nov. 28 that got Bonner an open jumper from the corner — one that tied the game 91-91 with two seconds left — was nice work. But the down-to-the-wire losses aren’t exactly consolation to the learned fan.

It’s obvious superior foes can bring the D game and still get the dubya.

Mitchell, of course, would counter that with an “I-can’t-control-whatthe-other-team-is-doing” rant. But what, exactly, can he control?

“The only things I can control is to keep working, keep these guys focused, keep ‘em playing hard and keep ‘em pointing in the right direction,” Mitchell says.

The spin is the same but the results don’t back it up. The Raptors, to review, are the worst defensive team in the league. Defence, last we checked, comes down largely to effort.

And yet the current mantra in Raptorland involves the repeated use of the phrase, “We’re playing hard.”

Some of them are and many of them aren’t. Defenders may be born, but slackers can be made. And Mitchell, in a matter well within his control, must fight hard to keep his youngsters from descending into the woeis-me slouch of the NBA loser.

ome next weekend, Pat Burns will saddle his Harley and roar off down the road. But not into the sunset. Not yet.

And then on the following Monday, the former NHL coach of the year will submit to yet another round of intensive, debilitating chemotherapy. Then he’ll come home, likely spend the whole day shivering in bed, vomiting repeatedly.

“The stuff’s poison, right? After the past year, my body’s full of poison. It knocks the s—- out of me.”

Such a difficult life, fighting cancer, the hardest thing this very tough man has ever done. But it is a life worth living, worth defending, even if the treatment often feels more brutal than the disease.

“I’m going to beat this,” 53-year-old Burns vows. “We thought we had it beaten once but then it came back. That was the worst part, the worst day, when they gave me that news. I was devastated.

“I’d been feeling so much better, was going to the gym, looking forward to coaching again after the lockout. Then — bam.

“I asked the doctor, ‘So what do we do now?’ He said, an operation and another six months of chemo.”

Burns, the one-time cop, doesn’t scare easily. But a diagnosis of cancer can put the fear of God into us all.

“I never blamed God, never got mad at God. I’ve never even said, why me?

But this is such an up-and-down disease, mentally. There are days when you’re sure you’ll beat it, when you feel strong in your head and in your body. Then there are other days when you’re nauseous and throwing up, when your stomach hurts so bad, when you’re dizzy, when you’re so weak you can hardly walk.”

Even on those bad days, most of them, Burns will force himself to get up, take his bulldog Roxie for a short stroll, smell the roses, feel the sun on his face.

It was last July, his blood pumping again as a resolution to the labour situation appeared imminent, already fooling around with possible line combinations

in anticipation of taking his place behind the New Jersey bench, that Burns discovered his cancer had returned. The original diagnosis of colon cancer had been a year previously, announced publicly only after the Devils had been ousted from the playoffs. An operation and chemotherapy had appeared to halt the disease. And colon cancer, if detected early, has a good survival rate with aggressive treatment.

This time, the reoccurrence of cancer sounded awfully dire: it was in his liver.

In August, Burns went under the knife again for a more invasive procedure. A section of the organ was removed.

However, as Burns points out, the liver is capable of regenerating itself.

It’s as a hockey man that Burns defines himself and the subject he prefers to discuss.

“I love the new hockey without all the obstruction, although the trap’s still there, for those teams that need to use it. Everybody said, oh, defensive-minded coaches will never be able handle the new rules. But I haven’t seen that.

And I won’t have any problems, either.”

Likes the shootout, as a fan, but “it would drive me crazy, behind the bench.”

At times, Burns has felt well enough to watch a hockey game. Since he resides in a small Florida town just south of Tampa, he made the trip to Tampa recently to take in the BoltsDevils match.

It was the first hockey game he’d seen, live, since the Devils were eliminated from the playoffs in 2004 and he was behind the bench.

From a private box, in the company of Devils’ GM Lou Lamoriello, he watched Jersey dump the Lightning 82. Then he went to the dressing room and mingled with the players. “It was great to see them all again. I can’t tell you how wonderful that whole organization has been to me through this, especially Lou.” But if there’s no coaching job available in New Jersey when he’s well again — because, “you’ve got to believe” — Burns will move on, as all coaches do.

“It’s what I do. It’s who I am.”

