How is it that the province can claim a victory in a new revenue sharing deal where NS gets $870 million over 15 years… Last year the province claimed our share was worth $1.8 billion and now we’ve accepted less than half of that?
I have not seen anywhere in print where there is any recognition of the “time value of money” Try telling your banker that you will make all of your mortgage payments in year 24 of a 25 year mortgage and see what happens.
Sometimes I think the people negotiated these deals are way out of their league.
This article appears in Jul 10-16, 2008.
NS government gave it up from the start, NS government should get $0. I have no idea why Ottawa even offered anything. If the NS government gave away sable island and offshore resources, NS should have no right to claim anything back. NS GAVE IT UP!
Sometimes I think you want us to fail.
Good miles, keep that thought. I’m assuming that you think it’s good that NS gave up billions of dollars of revenue to settle for $870 million. That’s the way of thinking that’ll just lead NS to freedom, security, prosperity, and success, noooo not failure, God forbid. I guess NS tries to do the opposite of what AB does to avoid being labeled as the jealous province. Our government clearly prefers the moronic province! Hence AB is PST free and we’re still struggling with debt! I tip my hat to thee NS. Miles, please present a better argument then comment!
I actually don’t think it’s good that NS made such a crappy deal with Ottawa (which did not “give away” the oil revenues by the way, just ownership). I also don’t think that the $870 million we are getting is a big enough number considering what we are entitled to. Further, I don’t think NS deserves $0 for mistakes made by those in government 20 years ago. NS deserves what we were entitled to, which is the compensation for giving up ownership of the oil and gas resources. Further, i think that even though we got bent over by this deal, something is better than nothing and NS can put what scraps Ottawa throws at us to good use. Your original comment implies that NS should get nothing because we made a bad deal (which was supposed to give us compensation for turning over ownership) which leads me to say “sometimes I think you want us to fail”. You seem happy everytime NS does something to reinforce your “NS sucks” hypothesis. So, here is my long winded “arguement” which contains the same conclusion as my previous (brief) comment.
But Miles, if someone brings up the OBVIOUS, you can’t go around hating them for it. You said it yourself. NS GAME UP OWNERSHIP. It’s kind of like selling your house but expect the buyer to pay you rent. What messed up mentality is that? Oh ya, the Nova Scotian Mentality. Is that really what we want? Scraps from Ottawa? That are going to the pockets of your beloved Nova Scotia politicians? And Nova Scotians don’t see any of it? It’s amazing that Nova Scotians think that it’s really smart to sell something that’s worth billions for a few hundred millions! Not to mention we could have supplied ourselves with natural gas. We could have just simply made life so much easier for Nova Scotians.Miles, I do appreciate your argument, it just simply supports mine! Admitting that NS gave up ownership, Not Sold, gave up, for scraps, its kind of like telling someone i’ll give you my nice beautiful $2000 shiny watch for your gorgeous $50,000 BMW. If the NS government is that dumb, they deserve nothing!
So, Coyotex, I am not familiar with the nuances of this deal and my initial comment was not meant to discuss it, only to tease you for always ragging on NS. I would have thought you would see NS getting money to be a good thing, not bad, since we fought for 20 years to finally get what we were promised in the first place. From what I do understand about this situation, NS transferred (not gave) ownership with the agreement from the feds that we would receive compensation and that our equalization payments would not be negatively affected. This has something to do with the national energy program that got canned around 20 years ago when this “deal” was made. Ottawa tried to pull a fast one, and argued that NS was shit outta luck. NS has maintained that we are owed money in exchange for transfer of ownership…we didn’t simply “give” away ownership, we sold it. For 20 some years, Ottawa has refused to pay what NS maintains was owed to us. Finally, we now get a deal that, while not as sweet as it should be, recognizes that NS got ripped off. I think that is a positive thing and I was surprised that you do not as well. This money is good for NS and Nova Scotians fought to get it.