A7

Peter T. Smith

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The provincial government's unprecedented proposal on NB Power has given us a lot to digest in just a few days. The idea that NB Power could be sold to Hydro-Québec went off like a bomb in the province last week. This week we're waiting for the smoke to clear enough to see what really going on.

My first reaction when I heard rumours of NB Power being sold to Hydro-Québec was the same as most New Brunswickers. That particular sentiment is best represented by the phrase "What the heck?" I watched Progressive Conservative leader David Alward on CBC News refuse to oppose such a deal in principle, saying it would be irresponsible to comment without seeing details, and then read Premier Shawn Graham's comments that any such deal would have to eradicate NB Power's debt and guarantee good rates for New Brunswickers, and thought, well, maybe... let's see what this is about.

Then, like most everyone else, I learned that this was basically a fully fledged agreement, and most everyone else, my reaction returned to "What the heck...?" Comments from the government that there was no deal were clearly making a differentiation where there was no essential difference, as the memorandum of understanding between the two provinces seems to be a pretty clear roadmap from the status quo to Hydro-Québec owning most of our power assets.

I don't know if this agreement is the right move or not, but there are benefits here that are very hard to ignore. And to look at them fairly, we have to set aside a number of issues that adding to the smoke around this volatile deal. Right now we need to set aside the emotion and initial reaction of shock that the government would make such a bold move. Then we can give the proposed deal a fair assessment and respond favourably, critically, or with outright rejection.

First, there's no way any government could negotiate an agreement such as this in the public eye. Both premiers have to face the electorate with some kind of framework in which a deal can happen. We might not like the secrecy, the misdirects, or appearance that NB Power will go from first to worst in the energy agenda, but if anyone is going to do this, it's a simple political reality that it would have to go this way. We all would have liked to have known more, sooner, but we didn't so let's focus now on what we do know.

Second, we should be able to continue to develop an energy hub regardless of who owns the transmission lines. Selling NB Power at first glance appears to be a step backwards on this agenda. But the big projects in recent years have been private investment, not public works. A deal that reduces industrial energy rates should help with private industrial development.

Third, judging by comments I've heard and read, for some people at least it's not so much a problem that we're selling NB Power, but that we're selling it to Hydro-Québec. People with a more right-wing economic vision aren't big fans of these utilities being in the public hands, but putting the utility into someone else's public hands instead of private industry seems like nothing more than a shell game.

For a minority of people, unfortunately, the fact that it's our francophone neighbours to the west purchasing these assets adds insult to injury. Any anti-Quebec or anti-francophone sentiment underlying criticism of this deal needs to be set aside. And, yes, they have a separatist party, but the people of Quebec have said no to that option twice, and anyway we can't fail to make deals with the province on the basis that someday the sovereignty arrangement might change.

The positives of the agreement are positive indeed. In fact, if one was going to sell NB Power, I don't think one could get a better deal. I don't even know if it's really worth $10 billion. Dropping about a third of our province's debt has tremendous appeal. We're always talking mega-project now and bailout now and political spending now and pay for it later. Maybe it is time we paid for a generation of accumulated debt instead of passing it along with interest. There's no question the rates are good for residential and industrial customers, at least for the first five years.

So the big object we're left with is whether or not it's in the public interest to maintain ownership of this public utility, particularly against the option of the positives of selling.

I don't know the answer to that question, but that's the question I think everyone has to answer for themselves on this deal.

Peter T. Smith is a teacher and writer. His column appears on Tuesday.