Stelmach's Royalty Give Away

As I said here Stelmach's Royalty announcement is a sell out.

Alberta's bid to wring more cash from the oil sands with a controversial royalty hike wound up as little more than "smoke and mirrors", one of the province's advisers said on Monday, as it backed away from key elements of a review panel's recommendations.

Pedro van Meurs, who has consulted on royalty regimes in 70 jurisdictions, said the Alberta government left cash on the table when it announced a new royalty scheme last week.

But van Meurs said the changes are at best a minor increase and the province's has lost a once-in-a-generation chance to get what he considers a fair share of the burgeoning sector's revenues.

"It's pretty disastrous," van Meurs told Reuters. "Instead of having a simple tax, what we are now going to see is very complicated system that is more smoke and mirrors than reality."

Van Meurs was a consultant for the review panel that recommended higher rates and a per-barrel tax on oil sands production.

"It's absolutely a minor increase," he said. "The most idiotic thing is that Alberta already had 25 percent."

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Made In Calgary Homeless Plan

No rent controls. A bungled boondoggle of subsidies to renters. And now a corporate committee to deal with homelessness in Alberta sometime in the next decade.

Alberta's government has announced it's forming the Alberta Secretariat for Action on Homelessness to help end the problem over the next 10 years.

Premier Ed Stelmach says in a release that while that may be an ambitious goal, it's one that the government needs to strive for to help those in need.

The secretariat, which will include representation from across the province, is expected to be working by April.

It will be headed by Yvonne Fritz, the government's associate minister of affordable housing and urban development.

The government says issues such as a budget and membership will be worked out over the next few months.

Last January, a committee that includes some of Canada's biggest corporate leaders formed with the aim to wipe out Calgary's homelessness problem over the next decade.

Calling any announcement on the issue a good one, Calgary Homeless Foundation president and CEO Wayne Stewart said he's hoping Stelmach will focus on long-term sustainability.

Stewart said his group has been working on a 10-year plan to eliminate homelessness in Calgary and expects to release its preliminary findings in January.

This is not a solution to the problem of affordable housing it is just another Tired Old Tory form of the old poor laws updated for the 21st century. Where the old poor laws produced workhouses run by the Church, we now have corporate philanthropists coming up with housing solutions, but no cheap housing while the condo conversions boom and tent cities for the homeless spread across the province.

Premier Ed Stelmach unveiled an initiative Monday to build 11,000 new affordable homes in Alberta over the next five years.

Eleven thousand homes is a drop in the bucket. What we need is the end to condo conversions, rent control and the creation of mass public housing NOW; town houses, row housing and apartments subsidized by the provincial and federal governments.

About 2,600 people in Edmonton and 3,400 in Calgary don't have a place to live, according to the last count of the homeless population in 2006.

Both major cities have seen an increase of at least 20 per cent in their homeless populations since 2004.

Add to that the fact that Syncrude alone is looking to hire 5000 workers to live in Fort McMurray a 11,000 homes across the province is a joke.

Not only is the oil boom in Alberta causing a labour shortage, but Syncrude faces a host of retirements, with an attrition rate of eight to nine per cent, he said.

"We're trying to get up to 5,000 employees," said House, adding the company now employs some 4,600 people.

Exciting as all this might sound, he was finding few takers at the CASTLE event.

"Housing cost is the number one deterrent," said House.

In labour-starved Fort McMurray, he said, "you can work at a Burger King and make $15 an hour.

"But in order to afford the housing, you'd better work a lot of hours," he added. "A person making $15 could not survive alone."

SEE:

This Is Better Than Rent Controls?

Stelmach's Robber Barons

And New York Has Rent Controls

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The Honorary Canadian

Before the U.S. gave the Dalai Lama a medal Canada made him an honorary citizen.

The Dalai Lama first visited Canada in 1980, meeting with the Governor-General. In 1990, he visited again and was greeted by the government minister for multiculturalism. In 1993, he met the external affairs minister. Paul Martin was the first prime minister to meet him, in 2004, and last year he was granted honorary citizenship.

