Harper to Conjure Up NEP Zombie to Buy $850 Million Worth of Nova Scotia Votes

Whooee! Well friends an' foes, things don't get much stranger than this. Stephen Harper's Conservative government is reviving the NEP (National Energy Program). No, I'm not referring to Harper's attempt to equate Dion's Green Shift with the NEP. Harper is actually reviving the NEP itself.

Read about it in the National Post. A tip of the tuque to Impolitical (Oh, how I wish he allowed comments. He'd have about the best blog in Canada.)

From the indispensible Impolitical:

There's likely to be outrage over this one: "Tories set to hand N.S. $850M windfall."

"The Conservative government is set to buy political peace in Nova Scotia with $850-million in taxpayers' dollars."

These funds are recommended settlement moneys from a panel of experts opining on how much Nova Scotia should get for having lost a potential ownership stake in offshore oil and gas projects.

The Crown share issue dates from the 1980s' National Energy Program and has been dormant for 20 years. Under the NEP, Nova Scotia gained a potential ownership stake in energy projects on Canadian lands off its shores. Successive governments have argued that when the NEP was dismantled in the mid-1980s, the Crown share went with it. But Nova Scotia has argued consistently that it should be compensated for loss of potential profits. (emphasis added)

In the wake of Harper messing with the Atlantic Accord last year, in order to save face with Nova Scotia, they agreed to throw in resolving this outstanding issue from the 1980's. This panel has now recommended that Nova Scotia get $850 million in compensation - for something that really was pie in the sky - and based on the Nova Scotia government's inflated numbers.

I reckon this tells everybody just how desperate the Con's are in Nova Scotia. Peter MacKay is lookin' worser and worser while the gal I adore, Earth Mother Lizzie May, keeps lookin' better an' better. Ol' Pete's on the hot seat about a bigass submarine contract that he awarded to a BC outfit. Then there was the Bill Casey fiasco.

Junior MacMoneybags is buying NS votes. Harper is reviving the NEP to make it happen. I wonder what the Alien Alberts think of their boy bringing the zombie NEP back to life in order to give away $850,000,000 to the 'the region that breeds a culture of defeatism.' Poor little Allbertans had to work hard squeezing those millions out of tar sands and now, YoBoy is handing it over to those layabouts for NOT drilling.

JimBobby