30 • INDEPENDENTSPORTS

DECEMBER 4, 2005

OF THE

DEVIL WEEK DEVIL STATS

Ilya Ejov, goaltender Age: 18, born Jan. 12, 1987 in Krasnoda, Russia Little known fact: Ilya did not start playing hockey until he moved to Montreal with his parents at the age of 11.

Favourite hockey team: “When I came here (Canada) I was a big fan of the Detroit Red Wings because they had the Red Line (Sergei Fedorov, Vyacheslav Kozlov, Igor Larionov, Viacheslav Fetisov, Vladimir Konstantinov) and won two Stanley Cups.”

Favourite hockey players: Sergei Fedorov and Vladimir Konstantinov.

Best part of living in St. John’s: “I love the people – everybody here is extremely friendly. And I like the hockey atmosphere.”

Favourite movie: Braveheart; Favourite singer: 50 Cent

NAME Oscar Sundh Scott Brophy Nicolas Bachand Luke Gallant Marty Doyle Sebastien Bernier Matt Fillier Pier-Alexandre Poulin Zack Firlotte Wesley Welcher Pat O’Keefe Olivier Guilbault Anthony Pototschnik Maxime Langlier-Parent Jean-Simon Allard Philippe Cote Josh McKinnon Matt Boland Kyle Stanley Steve Tilley

POS. LW C RW D RW D LW C D C D RW RW LW C RW D D D RW

# 10 12 23 6 43 44 27 18 5 14 11 21 24 16 4 22 8 26 3 25

GP 21 24 27 28 28 27 26 28 28 28 20 28 22 24 28 25 17 10 25 24

G 7 9 13 7 5 2 5 4 3 4 2 4 5 3 1 1 0 0 0 0

A 22 17 10 15 7 10 6 6 7 5 6 3 1 2 4 2 1 0 0 0

GOALTENDER Brandon Verge Ilya Ejov Matthew Spezza Devin O’Brien

W 3 6 1 0

L 7 8 2 1

GAA 4.08 3.87 3.99 5.06

S.PCT .893 .880 .891 .855

PTS 29 26 23 22 12 12 11 10 10 9 8 7 6 5 5 3 1 0 0 0

All stats current as of press deadline Dec. 2

HOMEGROWN “Q” PLAYER Robert Slaney Colin Escott Ryan Graham Justin Pender Brent Lynch Brandon Roach Mark Tobin Sam Hounsell

HOMETOWN Carbonear St. John’s St. John’s St. John’s Upper Island Cove Terra Nova St. John’s Pound Cove

TEAM Cape Breton Gatineau Gatineau Halifax Halifax Lewiston Rimouski Victoriaville

GP 26 23 25 11 12 28 26 2

G 1 3 7 0 0 8 8 0

A 4 7 3 0 0 16 8 0

PTS 5 10 10 0 0 24 16 0

GOALTENDERS Ryan Mior Roger Kennedy Jason Churchill

HOMETOWN St. John’s Mount Pearl Hodge’s Cove

TEAM P.E.I. Halifax Saint John

W 8 5 9

L 17 1 15

GAA 3.85 3.51 3.46

S.PCT .899 .882 .907

‘Competing against myself’ From page 32 taking them on in a couple of years.

“The 2008 Olympics, I’d like to go and get the experience. It’s a huge honour all by itself to go, but for a strong performance at the Olympics, I’m looking at 2012 in London. It would be realistic to place high (in London),” says Roberts.

While it certainly appears Roberts has the talent and drive to one day compete for an Olympic medal, he will face many obstacles along the way.

Ironically, one of his biggest challenges has nothing to do with other world-class power lifters, but stems from the fact he faces little to no competition in his home province.

Simply put, power lifting isn’t very popular here, so Roberts is in a class of his own at every provincial power-lifting meet he attends.

“When I compete here, I’m only competing against myself,” says Roberts. “I’m pretending I’m there with the top guys from Ontario, B.C., Quebec … you have to. You train, train, and train and then you get one opportunity and have to make the most of it.

“We don’t have enough participants to segregate juniors and seniors. Quebec on the other hand has their own juniors, their own seniors plus many other events throughout the year. They have hundreds and hundreds of lifters — we have 20.

