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Vol. 25, No. 01 GOVERNMENT AND POLITICAL ANALYSIS January 4, 2012 AT THE CUTTING EDGE: REPUBLIC OF MINING BLOGS ABOUT THE NORTH As a devout generalist, ready to splash around in puddles that are a mile wide provided they are not more than an inch deep, IQP defers to and relies upon the many specialists who drill deeply in one field or even more. One such is Stan Sudol, a talented writer and energetic researcher whose long experience of all things mineral is evident to those who keep up with his RepublicOfMining.Com web-site and blog postings. A self-professed Sudbury Inco-brat he worked for the companys Clarabell Mill in 1976-77 and underground at the Frood-Stobie mine in 1980 he now calls Toronto home but still keeps a close eye on northern Ontario and mining issues. He also worked at various Queens Park ministries in the late nineties and early part of this decade as a communications consultant. IQP is very proud to announce that todays issue marks the beginning of our 25th year of publication. Expect to hear before 2012 is much older about our plans to celebrate this splendid benchmark. The blog is a combination of Sudols columns, industry news releases, speeches, opinion pieces and an aggregator of mainstream media mining news. Past Northern Development & Mines minister Mike Gravelle had many of his speeches posted on the blog. Sudol says, In contrast to the avalanche of anti-mining information on the internet and in the media, RepublicOfMining.com tries to ensure that clear and accurate facts about the mineral industry are available on the web at what is seen as the first source for media, politicians and public. RepublicOfMining.com posts both the good and the bad about the industry and professes to be the largest digital database for media information about the Ring of Fire mining camp, the most important mineral discovery in Canada for a generation, if not longer. In October 2011, Australian-based Mining IQ, a mining guide and international learning and communications portal, put RepublicOfMining.com, which has been in existence for four years, on its list of Top 10 Mining Blogs, one of only two Canadian sites to be included. Mining IQ says, We especially like the variety of categories available on the site with commentary from aboriginal mining to mining education and women in mining to green mining. The Canadian Business Ethics Research Network called RepublicOfMining.com The ultimate mining database! It continued: A new blog is fast becoming a go-to resource for professionals and academics involved in the mining and resource extraction industries. Republic of Mining has in fact become a large, wellresearched repository for articles and information about Aboriginal mining issues in Canada and abroad. In addition to his blog, Sudols mining commentary routinely appears in Ontario print and radio and he is an occasional guest on Steve Paikins The Agenda when northern Ontario and mining issues are debated. Current Ontario government policies that affect northern Ontario and the mining industry are giving him a lot to write about. A recent lengthy column on the Financial Post op-ed page raked the McGuinty LIBs over what Sudol terms the proverbial coals about the Far North Act demand to turn half the Far North into provincial parks. There has been heated opposition from the mining sector and most importantly, outright rejection of the Act by the vast majority of the regions Aboriginal communities. The column highlighted many Aboriginal/mining industry success stories. Sudol says: Once-proud Ontario has turned into a have-not province receiving $2.2B in equalization payments in fiscal 2011-12. Moodys has placed the province on credit watch. Our social programs are not sustainable and yet the mining sector which wants to sustainably develop the norths rich mineral potential, create jobs and tax revenue is being held back by government policies that are detrimental to the industrys vibrancy. This is green economic madness! Sudols May 30, 2011 commentary in the Toronto Star highlighted the need for both the provincial and federal governments to invest taxpayer funds to build a railroad into the geologically rich chromite, nickel, copper to name just a few minerals Ring of Fire deposits in the far north to create jobs in both the south and north and provide employment for the regions desperately poor Aboriginal communities. The junior mining sector is the lifeblood of the industry, doing the vast majority of greenfield exploration. The extremely rich Ring of Fire mining camp was discovered by junior companies which are also very upset with the Mining Act revisions, says Sudol. The government claims to be consulting with the industry but rarely listens to what we recommend. There is a real fear in the junior sector that current changes will drive many out of the province. As Sudols blog highlights, the world is in the middle of a commodity super-cycle driven by industrialization and urbanization of China, India and many other developing countries which cant modernize without the mineral products northern Ontario digs out of the ground. Well be hearing a lot more from Stan Sudol and the RepublicOfMining.com. INSIDE QUEENS PARK

