Lost in the glare of New Brunswick’s elections and post-election reporting last week were two events of significance to Canadians;

• the release of Ontario Justice Dennis O’Connor’s “Findings of Inquiry” in respect to Maher Arar, and,
• the bizarre spectacle of U.S. President George W. Bush lobbying the U.S. Congress for permissible torture legislation.

Mahar Arar was the Canadian of Syrian birth who in 2002, following the attacks of 9/11 was deported to Syria by U.S. Immigration officials (or the CIA) and allegedly tortured by the Syrians. The RCMP had suspected Arar of being part of a group of Islamic extremists linked to the Al Qaeda terrorist movement and provided this information to U.S. officials. Mr. Arar was returning from Tunisia via New York when he was detained by U.S. Immigration.

At issue in Justice O’Connor’s inquiry were four things:

• Was Canada complicit in Arar’s removal to Syria?
• Did the RCMP knowingly provide the U.S. with false information?
• Was Arar tortured by Syrian Intelligence?
• Could Canada have done more to secure Mr. Arar’s release from U.S. Immigration and later imprisonment in Syria?

Justice O’Connor concluded that the decision to ship Arar to Syria was made by the United States Immigration Service (or the CIA) without agreement or knowledge of the Canadian Government.

Indeed Canada had provided legal assistance for Mr. Arar in New York but apparently the Americans hustled him off to Syria in the middle of the night before the legals could help him. Earlier this week, the New York Times reported that when the United States sent Arar to Syria, “the deportation order stated unequivocally that Mr. Arar was a member of Al Qaeda but a few days earlier, Canadian investigators had told the F.B.I. that they had not been able to link Arar to the terrorist group”.

Context is important here.

Post 9/11, the Muslim community was put under intense scrutiny and anyone associating with known or suspected supporters of al Qaeda, casually or otherwise was put on a watch list.

Justice Connor concluded that information provided by the RCMP in respect to Arar had no basis in fact. The Mounties may have erred in judgment when they passed Mr. Arar’s name to the U.S. and for that they need reprimand but not the abuse heaped on them by our national media and Justice O’Connor.

As to the matter of torture, there are conflicting reports. Some suggest Mr. Arar was not tortured. Apparently the Canadian Consul in Damascus visited Mr. Arar in prison and did not observe signs of torture.

Justice Connor says unequivocally that Arar was tortured but doesn’t tell us how he arrived at this conclusion. U.S. officials refused to testify at the inquiry. I’m not sure if Arar testified yet Justice O’Connor concluded that he was tortured and says Canadian officials should have assumed he was tortured.

Some of the Commission’s testimony was taken in-camera (no public allowed) so we may never know the full story. What we do know is that Arar has surrounded himself with a high priced legal team. He orchestrates a very professional public relations campaign and I understand he has launched a $5 million lawsuit against the Government of Canada, the RCMP and others he blames for his deportation.

Could Canada have done more to prevent Arar’s deportation or his alleged torture? Not likely.

Canada has no authority and no influence in Syria. Could the U.S. have intervened with Syria on Arar’s behalf? Theoretically yes, but keep in mind it was the U.S. that deported the man to Syria. A U.S. Administration obsessed with terrorists and the right to torture is not likely to intervene on behalf of a torturee.

Consider that U.S. President George W. Bush asserted before Congress recently that U.S. laws against torture and Congressional oversight of such activity should apply only to interrogations that take place on American soil. In his view, if the CIA uses "alternative procedures" in Iraq, or Syria, or in secret CIA prisons abroad, those should not be considered illegal

The Geneva Convention’s Common Article III on the treatment of captured prisoners is quite clear and specific: no country is permitted to use "cruel" treatment or "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment" on prisoners in its care.

Bush says that’s too vague and CIA interrogators need "latitude" in interrogating and torturing suspects.

The Pentagon's senior lawyers accept the clarity of Geneva and openly disagree with the Bush interpretation. Colin Powell, Bush's former Secretary of State joins in opposing the President’s legislation, warning that "the world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism."