We combine with Nova Scotia for some events just to make it more competitive.”

Power lifting is enough of a sleeper sport here that Roberts often finds himself explaining exact-

ly what it is he does — including the importance of combining strength and technique, a formula more commonly used by football players.

“It has to be equal because you can be a super strong guy but you won’t lift anything without the proper technique. It’s that precise,” says Roberts.

“At the same time, technique will only get you so far. Power is a big thing because you have to create this speed strength, similar to a football player — a running back driving through a crowd.”

Now that he’s about to begin competing at major international events, Roberts also has to get used to random drug testing. In short, the more you lift, the greater your chances are of being surprised at home, work or school by national officials looking for a urine sample to prove you’re not taking steroids, stimulants or masking agents.

“They have to, otherwise there’s so much people could get away with.”

Roberts says he’s not worried about being tested prior to the Commonwealth Games, simply because he doesn’t take any banned substances.

While he does dabble in legal, over-the-counter supplements such as creatine, Roberts says it simply isn’t worth it to cross the line and take illegal performance enhancing drugs.

“If you get caught, it’s two years — at least — that you’re gone and that’s a long time to sit and not compete,” says Roberts. “And also, afterwards you’ll never qualify for funding and you’ll always have a tainted name.” darcy.macrae@ theindependent.ca

Freshly baked fan From page 32 even a bit uninterested. I was beginning to wonder if it was possible he wasn’t into the game.

But then it happened.

Mike Ribeiro got the Habs on the board, beating Ed Belfour with a bad-angle shot. I watched with sheer joy as Logan’s arms shot up in the air, accompanied by the giggles and laughter that can only be associated with the sheer pleasure of watching your team claw their way back into the game.

Or so I thought.

It turns out the missus entered the room with a plate of freshly baked cookies — chocolate chip at that — at the precise time Ribeiro bulged the twine.

By the time Ribeiro was finished with the high fives and fist pumps from his teammates, Logan was on his second cookie and looking for a top up on the chocolate milk.

It wasn’t long after that Logan left me on the couch to watch the game alone. It was bath time, after all. Soon after he was tucked snugly away

in bed, eyes closed, sleeping like the little angel he is.

It’s just as well I guess. While I wish Logan was sitting next to me to watch Michael Ryder set up Tomas Plekanec’s game-tying goal, it was probably best he wasn’t there to hear the list of obscenities I let out when Craig Rivet took a tripping penalty at the end of the third period.

My language only worsened when Mats Sundin scored in overtime — a profanity-laced tirade not meant for Logan’s young ears.

But even though he was more interested in cookies than hockey, and preferred bath time to the Satellite Hot Stove, there is still hope that young Logan is on his way to being a hockey fan.

I like to think that while he lay in bed sleeping peacefully, he dreamt of pulling the red, white and blue jersey over his shoulders one day while thousands of Habs fans chant his name. If these same fans would include a plate of cookies, I’m sure Logan would oblige. darcy.macrae@theindependent.ca

DECEMBER 4, 2005

INDEPENDENTSPORTS • 31

‘Starting fresh’ Last season Jason Churchill was on one of the Q’s top teams; an off-season trade brought him to expansion team with plenty of inexperience

By Darcy MacRae The Independent

J

ason Churchill is familiar with both ends of the spectrum when it comes to the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.

Last season, Churchill was a member of one of the league’s top teams — the Halifax Mooseheads — and enjoyed a trip all the way to the Q finals before losing to Sidney Crosby and the Rimouski Oceanic. A year later, the Hodge’s Cove native is in a very different position — tending goal for the expansion Saint John Sea Dogs.

“It’s quite a bit different,” Churchill tells The Independent. “We had a lot of experience on the blueline last year — I don’t think we had one rookie on defence. That makes a lot of difference in rinks like this (Mile One) and in northern Quebec where the fans are loud and get into the game. It’s situations a veteran defenceman expects but is new to a rookie.”

ON-ICE CHEMISTRY Churchill says his new teammates are easy to get along with, but like any expansion team, on-ice chemistry takes time to develop. With a squad full of players with little or no major junior experience, he says the Sea Dogs also have a lot of growing pains to deal with.

“There’s no one coming back to this team, everyone is starting fresh. It’s kind of challenging,” says Churchill.