In a move likely to further aggravate Canada's relations with China, Prime Minister Stephen Harper will use his office on Parliament Hill to host a meeting and photo session with the Dalai Lama on Monday afternoon.

Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean also plans to receive the 72-year-old monk at her official residence, Rideau Hall, and Opposition leaders are scheduled to meet him at the Lord Elgin Hotel Tuesday morning.

On Iraq

On the U.S. presence in Iraq, the Dalai Lama then told an Ottawa audience on Sunday that the intention was "not necessarily" bad, but the practical result was that the problem is only getting worse.

"No matter what the intentions, methods become unrealistic. So instead of solving the problem (they) increase the problem," he said to the audience of about 5,000 people.

As a person, he said Bush was very likable.

"I love him, really, as a human being. Very nice man, very simple, straightforward, no formality," he said, to laughter from the audience.

He criticized U.S. policy in Iraq, diagnosing the cause of policy blunders as a "lack of awareness about reality."

This lack of realistic perception, he said, causes "the whole policy or method [to] become unrealistic," and therefore unpragmatic and ineffective.

As a result, he said, U.S. policy in Iraq, "is not solving the problem, but increasing the problem."

So I wonder what he will tell Steve about Afghanistan?

"First inner disarmament, then outer disarmament."

But will he listen?

And despite being an Honorary Canadian the Harpocrites are two faced when it comes to the real politics behind trade relations with China. It seems our taxpayer funded State Capitalist companies in Quebec are eager to play footsie with the Chinese state in Tibet, while the PM blusters on about human rights.

Although His Holiness says Canada has been and continues to be a good friend in his struggle for autonomy -- he says Mr. Harper "seems very concerned about human rights" -- it has been at times a shallow friendship. There are, for example, the helicopter engines built in Quebec by Pratt & Whitney Canada, a subsidiary of a U.S. firm, that have ended up in Chinese anti-tank attack helicopters, prompting an investigation by the U.S. State Department. And there is the railway from China into Tibet, completed last year by Canadian companies Bombardier, Power Corp. and Nortel, which the Dalai Lama says could be "really dangerous" for his people.

SEE:

No Reincarnation Without Permission

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The Death of Quality TV

In a discussion of the decline of quality Sci-Fi TV programing, in this case Battlestar Galactica, in the niche market of cable channels like the Sci-Fi network, Space in Canada, James Bow concludes;

Clearly what has happened is that the vaunted 500-channel universe has not delivered the democratization of programming that was promised twenty years ago. We used to believe that any niche program could find itself an audience here, but we forgot the other side of the demand/supply equation: television costs money to produce, and sometimes good television costs a lot of money to produce.

Well actually we didn't forget that good TV costs money to produce. What some folks forgot was that the bottom line always was the basis for all commercial TV production. Which is why we have the rise of reality TV programs, including whole channels devoted to reality TV like the Food Network, Home and Garden channel etc. All this costs far less to produce than a regular network show which of course has real writers (unionized), directors (unionized), actors (unionized), techies (unionized).

In other words the 500 channel universe did not democratize TV nor did cable. What has happened is that the business tycoons who own the studios and production companies have expanded into a variety of other entertainment and amusement businesses and are using TV to support these endeavours. In doing so they are looking to create cheap productions and that has resulted in a plethora of union busting bottom line programming hence reality TV. The sound you hear is the owners cashing in.

Look at the Sci Fi programming on mainstream channels; ABC, NBC, CBS that were launched last year and were canceled; Surface, which was excellent and had potential, Threshold, and Invasion. Gone. In some cases they barely lasted one season. While the networks cash in on them by issuing them on DVD.

Just as the Sci-Fi network did in killing Babalon 5 and later Farscape. They still profit by issuing them as DVD's and with mini series tie ins.

