Disqualification, chapter and verse
Sometimes the light of reason shines from rather unexpected places, such as the front-of-the-book item in Canadian Business (May 22-June 4 issue), in which Andrew Nikiforuk neatly dissects the Gwyn Morgan affair. [sorry, I couldn't find it online]
You'll recall all the sturm und drang surrounding the Commons committee that rejected Morgan as new head of the public appointments commission. And how Tom D'Aquino, the CEO of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives denounced the decision. And how the Prime Minister picked up his toys and quit the game in a huff, saying he'd need a majority to get anything done around here (mutter, mutter).
Well, veteran magazine and book writer Nikiforuk, in about 600 well-chosen words under the slug "Opinion" and the heading "Eminently unsuitable", essentially takes Morgan apart. Not only does the piece make it clear that Morgan's ill-advised remarks about Jamaican immigrants probably disqualified him, but if they hadn't, there were plenty of other reasons to do so, going back to the Wiebo Ludwig case, a controversial Ecuadorian pipeline, and the fact that, on Morgan's watch, his company racked up more environmental fines by dollar value in Colorado than any company in the previous 15 years.
Nikiforuk also asks a question I never heard any of the mainstream media ask: how was the ex- head of the country's largest gas company going to oversee appointments to the National Energy Board?
By the time you're finished reading the item, you won't be wondering about Morgan's rejection; you'll be wondering what the Prime Minister was thinking when he put his name forward.
You'll recall all the sturm und drang surrounding the Commons committee that rejected Morgan as new head of the public appointments commission. And how Tom D'Aquino, the CEO of the Canadian Council of Chief Executives denounced the decision. And how the Prime Minister picked up his toys and quit the game in a huff, saying he'd need a majority to get anything done around here (mutter, mutter).
Well, veteran magazine and book writer Nikiforuk, in about 600 well-chosen words under the slug "Opinion" and the heading "Eminently unsuitable", essentially takes Morgan apart. Not only does the piece make it clear that Morgan's ill-advised remarks about Jamaican immigrants probably disqualified him, but if they hadn't, there were plenty of other reasons to do so, going back to the Wiebo Ludwig case, a controversial Ecuadorian pipeline, and the fact that, on Morgan's watch, his company racked up more environmental fines by dollar value in Colorado than any company in the previous 15 years.
Nikiforuk also asks a question I never heard any of the mainstream media ask: how was the ex- head of the country's largest gas company going to oversee appointments to the National Energy Board?
By the time you're finished reading the item, you won't be wondering about Morgan's rejection; you'll be wondering what the Prime Minister was thinking when he put his name forward.
posted by D. B. Scott at
6:00 am
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