Reading weak

A few days ago, Minister of Something Charlene Johnson told the House that you don't have to worry your little head off with reading the Grand Falls environmental reports, because she’d already read them for you.

Today, in a hilarious appearance on Open Line with Randy Simms, Minister of Something Else Kevin O’Brien told radio listeners that you don’t have to worry your little head off about reading the legal opinions on the Régie de l’énergie decision, because he already hasn’t read it for you:

O’BRIEN: In my earlier comments, I’ve depended on legal minds and legal opinions pretty well all my life. And that’s the way it is. We have some of the best minds in the country, in the nation, also in North America, in regards to this file, on that file, through NALCOR and through Government. And I rely on them in regards to their opinion. Now, listen, I don’t need an interpretation or a English version of that particular document in regards to understanding or knowing exactly what it means to NewfoundlandaLabrador.

And that’s what this motion is all about. This is what this private member’s motion is all about. It’s all about what is right for NewfoundlandaLabrador and the people of NewfoundlandaLabrador. And I’m gonna tell you something, Randy. I’m gonna tell you something now. If you go out to the general public in regards to that legal document and 130 pages that has to be translated in regards to this private member’s motion, and the legal opinions there rendered in regards to what it means, I think most of the people, if not all of the people, of NewfoundlandaLabrador will see it exactly the way I see it…

SIMMS: …I gotta admit, I find it disturbing, that we would go into the House of Assembly and vote on a motion that we had not studied. I find that disturbing. And I gotta tell you, Minister, I find it disturbing that you’re saying you think that’s OK.

O’BRIEN: I’ve studied it, and as a matter of fact, I’ve lived it for the last seven years.

SIMMS: No, you’re telling me that you’re prepared as a Member of the House to vote tomorrow on a motion on a legal opinion, a hundred-and-thirty page document -

O’BRIEN: Because I’m a hundred percent -

SIMMS: - and you’re not gonna read it.

O’BRIEN: - I’m a hundred percent sure. And matter of fact, I’m more than a hundred percent sure in regards to what that legal document says in French and in English. I know exactly what it says.

SIMMS: Well, Minister, all 48 of you stood up in the House of Assembly and you were a hundred percent sure that we didn’t expropriate a mill, too.

O’BRIEN: Yup.

Well.

I mean, that was, that was something.

But, I mean, this is a legal, this is a legal, This Is A Legal opinion, I guess, in regards to what was rendered in the Régie in Quebec in regards to blocking everything and anything we do in NewfoundlandaLabrador to develop our energy file. And that’s the bottom line of it. And we’re not expropriating anything here.