Quality TV programing especially science fiction and drama is now too costly to produce, not because it is, thanks to the advances in CGI technology, but because the bottom line is so low in production costs that anything that is quality is priced out of the market. Thus reality TV is the thin wedge of union busting in TV land.

Nor has the 500 channel universe opened itself to DIY programming, in fact it has closed off access. It is still controlled by the same corporate interests the owners of production and cable companies.

While fears that the 500 channel universe would be the Deathstar to commercial mainstream TV such has not been the case. Instead mainstream TV and its cable, movie, news, DVD rivals are the New Empire; resulting from interlocking corporate ownership .

The sucking sound you hear is not Darth Vader, it's the decline in quality TV production as the Empire expands in the inevitable mediocrity of the bottom line.

SEE:

Blade Runner

Dr. Who Curse

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The Sky Is Not Falling

After all the sturm and drang, the wailing and whining, the threats, doom-saying and warnings, from Big Oil the sky did not fall down on Friday after Alberta CEO Ed Stelmach announced his royalty compromise. Ok everyone take a Valium. Capitalism remains alive and well in the oil patch. In fact it is still booming.

Energy sector stable amid royalties hike
Market reacts calmly to royalty rules

Citigroup Investment Research energy analyst Doug Leggate has crunched the numbers, and he just doesn't see what all the fuss is about in the Alberta oil sands over the province's new royalty plans.

The negative after-market reaction to Alberta’s proposed royalty changes for the energy sector appears overdone and may present an opportunity to buy some names in the sector, says Citigroup analyst Doug Leggate.

He recommends keeping an eye on preferred names in the sector like Suncor Energy Inc. (SU/TSX) and Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. (CNQ/TSX), but admits there will likely be a strong response to any change from the industry.

“...Versus the level of oil prices we estimate are currently being discounted in the major Canadian oil sands players, the impact on valuations looks benign,” Mr. Leggate wrote.

So while he acknowledged that the new regime gives away some upside, the analyst thinks plenty of core value remains with investors.

Friday's market response to Stelmach's decision was less dramatic than some experts expected. Shares in Suncor (TSX:SU) opened down 3.4 per cent, while shares in Petro-Canada (TSX:PCA) and Imperial Oil (TSX:IMO)were down less than one per cent.

Petro-Canada's Mr. Brenneman told his conference call that the royalty decision won't delay his company's plans to continue its work at Fort Hills, its 60-per-cent-owned oil sands mine and upgrader project north of Fort McMurray. "We intend to progress this through to the sanction point," he said. He indicated that Petrocan should reach the point where it is ready to make a final decision on whether to proceed with the project in about 12 months.

Petro-Canada's third-quarter profit climbed 14 per cent as oil and gas output surged by nearly a third, the country's No. 4 oil producer and refiner said Thursday.

The company extracts 20 per cent of its cash flow from oil and gas operations in Alberta, and is currently planning the $26-billion Fort Hills oilsands development there.

In the quarter, Petro-Canada earned $776 million, or $1.59 a share, up from year-earlier $678 million, or $1.36. Including one-time gains and charges, earnings from continuing operations rose to $630 million, or $1.29 a share, from $564 million, or $1.13 a share.

And if there are market swings they are the result of other factors than the royalty compromise, ironically because of the emissions caps; the Alberta Green Tax as well as labour costs in Alberta's overheated economy.

The downside is that this method of assessing royalties encourages more inflation in this already red-hot economy. There's little incentive to keep costs down on oilsands plants when you have a royalty holiday until construction costs are paid off. The higher the construction costs, the longer the royalty holiday. (After costs are paid off, royalties jump to 25 per cent, rising to 40 per cent when oil reaches $120 a barrel, under Stelmach's proposals.) Yet, it's precisely those rapidly rising costs in construction and labour that are being felt in all sectors of the provincial economy. As Fort McMurray Mayor Melissa Blake says, "we used to call that the Fort McMurray factor -- 30- to 40-per- cent higher price. Now it's all over the province." At this rate of economic growth, her city of 65,000 will have a population of 100,000 in another five years, Blake said in an interview. Good grief.