MEETINGS, BLOODY MEETINGS (I) The committee imbroglio reported on in our last issue of 2011 remains unresolved as we publish this first issue of 2012. But opportunities to gum the problem abound, with sessions of the Parliamentary Working Group (seemingly the governments preferred place to address minority management problems) set for January 16, January 30 and February 13. The house leaders are also scheduled to meet again, separately, also on February 13. The Family Day holiday is a week later. IQP bets that some kind of deal will emerge before this talkfest is over. Meetings, perhaps bloody? MEETINGS, BLOODY MEETINGS (II) Comsoc has been working hard to fix problems in the system for meeting the cost incurred by Community Living organizations for the accommodation and care provided to members of a hard to serve group. So the ministrys policy branch deserves praise for arranging a December 19 webinar to put the CLs in the picture. Those running things locally had been consulted some two years back but had since heard nothing from Comsoc and were keenly interested in the new regime. They were also irked to find that the participants, understood to number some 200, lined up for the gospel according to Grosvenor, set to be rolled out at 9 a.m., were obliged to twiddle their thumbs for more than 30 minutes. That inflicted a collective waste of 100 hours across Ontario because some manager and / or techie failed to get things going on the schedule stipulated by Queens Park. But that delay was nothing like so bad as the experience of having a bureaucrat torture her cyber audience by reading word for word through a large slidedeck which had been previously distributed in hard copy to the hapless audience. Bloody meetings, indeed. INFRASTRUCTURE AS OPPORTUNITY One of the circles which the provincial government must try to square, Drummond or no Drummond, arises from the strong public concern about fixing Ontarios lamentably degraded physical environment. It took a long time for this message to lodge in societys collective cranium but it shows signs of staying helped by imaginative and dynamic representations made by industry groups. The Residential & Civil Construction Alliance of Ontario, whose ED is Andy Monahan, is one of the most active such groups with labour and management backing and an array of other stakeholders. RCCAO has produced a stream of reports, sponsored a number of conferences and has lobbied continuously. Its latest ploy is to commission a report from the consultancy RiskAnalytica. Public Infrastructure Investment in Ontario: the Importance of Staying the Course applauds the Ontario governments 10-year

capital plan set out in the Infrastructure ministrys Building Together. The new report calls for infrastructure spending to climb from 3.0% to 3.6% of GDP to avert a 1% drop in GDP. WHERE THEY ARE NOW Peter Fonseca is now working in business development as VP of Strategy for Able Translations & Transportation, a Mississauga-based firm with $10Mplus revenues. The connection between one T and the other quite eluded IQP, but the former Labour minister explained the connection between the language work done by its 3,500 affiliated translators and serving its customers needs for medical appointments, insurance meetings and the like using its car fleet, ambulances and other specialized vehicles. Look for further WTAN reports throughout the year on the post-Queens Park doings of former MPPs who were defeated in or chose not to contest the 2011 Ontario provincial election. MIRRORING THE COUNCIL OF THE FEDERATION The Ontario Association of Former Parliamentarians hosted a Nov. 30 meeting with its Qubec and Manitoba counterparts to develop on-going affiliation and exchange information with other provincial associations on the circumstances and role of former members following defeat or retirement. Sessions were run by OAFPs chair, Rev. Canon Derwyn Shea, the president of the Manitoba Association, Dr. Linda Asper, and the chair of the Amicale des anciens parlementaires du Qubec, Ms Ccile Vermette, on retirement benefits, placement and counseling, international election monitoring, research, campus speaking programs and public education. By adopting the Toronto Accord, the three associations agreed to affiliate and collaborate. Annual meetings will be held 2012 in Qubec and 2013 in Manitoba and they will reach out to the associations in British Columbia, Alberta and Prince Edward Island and support former parliamentarians located in other provinces interested in forming an association. The gathering concluded with the OAFPs PreChristmas Soire for former and current members. THIS DAY IN ONTARIO ELECTORAL HISTORY January 7, 1967 Bob Nixon was elected leader of the Ontario Liberal Party for the first time. He won the leadership again in October 1973 when he chose to get back into the contest after deciding that the candidates seeking to be leader were not good enough. IQP will reach subscribers every two weeks in 2012.

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GILLES BISSON, MPP NDP HOUSE LEADER PROVINCIAL PROFILE Gill1es Bisson has represented the Timmins-James Bay riding since 1990. The electrician and former soldier was cochair of the 2011 NDP campaign and is now his partys House Leader and Transportation critic. IQP: Your background before politics? Bisson: I had been in the Algonquin Regiment reserves here in Timmins and when I turned 17 I left school and joined the armed forces to train as an infantryman. I finally figured out that I wanted to get into the trades, completed Grade 12 in a Northern College upgrading
program and eventually got to be an apprenticeship electrician working in the mines fixing things underground and on surface as a maintenance electrician.

I was fairly involved with the union, mostly on industrial diseases, working with Homer Seguin and Moses Shepherd on a Steelworkers project on lung cancer among gold miners. I was first a volunteer and then on temporary union staff. We quantified why miners had died because of exposure to carcinogens and dust underground. That led to changes in Workers
Compensation Regulations and in the Act itself. I knew from age 15 that I was political and wanted to run. Experience taught me that you cant get change by advocating outside any organization. So I decided to run and was elected in 1990.