Senator John McCain (who was tortured as a POW in Hanoi) and others point out that the U.S. would put its captured troops in great jeopardy of "cruel and degrading" treatment - torture - similar to what the CIA or its proxies are/were meting out in secret prisons abroad.

At a recent news conference, Bush suggested that Senators McCain and his Senate colleagues were endangering U.S. security by opposing his legislation to allow harsh interrogation of detainees. The Bill passed Congress on Wednesday. On Thursday, it was passed by the Senate.

For the first time in the history of the planet, a government may have legalized torture.

On Thursday Royal Canadian Mounted Police Commissioner Giuliano Zaccardelli apologized for the RCMP’s contribution to the U.S. decision to deport Arar to Syria. The Government of Canada is considering making a formal protest to Washington on the matter.

Good luck, so long as George W. Bush is President, there will be no apology from the United States for mid-night transfers of suspected terrorists to countries of torture and there will be no apology for Mr. Arar’s deportation to Syria and his alleged torture.

W.E. (Bill) Belliveau is a Shediac resident and Moncton business consultant. He can be contacted at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com Atlantic Insight is a published Blog inventory of opinion articles published weekly in New Brunswick's print media as written by W.E. (Bill) Belliveau, who is a resident of Shediac, New Brunswick, and small business owner, operating his Moncton-based marketing consultancy, Bell Strategic. He can be reached by e-mail at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com

On Monday past, the Liberals were declared winners of New Brunswick’s provincial election winning a majority 29 of 55 seats.

As pre-election polls had indicated, the vote was close with the Conservatives polling 47.5% of the vote and the Liberals polling 47.1 %. However, when you factor in the Independent and NDP vote, 52.5% of the electorate voted against the Conservatives and that’s what gave Mr. Graham his winning numbers. He will now become Premier of New Brunswick.

Mr. Graham’s first task will be to appoint a cabinet.

One should expect that his priorities, the economy, education and energy will dictate that the most competent in his caucus be placed in positions that allow him to address these priorities.

• Greg Byrne would be an excellent choice for Finance.

• Mike Murphy would look good in Economic Development.

• Kelly Lamrock would be a good choice for Energy.

• Rick Doucett would be good for Fisheries & Aquaculture and,

• Victor Boudreau would be terrific in Health.

There are three women in the Liberal caucus. I don’t know them personally but I would recommend that at least two of them should be in Graham’s cabinet if not all three. Bernard LeBlanc from the new Memramcook-Lakeville-Dieppe riding would also be a solid choice for cabinet. There will be others from Saint John and Fredericton.

One of the most important cabinet selections for Mr. Graham will be Education.

The Province needs somebody in that portfolio who has the ability to step back and analyze the problems in our education system and then to come back to us with some solutions. It could be one of the above cabinet designates or it could be someone new to the scene.

New Brunswick’s tourism industry struggled this year. It needs urgent attention. The cabinet minister who assumes responsibility for tourism will have to jump into the marketing fray with big dollars and innovative plans to turn the industry around.

Once the cabinet is set and the Government is sworn, Mr. Graham will have to organize his priorities. What he does and says in the first hundred days in office will characterize his government for at least the next four years. Too many promises or too many priorities will blur the landscape.

The appropriate planning and right strategic decisions will solidify his hold on power. An early miss-step could damage his image and the image of his government, making it difficult to effect real change. Focus will be essential.

Once in government, there are some house-cleaning matters that will need immediate attention: removal of the 3.8% excise tax on gasoline, help for seniors, grants for post-secondary students and a decision on public versus private auto insurance. In the longer term, the new government will need to focus on its triple “E” platform of education, economic development and energy. There will be need to articulate real objectives and programs to support them.

The Liberal platform should be turned into a working business plan. The disciplines of a business plan could bring purpose and strategy to the workings of government. Mr. Graham cannot afford to have a dozen mini-governments headed by a dozen independent cabinet ministers. He needs a cabinet singly focused on the priorities of government as distinct from the established priorities of departmental bureaucracies.

Think of it as an arrowhead with the tip focused on self-sufficiency and the wedge-shaped body of the arrowhead fleshed out by education, economic development and energy.