Suncor has also had to do mechanical upgrades this year and is looking at costs involved in upgrading its refining processes. All part of the day to day cost of doing business. However it's share prices rose despite the minor drop in third quarter earnings.

Suncor cuts targets as profit drops on oilsands output

Suncor cut its oilsands production target for the year and raised cost estimates because of shutdowns and limits on emissions. Alberta regulators capped production from Suncor's Firebag deposit at 42,000 barrels of bitumen a day until it can reduce emissions, the company said. Bitumen is a heavy crude extracted from the tar sands.

Suncor's shares rose $1.46, or 1.4 per cent, to $102.75 on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The stock has gained 12 per cent this year.
Suncor earnings slip as emission caps take toll

Suncor Energy Inc. said Thursday its third-quarter profit fell due to a drop in oilsands sales volumes, and it lowered its production outlook for this year because of maintenance at its oilsands operations near Fort McMurray.

Suncor cut its oilsands production target for the year and raised cost estimates because of shutdowns and limits on emissions. Alberta regulators capped production from Suncor's Firebag deposit at 42,000 barrels of bitumen a day until it can reduce emissions, the company said. Bitumen is a heavy crude extracted from the oilsands.

"We're taking a number of steps to address regulator concerns including accelerating the construction of emission abatement equipment," CEO Richard George said in the statement. "At the same time, we're also examining ways to increase bitumen supply from our mining operations to help offset supply restraints at Firebag."

Suncor eyes US for major oil facilities

Mr. George, the company's longtime executive, said Suncor is working towards charting growth beyond Voyageur and Suncor will most likely seek opportunities that do not stretch far from its core oilsands business.

"We're sitting on huge reserves, some of which haven't even been described publicly, and I still think the core and heart of this (company) is going to be the oilsands," he said, adding that tie-ins or joint-ventures between Suncor and companies in the Fort McMurray area looking for upgrading capacity for raw bitumen represents one opportunity.

"Just continuing to build upgraders probably isn't (our growth plan) but I don't want to preclude anything. Will you see Suncor exploring in North Africa of West Africa? Probably not."

"We have leased land outside Edmonton and that is a possibility and we will also look farther south as well," he said, adding costs to build upgraders and refineries in Fort McMurray are more than double those on the refining hub along the U.S. Gulf Coast.

And the impact of Flaherty's Income Trust Tax plays as much a role in Syncrude's profit outlook as does the Alberta Green Tax. So in balance the impact of the royalty increase is only one factor in Syncrude's future forecasting of its production output.

Alberta, Oct 26 (Reuters) - The firm with the biggest stake in the Syncrude Canada Ltd. oil sands venture said on Friday it is willing to talk to the Alberta government on changing Syncrude's royalty structure, but issued a reminder that its terms are part of a legal contract.

Canadian Oil Sands Trust (COS_u.TO: Quote, Profile, Research), which has a 37 percent stake in the sprawling oil sands mining and synthetic crude venture, said its terms have helped prompt C$8.5 billion ($8.9 billion) in Syncrude spending over the past five years and create 5,000 jobs.

Its royalty terms and those of rival Suncor Energy Inc (SU.TO: Quote, Profile, Research), do not expire until the end of 2015. Premier Ed Stelmach has said Alberta would negotiate with the two operations to agree a transition to the new royalty framework.

Canadian Oil Sands Trust units were were off 69 Canadian cents, or 2 percent, at C$32.90 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.

Meanwhile the impact of the royalty announcement has not deterred Syncrude from looking for 5000 workers to meet its current needs and those down the pike.

There's plenty of work to be had in the booming Alberta oilsands, but you've got to be serious about working there.

Fort McMurray, Alta.-based Syncrude was one of the employers on hand at Thursday's seventh annual Career and Skilled Trades Learning Experience (CASTLE) job and career fair, a first for the oil giant.

"We're looking all across the country," said Syncrude recruiter Dominic House. "We've gone from Vancouver Island to Newfoundland."