“Playing three in three (three games in

three nights) … a lot of the younger guys don’t know what to expect and it can be hard.”

Churchill took to the ice for two games in St. John’s Nov. 27 and 28 as the Sea Dogs challenged the Fog Devils. The games received a fair bit of hype, in part because the clubs are expansion cousins, but also because they are engaged in a three-team battle along with the PEI Rocket for the final two playoff positions in the Q’s Eastern Division.

The Fog Devils won both games, by scores of 5-1 and 6-3, leaving Churchill and the Sea Dogs distraught and frustrated.

“Dropping these four points … they were major games. We should have had these four points,” Churchill said after the 6-3 loss on Nov. 28.

Adding to Churchill’s woes is the fact he was yanked from both games after getting the starting nod each night. It was only the second and third games this season in which Churchill hit the showers early, but he was understandably upset to have it happen on consecutive nights in front of family and friends who made the trip to St. John’s from Hodge’s Cove.

“It’s kind of frustrating, getting pulled like that the first time back in your home province. But I knew I had to bounce back tonight (Nov. 28), but unfortunately I didn’t,” Churchill says.

“Two goals in a row I got caught falling asleep. I came out a little flat in the third and they (the Fog Devils) capitalized.”

Jason Churchill tends goal during a game of street hockey in St. John’s.

Although he had his share of disappointments in St. John’s, the two-game set versus the Fog Devils is not an accurate measure of Churchill’s season thus far. The Clarenville minor hockey grad has received rave reviews for his work between the Sea Dogs’ pipes, guiding the team to a pleasantly surprising record of 10-18 (pleasantly surprising when you consider they’re an expansion team), good for a playoff spot if the post-season began this week. His .907 save percentage is 10th best in the Q, a stat he has more than earned after facing the third most shots in the league (856).

Although he was yanked twice in St. John’s, Churchill also had moments that reminded those in attendance just how big a part of the Sea Dogs’ success he has been. Early in the first period of the Nov. 28 contest, Churchill watched the

Fog Devils’ Nicolas Bachand set up Scott Brophy at the lip of the crease with a perfect feed from behind the net.

Without so much as batting an eye lash, Churchill quickly got into position and let the Brophy one-timer hit him square in the chest. His dazzling glove save on Olivier Guilbault later in the frame — Guilbault beat a Sea Dogs’ defenceman wide before racing in alone and wiring a wrist shot toward the top right hand corner of the net — again demonstrated the skills that made Churchill a San Jose Sharks draft pick in 2004.

With good mobility, a sharp glove hand, and size scouts love — he stands 6’4 and weights close to 200 pounds — Churchill has a good shot of playing pro one day.

It could happen as early as next year if the Sharks sign him over the summer,

Paul Daly/The Independent

or it may wait until after Churchill attends university. While he admits to wondering if he’ll suit up in the AHL, ECHL or college ranks next season, Churchill maintains priority No. 1 is to help the young and inexperienced Sea Dogs secure a playoff position.

If he can do that, he’ll surely have impressed the Sharks’ hierarchy that much more.

“They (the Sharks) want me to have a good season, and at the end of the year start talking contract,” says Churchill.

“My main goal is to get an NHL contract, but not every player can get one.

“I think overall I’m doing pretty good this year, I just wish I could have played better these last two games (Nov. 27 and 28).” darcy.macrae@theindependent.ca

Bruins captain shocked by deal; Boston could have shopped around oe Thornton tried, with only limited success, to hide his anger.

“We’re not winning. Whose fault is it? Well, I’m out of here, so I guess it’s mine,” Thornton said Nov. 30 shortly after being traded by the Boston Bruins to the San Jose Sharks, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

Thornton’s eight-year run with the Boston Bruins ended last week with a stunning trade to San Jose, a transaction that caught the entire hockey world by surprise. Indeed, while rumours that the Bruins might be close to dumping coach Mike Sullivan were intensifying, there wasn’t even a sniff that the Bruins, who had signed Thornton to a three-year, $20 million (US) contract in the summer, were willing to try and fix their deteriorating season by dumping their 26-year-old

captain.

Thornton was the most stunned of all by the deal, a trade he found out about after finishing dinner with his parents in Boston about 7 p.m.

