Rotateller

 

Submitted by Will Arscott

 

 

We had a small turn-out for what turned out to be a very good program.  We met as usual in the Main Dining Room at the Saskatoon Club. Paul Gauthier was our MC.  The meeting began with members singing O Canada. Steve Wilson asked the blessing. The blessing tied very well to the presentation at the meeting. Steve asked for help in a time of real uncertainty. Uncertainty seems to be the outlook for many businesses today in the expectation of tariffs. In particular, he asked for help for our farmers who need to decide what to grow for a very turbulent marketplace. The meal was a very fine chicken dinner.

 

Cahier was Donna Gauthier. Technology was ably handled by Gary Rusu and 3 members joined us online. Avis Hardy greeted our members and guests.  

 

 

Avis Introduced our two visitors: Our guest speaker was Bronwyn Eyre and was formally introduced later in the program. Our second guest was Mitchell Start, General Manager of the Rattlers basketball team. We hope to see Mitchell again at a future meeting.

 

 

Wayne Palmer is on the mend after surgery and was reliably sighted in a Sobey’s store.

 

 

President Jack was happy to announce that Maureen Torr has agreed to become the vice-president of the club.  If all goes as expected she will follow Will Arscott and Don Lepp as president in two and a half years.

 

Gay Rusu announced that the club has an opportunity to serve at the Friendship Inn on March 31.  Please contact Gary if you can help on this date.

 

President Jack announced that the Ghana water project led by the Nutana Club is now fully funded and ready to move ahead. The four Saskatoon Rotary clubs, including ours, have met their financial commitments.  There was still a shortfall that was made up by a very generous donation by Rotarian Asit Sarkar of the Nutana club.

 

Will Arscott reported on his attendance at the very successful District Leadership seminar. Our club was one of the top five clubs in the district (out of 41) who received an award for our contributions to the Rotary Foundation. Will called our Foundation Chair Paul forward to accept the award and he read the citation revealing that we actually placed first in the district in giving.   Huge congratulations to Paul and to our members. President Jack and Secretary Graham deserve a special thank you as they were major contributors. We did so well because the club as a whole participated.

 

As always, grocery cards are available from Donna Gauthier.  Please support this fundraiser as it is the easiest project we have.

 

 

It was not a big day for the happy and sad fund.  Maybe the members felt with our district award that enough money had been donated to the Foundation.  There were a very few stalwarts:

 

Bronwyn was introduced by Paul Gauthier. Bronwyn is a very well-known recent politician in our province. Most recently she represented the riding of Stonebridge/Dakota in the Legislature.  This riding covered the gamut of the province being both a rural and urban riding with a significant indigenous component.  She served in the cabinet in the Attorney-General, Justice and Education portfolios.

 

Bronwyn began her career as a lawyer graduating from the U of S Law School in 1996. Before turning to provincial politics, she served on the Public School Board in Saskatoon.

 

Bronwyn began her talk by briefly reviewing the situation in Great Britain with which she is familiar. Britain now has a Labour government, but it has shown itself to be very different from Labour governments of the past. The government is looking to supercharge the post-Brexit economy by reducing regulations and just getting things done. In most western economies regulation and environmental rules have made it very difficult and slow to accomplish anything.   It is not that we do not need any regulations but rather that we need sensible regulations that allow projects to go ahead. For example, the government is moving to have a single environmental regulator. In the past the regulations were often so dense that any group could hold a project up for an unacceptably long time.

 

Saskatchewan has been in a difficult situation for at least ten years. The public is becoming much more aware of the situation since President Trump has weaponized uncertainty. Our province has not got a competitive economy. As a result, we are not attracting new investment. This has been a problem for at least a decade. There are opportunities in areas such as selling liquid natural gas (LNG) to Europe, but these have been largely blocked.

 

The problem is likely in three parts: Interprovincial barriers make things difficult as we are landlocked, and our production must pass through other provinces. National laws and environmental regulations have hugely impacted the province’s ability to move ahead. Finally, there is a malaise within the province that has set in.

 

Federal Bill C69 is an immediate culprit. This Bill makes large projects nearly impossible.   Many have referred to it as the ‘no more pipelines’ Bill.  Bronwyn believes the Bill is likely not constitutional as it treads on areas such as resources that are under provincial jurisdiction. The loss on the carbon tax was quite narrow and the larger issues need to be revisited by the court.

 

Going forward our provincial governments need to move to turbocharge our economy though we are not moving in that direction currently. We are also being held hostage to interests other than our own. When Ottawa placed 100% tariff on electric vehicles coming from China it was met with a 100% tariff on canola. Saskatchewan does not produce electric vehicles, but we require markets for our canola.

 

The blockages against products from one province moving freely across other provinces needs to end. We need pipelines going both north-south and east-west. These need to be built quickly with an expedited environmental process and a less onerous requirement for consultation with indigenous groups. The fact is that many indigenous groups would welcome the projects.   Bronwyn referred to this new order as a harmonized federation.

 

Bronwyn answered several questions from our members. She was thanked by Paul and the regular donation will be made to Bethany Homes. Bronwyn was familiar with Bethany Homes and seemed pleased to contribute to their cause.