Staff at the Syncrude table had a list of 21 different permanent positions currently in demand at the company, including plant operators, boilermakers, engineers in all disciplines and information technology analysts.

"About the only thing we don't hire are plumbers and carpenters," said House. "That work is contracted out."

Not only is the oil boom in Alberta causing a labour shortage, but Syncrude faces a host of retirements, with an attrition rate of eight to nine per cent, he said.

"We're trying to get up to 5,000 employees," said House, adding the company now employs some 4,600 people.

Exciting as all this might sound, he was finding few takers at the CASTLE event.

"Housing cost is the number one deterrent," said House.

In labour-starved Fort McMurray, he said, "you can work at a Burger King and make $15 an hour.

"But in order to afford the housing, you'd better work a lot of hours," he added. "A person making $15 could not survive alone."

All in all Stelmach's royalty compromise turns out to not to have been as balanced as he claims it leaves Albertans without a real share in the wealth being created by the extraction of our resources, and it does not even begin to pay for the social costs of the expansion of the oilsands. It is in effect too little too late.

Inflation is also eroding people's earning power. That's the observation of none other than this fall's TD Bank report on the Alberta economy.

"While average incomes have been rising, the bulk of the gains have been enjoyed at the high end of the income spectrum," says the report. People earning more than $100,000 are enjoying rising incomes. That includes lots of oilpatch workers, not just head office middle managers.

While low-income earners are most at risk, "perhaps the bigger surprise" is that middle-income earners are also hard pressed to record any gains after inflation, says the bank report.

People earning $60,000 or less have remained static or slipped back in inflation- adjusted dollars, according to the bank report.

This is also the province with the regressive flat income tax, which means high-income earners pay the same ten per cent as low-income earners. So the tax system does nothing to mitigate a growing income gap.

So Martha and Henry might have a few questions for Stelmach about a royalty regime that keeps the accelerator to the floor.

They might also note that the dire predictions that investors would dump their energy stocks and flee Alberta didn't happen. On the Toronto exchange Friday, the energy sector was up 0.17.

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Doom IV: Kandahar

A cynical ploy or child abuse? Taking advantage of young boys who play first person shooter video games to entice them to fight and die in Harpers War.
It is obvious that the Canadian Armed Forces are desperate for new recruits.

Teenagers who enjoy first-person shooter video games can now test their aim at Canadian Forces recruitment drives.

It illustrates mock battle scenarios, inviting users to take hold of a variety of realistic-looking military weapons and shoot at a large, nine-foot screen when an enemy appears. The weapons are made of plastic, and make no sound.

It's been set up in the Regent Mall in Fredericton since Wednesday, close to a food court, video arcade and children's play area.

"Their eyes are drawn to the screen and guns. They all want to try it out," said game designer Brad Hetherington.

Players have to be at least 16 to pick up the guns and need parental consent if they are under 18.

The danger is that some of those who play these games and are recruited may get rejected by the military and end up doing this.

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Fight Or Else

Under the Liberals the Canadian Armed Forces were a peacekeeping force. They attracted young unemployed Maritimer's with the promise of careers and job skills. Their recruitment drives emphasized the Canadian Armed Forces non combat role in solving crisis's. Recruitment focused on jobs training, career and used humanistic slogan; No Life Like It . These have been replaced by Harpers war mongering slogan; We Fight.

But unfortunately some folks who joined do not want to fight in Harpers war. They wanted a job.

The Canadian military has released several soldiers after they claimed conscientious objection to serving in wartorn Afghanistan, according to internal records from the National Defence department.

Steve Staples, director of the Rideau Institute, said some are enticed by flashy ads, the prospect of steady employment or the chance to help out fellow Canadians in emergencies. He believes the Canadian Forces should find other roles for those who don't want to fight in Afghanistan.

"They thought they were signing up to help Canada, not fight someone else's war in the Middle East," he said.