“They had flown in for the Ottawa game,” Thornton says. “I knew absolutely nothing. I was totally blindsided.

“Obviously (the Bruins) believed in their coach and GM (Mike O’Connell) and I’m next in line.”

The Bruins, now without a big centre in a Northeast Division that includes Jason Spezza in Ottawa and Toronto’s Big Three in Mats Sundin, Jason Allison and Eric Lindros, received youth and speed in the deal but no player remotely close to Thornton’s stature.

Speedy German winger Marco Sturm is headed to Boston along with defenceman Brad Stuart, a talented blueliner but also a young player who has yet to live up to his billing as a jun-

Solution to crossword from page 28

Solution to sudoku from page 28

By Damien Cox Torstar wire service

J

Would you like to swallow 20 pills every day, just to digest your food?

If you had cystic fibrosis, you’d have no choice.

Please help us.

1-800-378-CCFF • www.cysticfibrosis.ca

ior, particularly in terms of offensive production.

The Sharks also threw in checking centre Wayne Primeau in the deal to partially even out the financial end of the swap. Still, the Bruins dumped about $1.6 million in this year’s salary in the move, plus more than $13 million over the next two years that would have been owed the strapping pivot.

The Bruins, after signing a host of free agents in the summer, had constructed a payroll dangerously close to the $39 million cap. After owner Jeremy Jacobs ripped them for a lack of effort, Boston saved about $1 million by sending centre Dave Scatchard to Phoenix for rearguard David Tanabe, let bruiser Colton Orr and his $450,000 salary go on waivers to the Rangers and also placed veteran Shawn McEachern ($1 million) on waivers with no takers.

At first blush, the deal looks like a panic move between two clubs that

were highly ranked by many going into the season but are both mired in last place in their respective divisions after disastrous Novembers.

But while the Sharks, 0-7-3 in their last 10 games before the trade, gained the stud centre they’ve never had, the Bruins added nothing of major impact unless Stuart, the third choice of the ‘98 draft, develops into a star.

Indeed, it’s hard to look at the deal and believe they shopped around and got the best deal possible. Instead, getting Thornton out of the Eastern Conference and far from Boston was clearly a priority. And after the 6-foot-4 centre lost a faceoff to New Jersey’s John Madden in the final minute of regulation Tuesday night that resulted in the winning goal by Alexander Mogilny, the Bruins appeared to have decided that he wasn’t the marquee pivot they believed he once was.

“I’m surprised because of his youth

and the future he’s got in front of him; I’m very surprised that Boston moved him,” Sundin says. “I’ve heard some of the names that were compensated for him, but I don’t think it’s a negative for us.”

Defenceman Bryan McCabe was floored by news of the deal. “He’s one of the top players in the league and a captain, so it’s very surprising,” McCabe says. “I think he’s a great player. He makes the players around him better. He’s a great leader and I’m sure they’ll miss him.”

In San Jose, Thornton joins his cousin, ex-Leaf Scott Thornton, and Patrick Marleau, the player taken second in the ‘97 entry draft after Thornton went first.

“At 18, I came to (Boston). I’m 26 now, so I sort of grew up in the city. I love the fans,” says an emotional Thornton. “I’m disappointed. But I’ve got to move on.”

INDEPENDENTSPORTS

SUNDAY THROUGH SATURDAY, DECEMBER 4-10, 2005 — PAGE 32

Nick Roberts

Rhonda Hayward/The Independent

Weight of the world Mount Pearl’s Nick Roberts up for power-lifting medal at Commonwealth Games

By Darcy MacRae The Independent

N

ick Roberts is used to getting strange looks while working out at the gym.

It’s not that he sticks out. In fact, at first glance he’s your average 21-year-old college student with spiked hair, a goatee and book bag.

It’s when the Mount Pearl native starts lifting that he draws everyone’s attention.

With a tight T-shirt wrapped snugly around bulging shoulder, arm, back and chest muscles, Roberts looks every bit the elite athlete he is. The strength his well-defined muscles contain is quickly unleashed when Roberts begins his power-lifting exercises, much to the amazement of those around him.

“People say ‘How did you put more than 400 pounds over your head the other day with ease?’” Roberts tells The Independent.