To make self-sufficiency more than a dream, there has to be a plan to get us there. There has to be a plan for dealing with day to day issues. There are seniors’ issues to be attended. There are problems in the healthcare-system that need attention, there are highway issues that need to be addressed and there are promises of auto insurance improvements that will challenge Mr. Graham in the next sixty to a hundred days.

That said, the new Premier should consider a three-pronged approach to self-sufficiency and the definition of self-sufficiency: The first prong might be described as the maintenance and improvement of services such as seniors care, healthcare and the delivery of affordable energy. The second prong would focus on the tools of economic development such as education, transportation, investment and innovation.

The third would focus on revenue generation and include tourism, the development and export of clean energy, a strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the addition of value to our natural resources.

None of this can be done without good people. We need to find ways to keep our best and brightest in New Brunswick. We need to find ways to attract and hold new talent in New Brunswick. We need to make the Province a destination in the broadest sense of the word.

It will be easy for our new Premier to get caught up in the newness of his job. It will be easy for him to fall into the trap of ‘business as usual’ that will be presented to him by public servants and special interest groups. He should resist that temptation. He needs to step back in the calm of day and establish his work plan. He has about six months to make real change a reality. After that he’ll be fighting bush-fires and finding it more difficult to see the forest for the trees.

My advice would be to delay opening of the Legislature until the Premier-to-be has his work plan fully formulated. He needs to go into the Legislature with single minded focus and an unassailable plan to achieve real and necessary change.

Twenty five years (Graham’s time frame for self-sufficiency) is a long time. To get there, the basics have to be right.

Along the way, New Brunswick may have to deal with global issues such as climate change, energy fall-outs from a Middle Eastern war and more local issues like coastal flooding.

I wish Mr. Graham and his team good luck and God speed. They have been granted an opportunity denied to most who seek public office. May they use it well!

W.E. (Bill) Belliveau is a Shediac resident and Moncton business consultant. He can be contacted at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com Atlantic Insight is a published Blog inventory of opinion articles published weekly in New Brunswick's print media as written by W.E. (Bill) Belliveau, who is a resident of Shediac, New Brunswick, and small business owner, operating his Moncton-based marketing consultancy, Bell Strategic. He can be reached by e-mail at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com

Last Sunday, the three party leaders debated in French and English.

I missed the CTV forum on Thursday so I’ll reference the Sunday debates. To be fair they really weren’t debates, more Q & A sessions. That’s short for a questions and answers.

The questions were anticipated and the answers were scripted. There were no telling blows but there was a subtle change in strategy that is often the first indicator of change.

In Sunday’s session, the Premier took after Liberal Leader Shawn Graham calling him an obstructionist, accusing him of attacking teachers and students and fighting the Conservatives’ obsession with tax-reduction. When an incumbent leader starts attacking his opponent, it’s usually a sign that he is feeling the heat of battle.

To my knowledge, Graham has never attacked a teacher or a student.

He has simply acknowledged a truth and that is that New Brunswick suffers from the highest rate of functional illiteracy in the Country and New Brunswick students on average have the lowest test scores in Canada. Logic would tell you we have a serious problem in this Province.

Education is key to our economic future. If we are not making the grade, there has to be something wrong with our education system or there has to be something wrong with our culture or our society in that it chooses to tolerate the existing circumstance.

Mr. Graham is quite right to bring our education-deficit to the public’s attention. He is quite right to question the system. That is not a critique of teachers or their students. It is a cry in their defense and recognition of a problem that needs to be fixed. We cannot afford to ignore it any longer.

Another sign of concern was the Premier’s attack on Mr. Graham for opposing his tax cuts. That was followed by a last minute promise by the Premier to cut provincial income taxes by 2% a year for the next four years.

The reduction assumes an annual rate of inflation of 2% so the net impact for taxpayers will be zero. Numerically, the impact on government will also be zero but here’s the catch, the spending power of a no-growth revenue stream will effectively be reduced by 2% a year.

The cost of lost tax revenue over four years would be an estimated $120 million.

• Where will that money come from?

• Will it be found in higher fees for government services or in higher electricity rates that would permit NB Power to deliver surplus funds to the government?

• The federal government provides some 40% of the government’s current revenue. How will it react to further tax cuts by the province?

