Ottawa Refuses to Guarantee Offshore Revenues to Province

The Nova Scotia government is upset that the federal government is refusing to guarantee Nova Scotia the full benefits of the province's offshore revenues, Energy Minister Cecil Clarke said today, June 25.

In a letter to Premier John Hamm dated June 17, 2004, Prime Minister Paul Martin committed only to hold more discussions with the province on offshore revenues. This month marks the second anniversary of discussions on the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Accord between Natural Resources Canada and the Nova Scotia government. Senior federal officials have refused to take any Nova Scotia proposal to the federal cabinet until after the election.

While the accord states that Nova Scotia is to be the principal beneficiary of its offshore resources, Nova Scotia will only receive 19 cents out of every dollar produced by the offshore.

"The time for talk has long since passed. It's been two years, without any action from Ottawa and Nova Scotians deserve better from the prime minister than another promise of more discussions," said Mr. Clarke. "The prime minister has outright refused to guarantee in writing that Nova Scotia will receive 100 per cent of our offshore revenues."

Premier Hamm launched the Campaign for Fairness in January 2001 to convince the federal government to honour the commitments it made to Nova Scotians in the Canada-Nova Scotia Offshore Accord. Last week, Canadian Chamber of Commerce president Nancy Hughes Anthony recognized Premier Hamm as one of the country's leading advocates for new federal-provincial offshore revenue arrangements.

"When it comes to provinces being the principal beneficiaries of the offshore, there is no difference between the federal agreements with Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador," added Mr. Clarke.