Blame Canada: the coming sequel

"Province progressing with plans for prison", the Telegram's alliterative headline reads. As Rob Antle reports:

But there are no guarantees on when the government will move forward with replacing the aging penitentiary.

One issue complicating matters is federal support. Osborne said Ottawa is on side with construction plans.

But he noted the feds won't commit to funding a share until the province provides cost estimates and design criteria for the planned replacement complex. Those answers will be provided by the consultant.

The masthead chimes in:

The government has just started the process to design and build a new prison and lockup. At this point, the plans are still in the “expressions of interest” phase, and the provincial government is hoping for federal money. It’s early enough that it’s not clear whether the two facilities — prison and lockup — will even be together in the same building, or whether the province might try for the politically expedient (but practically indefensible) idea of moving the prison outside the St. John’s-Mount Pearl area.

Hmmm.

Sensible, competent provincial governments don't sit around like members of some South Seas cargo cult "hoping" for federal money. They identify programs which have been voted by Parliament, and apply for federal money — yes, a wacky concept to be sure, this whole voting "estimates" and establishing "Treasury Board guidelines" before spending public dime. But that is how the world — the modern one, anyway — tends to work.

In cargo cults (hi, Trevor), "hope" springs eternal:

I think, needless to say, having a highway added to the National Highway System is of little consequence if the funding that needs to be done to upgrade and further develop that highway is not associated with it. Mr. Speaker, this will be a priority of this government. We will be prepared to commit our 50 per cent to the ongoing upgrading of the Trans-Labrador Highway, and we would hope that the federal government will be prepared to do the same.

And as for political expediency... well, that's why the Codfather, John Crosbie, promised a federal pen during the lead-up to the 1988 federal election campaign. It's also why — well, it's why this happened:

Charges of favoritism flying over site for federal prison
Globe and Mail
Thursday, August 25, 1988
Graham Fraser

The announcement of plans to construct a long-awaited federal penitentiary in Newfoundland has led to charges of political favoritism.

Solicitor-General James Kelleher announced yesterday that the $29.3- million penitentiary will be built in Harbour Grace — in the Conservative riding of Bonavista-Trinity-Conception, held by Morrissey Johnson.

However, the decision was attacked in Question Period by Liberal George Baker and by New Democrat Jack Harris, who argued that other locations should have been chosen.

Mr. Baker argued for Buchans — which is in the provincial constituency of Windsor-Buchans, held by provincial Liberal Leader Clyde Wells. Mr. Harris argued for Belle Island [sic] — in his own constituency of St. John's East.

And that's why, two decades later, an expedient (and retiring) politician is still trying to cash that stale-dated IOU:

George Sweeney, Liberal MHA for the District of Carbonear‑Harbour Grace, is not pleased with the non-committal response he has received from the provincial justice minister related to the possibility of constructing a penitentiary in the Harbour Grace area.

"I was surprised to learn that a joint federal/provincial committee is being established to examine the possibility of a joint facility which would replace Her Majesty's Penitentiary in St. John's and would also accommodate medium and low security federal offenders. I was disappointed because I had hoped that the minister would recognize Harbour Grace as the province's preferred location for such as facility," says Sweeney.

The Liberal MHA wrote both the federal and provincial ministers of justice on this issue in January. He had hoped to get, at the very least, a commitment from the provincial government that they would support efforts to construct a new penitentiary at a site in Harbour Grace. In the response to Sweeney, the provincial minister stated that "At this early stage, Government is not in a position to make a determination about the preferred location of the institution."

During the 1988 federal election, the Mulroney government announced that a federal prison would be built in Newfoundland and Labrador. Following an extensive review by a number of experts in the correctional service of Canada, Harbour Grace was chosen as the preferred site to construct the new penitentiary which was expected to be built and opened in 1993. The project was later delayed, but the site remains a viable location for such a facility. At the time, the facility would have cost $30 million to build over four years, $50 million to operate annually and would employ 100 full‑time people in the community.

Just don't tell Buchans or Bell Island.

Maybe not Belle Isle, either, just to be safe.

In any event, the province is setting two more landmines — one on the location of the pen, another on funding arrangements — in the battlefield known as federal-provincial relations. So while the cargo cultists sit back and wait for the parachuted crate full of Canadian lucre, the rest of us can sit back and wait for things to go boom, as they always do.

And yes, this is possibly a record for mixed and mangled metaphors.