Everyone would prefer to have their taxes lowered. We also want the services that are provided by government – hospitals, schools, teachers, highways, etc. If the government should be allowed to shrink its tax revenue, it will have fewer dollars to pay for these services.

The wealthiest in our community benefit most from reductions in income tax. There is no jurisdiction in the world that I know of where persistent tax-cutting has created wealth for the majority of its citizens. It’s true that Albertans benefit from tax cuts and the province is wealthy. The difference is that Alberta’s tax-cuts are funded by royalties earned from the harvesting of oil and gas.

New Brunswick cannot afford to push business or high earners away from the province with high taxes but neither can the province afford to compete with Alberta’s tax regime unless we find a way to replace the revenue lost from tax-cuts. Two thirds of our residents need help with their reading and the Lord wants to give away the money that could help them learn.

People have been critical of this election campaign saying it’s boring, too quiet, without issues.

Quiet elections are often an indicator of pending change because people have already made up their mind about where they will deliver their vote. Another sign of change is high voter turnout at advance polls. That has been the case this election.

Change possibility is also found in the Conservative advertisement where Mr. Lord is pictured with Stephen Harper and boasts of their “strong relationship”. If Mr. Lord was confident of a win, he wouldn’t be sharing space with the Prime Minister.

On Tuesday following the debate, a poll conducted by Corporate Research Associates (CRA) showed the Liberals with a two point lead 44% to 42% for the Conservatives. More significantly, the poll showed an 8% increase in support for Graham as Premier, closing to within four points of Lord. The poll acknowledged a plus or minus margin of error of 3.8%. That means that Graham could actually have been ahead of Lord.

Confirmation of the CRA results was delivered Thursday evening by a CTV poll that showed the Liberals leading 45% to 43% with 11% for the NDP.

To confuse matters, Bristol/Omnifacts released the results of both a poll and a panel survey yesterday. The poll showed the Conservatives with a 1% lead and a 3.1% margin of error, in other words a tie. The panel survey which has a significantly higher margin of error (5%) when compared to the poll shows the Conservatives with a 5% lead. This newspaper chose to headline results of the panel survey.

In the absence of a weekend swing, it seems we have a horse race.

Indeed, the election could be a real nail-biter. The wild card could be the NDP. They could be spoilers. They could also be king-makers.

If a small percent of NDP supporters move to the Liberals, we could have a majority Liberal government late Monday evening.

W.E. (Bill) Belliveau is a Shediac resident and Moncton business consultant. He can be contacted at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com Atlantic Insight is a published Blog inventory of opinion articles published weekly in New Brunswick's print media as written by W.E. (Bill) Belliveau, who is a resident of Shediac, New Brunswick, and small business owner, operating his Moncton-based marketing consultancy, Bell Strategic. He can be reached by e-mail at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com

Most people would agree the first few weeks of the provincial election campaign were a bore.

Nobody scored points.

Everyone tossed policy planks against the wall hoping one or two would stick. Labour Day came and went, nothing was sticking.

On Wednesday, Saint John Lancaster Conservative candidate Peter Hyslop who prior to his candidacy was a public intervener before hearings of the Public Utility Board on electricity rate increases, called for someone in government to apologize to New Brunswickers for the Orimulsion fiasco.

After weeks of trying to get the issue in front of voters, the Liberals jumped on Hyslop’s remarks. The Premier denied responsibility and blamed management of NB Power for the boondoggle.

Guess what folks, it was the Premier and his Cabinet who made the $750 million decision and publicly announced the decision to refurbish the Coleson Cove generating plant so it could burn Orimulsion. The Venezuelan fuel was supposed to save electricity users $100 million a year for the next twenty years. That’s $2 billion dollars. There is no Orimulsion. There was no contract for the supply of Orimulsion.

The Premier says he was told by NB Power officials that everything was in order so they are to blame for the multi-billion loss.

What businessman or group of business people would make a $750 million decision, knowing the decision was based on the supply of a specific fuel and without knowing the supply was in place and assured?