the reduction on corporate taxes at a time of recession. The corporate tax cuts that are given are not targeted, essentially theyre only going to profitable companies, and in the end what we need to do is that New Democrats need to take a balanced approach to balancing the budget and providing services. How can you tell a person back home that they are going to have their health care cut, theyre going to have their education services lessened, and their highway winter maintenance reduced at the very same time were giving corporations almost $1B in tax cuts? IQP: The NDP gained seats in the north but did not win some other expected seats. Why was that? Bisson: We didnt just win seats in the north. We won seats in south western Ontario, Toronto and the north. In fact, we picked up in Brampton, Toronto, London and Windsor. We won seats in areas where the public was
mad at the government and their failure to deal with the economic issues that face those communities. People in Windsor, London, Timmins or in Elliot Lake were feeling that the government wasnt doing all that was necessary to deal with the hard economic times people are facing. I think we spoke to that and thats why I think we picked up seats in different parts of the province. Why didnt we pick up in others? You know, its a question of math. If you take a look specifically in Sudbury, where Rick Bartolucci won by barely 500 votes, that was a riding obviously that we targeted, that we were hoping to win. Why didnt we

IQP: What was the NDPs greatest achievement, and what the biggest disappointment, in the 2011 election ? Bisson: The greatest achievement was to run a very smart campaign that did not try to be everything for everyone. We were very specific about who we are, and we understood that people felt they were working harder and falling behind. Because the platform resonated with people, it bumped us up about 10 points in the polls, winning a whole bunch of new seats. Andreas performance and the pocketbook issues in our platform, like taking the HST off home heating, spoke to peoples concerns about making ends meet. The disappointment was that we didnt elect more members. We would have elected more but for the Tories doing as badly as they did. The Liberals Youve got to be afraid of the Tories message hurt us a bit. I think we were poised to pick up over 20 seats, if the ballots went as well as we thought they would IQP: As House Leader you have a crucial role in
managing minority government. How is that going?

win it? At the end of the day he had a good ground game, he had people on the ground, lots of volunteers being an incumbent for all of those years, and the Liberals pumped a lot of time and effort into trying to hold that riding, so it was a question of resources. In some cases, the Liberals or the Tories had more resources than we did, and that showed in their being able to spend more in advertising. IQP: You have the critic portfolio for Transportation.
What are your priorities in that field?

Bisson: Well, it works only when the parties all three parties want it to work. At this point, the Liberals are still in a majority mood. Theyre saying the right things publicly about working with the opposition, but other than providing some briefings and saying some nice things, they are still acting in majority mode. Theyre going to have to do some giving and some taking but so far, the Liberals seem not to want to be giving. IQP: How will the NDP position itself on the cuts
anticipated in the Drummond report and 2012 budget?

Bisson: Its a bit early to say were going to do A to B before those cuts come out, but a couple of things are fairly clear. We have said the government should forgo

Bisson: Urban transportation is done by my colleague Jonah Schein; I do everything outside of Toronto. Because we are in the middle of winter, Im trying to get the Transportation ministry to reverse a government decision to lower winter maintenance standards. Theres less equipment time on the roads, less snow clearance and less salt going on a lot of the highways and as a result weve been getting a lot more accidents and a lot more complaints about the conditions on the roads. Im also trying to get Ontario to take a more global view when it comes to transportation and moving people. We put more emphasis on roads and dont put enough emphasis on rail and on air in some cases where that makes some sense. We also need to look at inner city rail. How do we approach all those modes of transportation and balance them off so that we have a good transportation net?
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PEOPLE Peter Wallace has been named to the board of the Advisory Council to the Order of Ontario. Larry French, formerly Queens Park liaison for OSSTF, has been named to the Health Reform Committee of the Swiss Federal Socialist Party. Stephen Orsini has been named Chair of the Ontario Financing Authority. David Caplan, former Health minister, has joined Global Public Affairs as Vice Chair.

FOR YOUR DIARY


Jan 20-21 Feb. 10-12 Mar. 21 OCUFA Ensuring Student Success conference; Sutton Place Hotel, Toronto Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario Convention; Scotiabank Convention Centre, Niagara Falls LIBs 2012 Heritage Dinner; Metro Toronto Convention Centre, South Building

TRIVIA # 401: How many of the 107 MPPs elected in October 2011 were initially chosen in by-elections?

TRIVIA # 400: How many incumbent MPPs retained their seats in the 2003, 2007 and 2011 Ontario provincial elections? ANSWER TO TRIVIA # 400: In 2003, 62 of the 92 incumbent MPPs contesting the Ontario provincial election retained their seats, for an incumbency success rate of 67%; in the 2007 contest, 90 of the 96 incumbent MPPs were returned, for an incumbency success rate of 84%; and in the 2011 Ontario provincial election 76 MPPs were re-elected, for an incumbency success rate of 71%.

INSIDE QUEENS PARK is published by G.P. Murray Research Limited. Postal address: P.O. Box 65041, R.P.O. Chester, Toronto, Ontario, M4K 3Z2; Tel: 416-367-3777; Fax: 416-367-3778; E-mail: gpmrl@gpmurray-research.com; web site: www.gpmurray-research.com. Subscribers are invited to distribute it as they see fit within your own organization. But they are reminded that IQPs contents are copyright and may not be distributed outside the subscribing organization. ISSN 1197- 5008. 200 Annual subscription: $485.90 (including tax). Publisher & Editor: Graham Murray Page 3: Chris Brisbane Page 4: Sharyn Chandik Layout: Kim Brown

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