Roberts is the third-ranked power lifter in all of Canada, and as it stands now, is a virtual shoo-in to be named to the country’s Commonwealth Games team. Just a few weeks ago he broke nine provincial records at the 2005 Newfoundland Junior/Open Weightlifting Championships in St. John’s, lifting a total of 327.5 kg over three lifts.

Along the way, he became just the second Newfoundlander to ever clean and jerk more than 400 pounds — his cousin Bert Squires, a Canadian Olympian in 1984, was the first.

Considering he doesn’t expect to hit his peak in the sport until he’s around 28, the sky is the limit when it comes to just how good Roberts can be. He has already won two national titles, including a national junior championship in 2004, and is a medal contender for the upcoming Commonwealth Games in Melbourne,

Australia, March 15-26.

“It’s like a mini-Olympics for us,” Roberts says of the Commonwealth Games.

“It’s a good playing field for us. The total I think I can do in a few weeks (340 kg) would probably win me a bronze.”

Roberts takes part in a Commonwealth Games qualifying tournament later this month, but simply has to maintain his current standing in order to earn a trip to Australia. Unless something goes drastically wrong, he will be headed for Melbourne in early March.

The 2006 Commonwealth Games will be his second international competition, having taken part in the 2004 World University Games — although that meet isn’t as competitive as the one in Australia.

“Nobody takes it (World University Games) too seriously — it’s a fun meet where everybody mingles and there’s no

animosity,” he says. “But it’s a great learning experience.”

Roberts eagerly awaits his chance to compete on the global stage in Australia, saying he looks forward to going up against some of the best power lifters in the world.

While winning a medal is his goal, Roberts is also out to help improve Canada’s standing in the world power-lifting rankings.

“It’s a sport that Canada has not dominated in at all internationally,” says Roberts.

“The ability to get to that level of the traditional super powers of the sport is what drives me.”

The traditional powers he speaks of are Russia, Bulgaria, China, Romania, Greece and Turkey. While Roberts won’t oppose any power lifters from those nations at the Commonwealth Games, he does plan on See “Competing,” page 30

The big game … and a plate of cookies

N

othing beats watching a good hockey game, especially when a few of the guys are over and one of them happens to bring along a box of Blue Star.

When the game features the Montreal Canadiens and Toronto Maple Leafs, things just get that much better.

Emotions run high, popcorn gets spilt and sometimes a beer gets placed on the coffee table without a coaster (note to self: don’t let the missus know about that one).

This scene has played out more than once in my household. It’s a rite of passage I figure, a night when men crowd around a television and

DARCY MACRAE

The game embrace the on-ice warriors who make hockey the greatest sport in the world.

The Saturday night game on Nov. 26 between the Habs and Leafs had many of these traits, minus the beer.

Instead, the beverages of choice were chocolate milk and fruit punch, since my visitor that night is not yet of legal drinking age.

You see, I took in the game with a sort of up-and-coming hockey fan — my three-year-old nephew Logan.

Logan is a healthy little boy, but by the looks of things, is going to be small statured when he grows up. For this reason, his mother feels he would make an excellent jockey, but isn’t fussy about him lining up against kids twice his size on the frozen battlefield that is a hockey rink.

But I have other plans.

I’ve secretly been trying to convince Logan that hockey’s grace and brutality combine to produce the one game he’s destined to play.

So when Logan came over for an

overnight visit, I saw an opportunity.

When the puck dropped at 8:30 p.m., I’m proud to say Logan was seated right next to me on the couch.

He had the look of a tiger in his eyes — a future gladiator if you will.

However, he showed little emotion early on, even when Toronto took a 20 lead. I just figured he was saving his cheers for when the good guys wearing red, white and blue scored, much like his “auchie Shacy” — as Logan likes to refer to me.

By the time the first period ended, Logan was getting pretty restless. It was probably because the Habs hadn’t scored yet and Don Cherry was mak-

ing yet even more ridiculous comments about visor-wearing players (note to Don: give it up already, you’re a dinosaur who knows nothing about today’s game, stop making a fool of yourself). Yet the missus was sure it was because Logan was up past his bed time. I begged to differ.

After a quick refill of the chocolate milk and a trip to the bathroom for Logan (good thing the missus was around, not sure how I would have handled that one), we were ready for the second period.

Again, Logan seemed restless, and See “Freshly,” page 30