• When people build office towers, they do so only with signed tenant agreements.
• When companies build aircraft, they do so only when they have signed purchase agreements from airlines or governments.
• When construction firms build highways, they do so with signed contracts from governments.
• When a car dealer orders a factory car, he does so with a signed purchase order.

None would undertake these projects on the basis of a memorandum of intent or an employee’s assurance that everything was in order. The Premier cannot escape blame for this decision.

On Thursday, I watched the French language leadership debate between Premier Lord and Opposition Leader Shawn Graham. I don’t understand a lot of French so I missed much of what was being said.

I didn’t miss the body language, voice tones or the facial colour changes. Mr. Lord is fluent and comfortable in French. Mr. Graham is more accomplished in French than I had previously assumed but his first language is clearly English. Mr. Lord’s delivery was confident but cool. Mr. Graham seemed relaxed and more personable.

There was one telling moment in the French language debate when Mr. Graham raised the issue of Orimulsion. The Premier fought back but he was clearly agitated and turned red in the face.

Guilty, not guilty or just p----- off because he knows that he bears some responsibility for the Coleson Cove/Orimulsion decision?

Who knows but I know this, the matter has earned the right of public inquiry. If that decision is going to cost us 2 or 3% a year on our electricity bill, we need to know who to blame so he or they can be replaced.

A business executive who made a $750 million mistake, even with the best of intentions would be fired in a heartbeat.

There are pressing issues to be discussed in this election but Orimulsion may be the defining issue because it speaks to competence and integrity.

In the English debate, Mssrs Lord and Graham shared the stage with NDP Leader Allison Brewer. This discussion created few sparks.

Lord deflected criticisms from Brewer and Graham appeared confident, relaxed in his skin and more polished than expected. Once again he scored points on the Orimulsion issue and Lord’s refusal to take responsibility for the multi-billion dollar decision.

During a particularly heated point in the discussion, Graham suggested that the Orimulsion fiasco will cost New Brunswick households some $8,000 and demanded an apology from Lord. The Lord didn’t respond.

I think the demand for apology misses the point. Apology is not enough. If the Lord is responsible, then he needs to wear the decision.

Lord promised that a third Conservative mandate would mean continued fiscal responsibility. He said that “leadership is about vision and making decisions...”. I agree with him. That’s why the Orimulsion decision may prove to be the defining issue in this campaign.

We have issues of education and wealth/job creation in New Brunswick. We have issues of healthcare and seniors care in New Brunswick. We have issues of population decline and skill shortages.

Each one demands the vision, the wisdom and the competence of individuals who can lead us toward solutions. Can we afford to entrust that leadership to people who make $750 million mistakes?

I was born in Moncton but I have only lived in this area for the last fourteen years. I have spent parts of every summer of my life here and lived elsewhere in the region for another dozen years.

Ever since I first moved to Atlantic Canada thirty years ago, I have been listening to people who say we are a “have-not” region or a “have not” province. We are not.

We are a region with economic and social challenges. We are a region far too dependent on federal government largess but we can do something about it and that makes us a “have region”. The only difference between having and not is leadership.

If we want to be a “have province” we have to select the leaders who can lead us to “have land”.

W.E. (Bill) Belliveau is a Shediac resident and Moncton business consultant. He can be contacted at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com Atlantic Insight is a published Blog inventory of opinion articles published weekly in New Brunswick's print media as written by W.E. (Bill) Belliveau, who is a resident of Shediac, New Brunswick, and small business owner, operating his Moncton-based marketing consultancy, Bell Strategic. He can be reached by e-mail at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com

The latest provincial election poll shows the Conservatives marginally ahead of the Liberals but some 37% of voters polled say they are still undecided.

So what does that mean?

It could mean voters have been tuned off by the barrage of promises cascading from both sides of the fence.

It could mean that summer is not over yet and voters are still ignoring the election.

It could mean that Shawn Graham’s Liberals are in the thick of things and Bernard Lord’s Conservatives should be concerned or it could simply mean that people have not changed their minds since the last provincial election.

Whatever it means, one thing is clear, neither leader has been able to communicate his vision for New Brunswick. A promise to cap property assessments is not a vision. It’s a tactical ploy. A promise to invest $100 million Northern New Brunswick economic development initiative is not a vision but it’s a step in the right direction.

