Stagg Editorial- March 1996

Voisey Bay holds the greatest mineral discovery in Canada since the Sudbury mines made Inco an international code word for nickel. This makes the frozen barrens of northern Labrador a prime piece of Bay Street real estate capable of influencing the national economy in major ways. This mining bonanza is a resource requiring the attention of the stewards of the national interest of Canada. That means that Newfoundlanders should be on the defensive taking special caution against the economic kidnapping of this treasure.

The precedent for caution is to be found in the rage and sorrow and shame of Churchill Falls. It was the fabled and infinitely flexible " national interest " that cost Newfoundland its birthright claim to the ownership and sale of electricity drawn from the roaring inertia of the Hamilton River. It was a mute and pitiless federal government that refused to allow a power corridor for Newfoundland electrical wires over Quebec land. It was the national interest that required the federal government to stand idly by while government after government in Newfoundland performed futile legal contortions in an effort to rid itself of the contractual Albatross that was and is Churchill Falls.

Now the riches of the huge mineral quarry that is Voisey Bay are Newfoundland's for the time being. Beware however the lusty bray of a federal government making militant noises towards its once and future Quebec suitor. When the tearful frenzy of rejected love is quelled it will take many gifts and offerings to provide the solid ballast for a safe and sound second honeymoon. The partitioning of Quebec is a mirage to confound and delude the country while the "Quebec round " plays out the same nauseous routine that begat the variations on appeasement that pass for a national policy on Quebec. Voisey Bay and its development and industrial exploitation must not result in Quebec building a twenty-first century Sudbury on the foundation of a black wedding gift from the all-time losers in Ottawa.

Churchill Falls : Never again.

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