At the risk of sounding like a Green Party blog, today's news has to be disheartening for those adherents who have tried to get the party back on track. After the break, an email from Elections Nova Scotia Communications Director Dana Philip Doiron describes the outcome of a meeting this morning in which Chief Electoral Office Christine McCulloch gave outgoing party leader Ryan Watson and official agent Kathryn Herbert one last chance to demonstrate that the party can meet its legal obligations.
05 August, 2009
Contrarian reader Justin Ling thinks we're too impatient:
Come on now. The legislature isn't even sitting, and you're taking thinly-veiled jabs at the government-to-be for not doing anything?
28 July, 2009

Chief Electoral Officer Christine McCulloch's annual report has been posted, and it confirms our report last week that she has initiated deregistration proceedings against the Green Party for failure to comply with financial disclosure laws. As the chart above shows, the failure appears to be complete across the board: No audited financial statements, no public access thereto, and no copies or accounting of tax receipts. The Green Party of Nova Scotia received $133,469.90 in public financing last year. McCulloch's report doesn't say when deregistration will take effect, but over the weekend  party officials told contrarian they had until July 17 to avoid...

29 June, 2009
ryan-watson-smallNova Scotia Green Party leader Ryan Watson says the party will publish its 2008 audited financial statements "within a few weeks." Based on regular conversations with Elections Nova Scotia, he believes this will be soon enough to avoid loss of official party status. By law, the financial statements should have been filed by April 30. Elections Nova Scotia communications director Dana Philip Doiron told contrarian earlier today that Chief Electoral Office Christine McCulloch had issued the required 30-day notice of deregistration required under the Elections Act, and a report due for release Tuesday would detail the issue. He said deregistration could follow shortly. Watson said the late filing resulted from the party being new, its treasurer taking an untimely vacation,  and its reliance on volunteers who were "wading through the election regulations," and busy preparing for and fighting the June election.
26 June, 2009
green-watsonThe Green Party of Nova Scotia, and riding associations for the Greens and two other recognized parties, face imminent deregistration under the Elections Act for failing to publish audited financial statements for the last fiscal year as required by law. Dana Philip Doiron, communications director for Elections Nova Scotia, confirmed that Chief Electoral Officer Christine McCulloch will file her annual report under the Members and Public Employees Disclosure Act (MPED) Tuesday, and deregistration could follow shortly thereafter. "Sometimes [the report's release is] a ho-hum event, and Frank is the only one interested," Doiron said "In this particular case the report will be looking at compliance for reporting, and that report will be interesting."
26 June, 2009
[caption id="attachment_777" align="alignright" width="150" caption="Dr. Chris Milburn"]Dr. Chris Milburn[/caption] What's disquieting about our New Democratic Party government-in-waiting is the same thing that's been disturbing about Nova Scotia for decades: a lack of compelling leadership. It's not simply that our once-upon-a-time socialists have moved to the dead center of the road. Contrarian is OK with that. It's Darrell Dexter's meticulous avoidance of anything that might challenge voters in any way. The NDP knew that to get elected, they would have to win seats in rural Nova Scotia. They took polls and conducted focus groups, and discovered that rural Nova Scotians are upset about emergency room closures. So the NDP promised to end those closures, even though every thoughtful observer knows that doing so would be a wasteful diversion of scarce health care dollars. Among other things, it will make recruitment of physicians to rural areas more difficult, not easier. Why would a fully trained physician want to sit in an emergency room all night to treat one or two patients?
07 June, 2009

… The Nova Scotia Green Party gets all double-entendre with this YouTube ad combating "Electoral Dysfunction." Given the craven, focus group-driven campaigns by the three biggies, it's tempting. Damn tempting....

03 June, 2009

Esteemed Metro gadfly Michael Marshall, running this time for the Greens in Bill Dooks's Eastern Shore riding, agrees with fellow veridian David Croft. He writes: I am running and organizing again for the Greens, and I do for them what I did as an N-dipper: tell everybody what I think we'll actually get for votes, be it 2% or 16%. It didn't seem to hurt me among the public, other parties, or the media, but the party faithful often protested that we were going to win and should say so. But when I asked if  they were willing to sign for a...

02 June, 2009

Liberal, NDP, and Green party reps at last night's election forum on environmental issues expressed grave reservations about letting Xstrata open its proposed undersea coal mine at Donkin, Cape Breton. CBC reporter Jennifer Henderson has tape of the exchange, which has the potential to blow into a major issue in Nova Scotia's coal communities. Guess what? They have a point. Donkin coal is too dirty to burn in our own power plants under current and planned emissions standards. Why should we export it to be burned elsewhere? Isn't that like issuing a license to pee in the far end of the...

27 May, 2009
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