Vision is the product of imagination or dreams about the future.

A vision provides a glimpse of how things might be or could be. Sixty eight percent of New Brunswickers are functionally illiterate. A visionary might see a point in the future where 100% of New Brunswickers would be literate. An election platform would tell us how we might get there.

My point is this; a list of election promises does not constitute a vision. It’s simply a shopping cart full of Band-Aids.

Premier Lord promises to provide quality education, better health and senior care, more jobs, lower taxes, affordable energy, a cleaner environment and balanced budgets. It sounds a little bit like motherhood.

Who could be critical of such plans?

The devil of course will be found in the details.

The Premier’s self-definition of vision is planted in his five-in-five plan – a set of goals to be realized over five years. The first of five is the promise that New Brunswick will be known as the “smart province” by 2011. Supposedly, it will earn this reputation by having the largest increase in workers with post-secondary education in Canada.

Is that from 1% to 2% or from 10% to 20%?

Big difference! There is no mention of literacy in the Conservative equation, no definition of “post-secondary education” and no benchmark from which to measure.

The second of five is the Premier’s promise to have New Brunswick known as the “wellness province”. To achieve its wellness reputation, the province will experience “the biggest increase in physical fitness in the country”.

Wow! If everyone is more fit, will waiting times in our hospitals be reduced? How do you measure fitness and how do you measure an increase in the fitness of 750,000 people?

Moving on to number three, we have the promise that by 2011, New Brunswick will have the biggest reduction in water and air pollution in the country. This from a man who boasts of his tight relationship with Stephen Harper, the anti-Kyoto man.

Number four boasts the biggest reduction in poverty rates in Canada.

• What percent of our population lives in poverty?
• Is it ten percent, twenty percent or thirty percent?
• How does that compare to other provinces?
• Would a drop from twenty percent to eighteen percent qualify as the biggest reduction in Canada?

Rounding off the five is the Premier’s promise that New Brunswick will have the lowest tax burden, east of Alberta by 2011.

Does that mean we will also have the lowest level of government services in Canada?

Does that mean our highways will be sacrificed to the taxman? Does that mean that healthcare and education will be under funded?

Nowhere in the Premier’s five-for-five plan is there mention of energy or economic development or job creation. I guess that makes sense because Mr. Lord presided over the Orimulsion fiasco that will eventually cost New Brunswickers about $2.7 billion for the retrofit of Coleson Cove and higher fuel costs estimated to be $100 million a year. This is the same man who took control of NB Power and presided over rate increases of 8.9% between April 2004 and July 2005 and then added another 8% in 2006.

To ease the pain, he has offered to rebate the 8% sales tax on electricity and home heating fuels twice a year. The rebates will come after we have been burdened with payment of the additional 8%. Think about that when you pay your electricity bill for December and January.

That begs the question is there an alternative?

Liberal leader Shawn Graham has been making some me-too promises but he does seem to have a clearer sense of purpose in his platform. He envisions New Brunswick as a self-sufficient “have province”. He sees this province as a continental leader in energy conservation and environment-friendly energy production. He sees energy as a wealth creator not a drain on the public purse.

Mr. Graham recognizes education as the foundation for change. He sees economic development and job creation as essential components of the growth that will lead us to self-sufficiency. He proposes an initiative for northern New Brunswick that would include investments in transportation, communications, tourism and industrial infrastructure to narrow the gap between north and south.

Is he a visionary?

Who knows but he does have a vision of self-sufficiency that is a lot more impressive than a handful of immeasurable goals.

If Graham wants to win this election, he should spend the next few weeks telling people what he will do to help this province become economically self-sufficient.

Everything else is window dressing.

W.E. (Bill) Belliveau is a Shediac resident and Moncton business consultant. He can be contacted at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com Atlantic Insight is a published Blog inventory of opinion articles published weekly in New Brunswick's print media as written by W.E. (Bill) Belliveau, who is a resident of Shediac, New Brunswick, and small business owner, operating his Moncton-based marketing consultancy, Bell Strategic. He can be reached by e-mail at bill.bellstrategic@nb.aibn.com