Cochrane: Contradictions and hypocrisy at the House of Assembly

If you watched the government and the opposition spar in question period this week, it would be hard to believe they are talking about the same province and the same economy at the same point in time.

Using the same set of facts, each side spins vastly different narratives.

Each one is rooted in the extreme edges of the truth. But each one is also riddled with blatant contradictions.

The way the Liberals present it, Newfoundland and Labrador is a debt-ridden province, headed for an imminent financial catastrophe. The riches of the oil windfall have been wasted. Muskrat Falls has the potential to be the fiscal nail in the coffin if the costs continue to rise.

The governing Toriespresent a very different picture.

Newfoundland and Labrador is in the middle of a golden age, guided in no small part by the wisdom of successive PC premiers.

Incomes are up. Unemployment is down. Billions in infrastructure spending protected the province from the worst of the global recession. Oil project equity stakes and hydro megaprojects will secure the province's future for decades. These are the good old days.

No room for nuance

This is the binary nature of the political conversation that happens in the House of Assembly most days.

In the zero sum game of politics there is little room for nuance or factual concession.

There is, however, ample room for self-contradiction.

While Dwight Ball and Cathy Bennett focused this week on the financial challenge the province is facing, other Liberal MHAs presented a litany of demands that would cost the public treasury millions: More classroom space for all-day kindergarten, upgrades to the T'Railway system, a comprehensive rural economic development plan, a diabetes registry and management program, an expedited and more comprehensive Corner Brook hospital, an upgraded but cheap electricity system, new courts for Labrador, and so on and so on.

The luxury of Opposition

Much of the attack focuses on government neglect. Much of the attack focuses on broken government promises.

But if you're going to slam the government for failing to live up to a promise, implicit in that criticism is a promise that you will deliver. It is the luxury of Opposition to ask for something without having to pay for it.

That may hold true for now. But with an election less than a year way, it's possible the Liberal caucus is writing cheques the provincial treasury can't cash.

The same level of self-contradiction holds true on the government side of the house.

Despite a deficit that is $500 million dollars and climbing each day, the PCs spent considerable time this week boasting about past credit rating upgrades that came in a time of US $100 oil.

Selling their record

There is a lot of praise for past spending, while minimizing the three (soon to be four) straight years of deficits as a temporary setback caused by global oil markets. There is plenty of prosperity right around the corner, just as soon as new oil projects kick in or prices rebound.

But at the same time the government is selling its record of fiscal stewardship, it is digging in its heels on unpopular and financially minor spending cuts. The most glaring example is the now extinct family violence intervention court.

The court cost a mere $500,000 a year but has extracted many times that amount in political cost since it was axed in last year's budget. It is an insignificant line item in the billions government spends each year.

When the court was launched as a pilot project, oil was trading at about US $53 a barrel, far less than it is today even with the recent slide. The cut has left the government arguing that a have-province in the midst of an oil boom can't afford a half-million dollars to protect women and children from the ills of family violence.

This is the contradiction in the daily political debate.

On one side, it's the opposition warning of financial mismanagement and disaster, while simultaneously making expensive demands. On the other, it's the government preaching and promising prosperity, while simultaneously telling people they can't have nice things.