The Black Rod

Whither Liberals? We've been asked why we don't write anything about the Liberal Party in our provincial election coverage. Oh, c'mon. The what? There hasn't been a viable Liberal Party in Manitoba since the Swinging Sixties (that's more than FORTY YEARS AGO), and that includes the wacko election of 1988 when it became the official opposition under Sharon Carstairs with 20 MLA's, most of whom were shocked to find they had actually won their seat. One winner wanted to know if becoming an MLA meant he had to quit his job at Consumer Distributing. The Liberals haven't elected enough members to the Manitoba Legislature to rank as an official party since 1995---that's merely 16 years ago. They should run as the Ghost of the Liberal Party. In the last provincial election they got a whopping 12 percent of the popular vote. The news media continues to pretend there is a Liberal Party in Manitoba because the don't want to admit the truth. ...

An election financing scandal with the potential of disqualifying all NDP-endorsed candidates in the Winnipeg civic election has erupted in Mynarski ward. Comments made by NDP candidate Ross Eadie at an all-candidates forum on Monday have prompted a formal complaint to Elections Manitoba. The charges involve such a serious breach of election laws that any investigation must also include everyone running under the NDP banner in the election. It will be the first test of Elections Manitoba since the retirement last April of former chief electoral officer Richard Balasko who helped the NDP cover up a scheme by the party during the provincial election of 1999 to file phony candidate expense forms and fraudulently collect rebates from the public purse. During the all-candidates' forum at the Norquay Community Centre, Eadie...well, why don't we let an eyewitness tell the story. AlexLV, as he calls himself, posted this play by play on the Winnipeg Free Press website W...

The complaint from the Manitoba Hydro Whistleblower has been punted back to the province's do-nothing Ombudsman. The Public Utilities Board last month told the whistleblower, a New York energy risk consultant, " Tough luck, sweetie. It's not our job to see if Hydro pissed away a billion dollars of taxpayers' money." Their exact words in bureauspeak were: "The Board’s jurisdiction derives from The Public Utilities Board Act of Manitoba and The Crown Corporations Public Review and Accountability Act, in connection with regulatory responsibility for MH. As a result, it is not possible for the Ombudsman or the Auditor General to transfer their investigations to the Boa rd, although this may have appeared to be the process to the NYC . The Board is also not governed or bound by The Public Interest Disclosure (Whistleblower Protection) Act in the completion of its statutory responsibilities." So the complaint is back in the hand...

The first day of the December rump session of the Legislature turned out to be an unexpected day of revelations. Hugh McFadyen revealed why he is the worst Opposition leader in living memory and why he's no threat to the NDP government with or without Gary Doer. And unelected Premier Greg Selinger revealed why the NDP's "historic" Whistleblower legislation is--- and will continue to be--- a farce. McFadyen went on the attack from the start, and promptly fell flat on his face. Why, he asked the Premier, was there no mention of Manitoba Hydro in the Throne Speech, "when Manitobans are seeing their rates go up by 9 percent over two years with the prospect of severe rate hikes into the future." Hon. Greg Selinger (Premier): "The member from Fort Whyte first makes a comment about the rates. Let's remember it was him-it was he that, in the last election, promised to increase rates to full market value and stick it to every single Manitoban with a 40 perc...

Transcripts of meetings of Legislature committees are generally pretty dull reading. So why, we asked ourselves, were we getting a chill up our collective spines. Suddenly, it was clear. Without knowing it, we had entered---- the NDP's Hallowe'en House of Horrors. Page after page of last week's regularly scheduled Public Affairs Committee meeting were filled with demonic scenarios, ghosts of scandals past, and disgraces risen from the dead to scare us once again. Continue reading at your own risk. There are no treats here. Audits that go bump in the night or, Don't Call Me Quasimodo Carol Bellringer knows how fishy it looks for her to be auditing her friends and colleagues at Manitoba Hydro. But she's determined to plow ahead, the public's concern for ethics be damned. "I don't actually believe that I do have a conflict, but we do acknowledge and accept the fact that there could be that perception with the public," Bellringer, Manitoba's Audit...