Scott Taylor, a former soldier who now publishes Esprit de Corps magazine, said some resist deployment because they aren't psychologically or physically ready for combat or because they get cold feet.

Many signed up to learn a trade or because they thought it would be an adventurous career path -- not to fight a war.

"There was a long time when unless you were in the infantry, you wouldn't be doing any front-line stuff where there might be some danger," he said. "So it was kind of like a lifetime of training for a war you never thought was going to happen."

Employee turnover and loyalty pose serious problems for employers of all stripes. Stress, age or other factors including opportunities for more appealing, better paid work elsewhere have valued and highly skilled people changing jobs at an unprecedented rate.

Imagine the problem the Canadian military faces in keeping its well-trained force together. More soldiers are leaving than in the past.

The reason is evident: the work is hard and the pay doesn't always compare well to what can be earned in the private sector. Despite the fact that recruitment is up, the current attrition rate is hard to accommodate, especially in the Afghan mission.

This is particularly true of our Reservists who have regular lives and joined to be part of an armed forces more interested in peacekeeping and solving humanitarian crises. Now as we run out of regular forces for combat they are being relied upon more and more to fill the gaps in Harpers War. Unfortunately when they return from active duty still do not have their jobs assured them. They have to fight to get their jobs back.

Which is why the petition below is so important to support ,as is support for NDP MP Dawn Black's private members bill.

Black wants to make sure soldiers have jobs at home

While the government talks about helping the reservists the NDP is doing something.

The Conservatives’ Throne Speech promised to look at the issue by consulting with the provinces. However, such consultation is simply unnecessary and is a delaying tactic.

“In January this year, I visited Kandahar Air Field in Afghanistan and met reservists from across Canada. Many of them told me that they were unsure whether their jobs would still be waiting for them when their service was completed,” said Black. “Nobody should have to worry about being unemployed because they’ve chosen to represent Canada overseas.”

Job Protection for

Canadian Reservists

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Hidden Costs of Harpers War

The Harper government does not release the numbers of Canadians wounded in Kandahar.

Now most injuries not reported

A new policy has clearly emerged. Deaths are still reported but injuries are not, unless one of two scenarios exists. The first is if the injury is so severe, it may very well result in death. The second is if journalists already know about it. If a journalist happens to be in a convoy that is hit and sees the injury, they’ll obviously know about it.

Injuries are increasingly frequent these days. As many as four roadside bomb strikes happen each week. Soldiers are being injured in the process, some of them seriously. Some of them will lose limbs. Others will have their lives irreparably damaged. We won’t know. Whether we should know is another question.

So what’s changed? There is the argument that politicians — fearing a further loss of public support for this mission — don’t want to reveal the true number of injuries. Another school of thought is that the injuries have become so routine, the military doesn’t view them as a “new development” and thus not newsworthy (or publicly releasable). A final argument is that there is now so much violence, the deployed soldiers’ would prefer to reduce the publication of bad news that will further worry their families back in Canada.

As the medevac crew was launched on one medical mission after another, we repeatedly saw Canadian soldiers being loaded and unloaded.

The point is this: soldiers have died in this place, but many more have been injured. The United States, which is engaged in its own largely unpopular war in Iraq, still releases injury statistics. Canada does not.

The long term impact of this war is veterans returning with post combat syndrome. Once upon a time it was called battle fatigue, and those who suffered from it were often summarily executed in the field during WWI. We have come a long way since then. Hardly it remains a hidden injury of war and like other injuries occurring to our troops it is to be covered up from the public according to the Harpocrites.

Nearly 400 of 2,700 Canadian soldiers who have served in Kandahar province might have come home with mental health problems, according to a report by the office responsible for the health of deployed troops.

The heavy toll that the war in Afghanistan has taken on the minds and bodies of Canadian troops has been revealed in data, documents and interviews provided by the Canadian Expeditionary Force Command.

In addition to the 63 Canadian soldiers who have been killed in Afghanistan since February 2006, 243 have been wounded, according to the data.

Waiting lists are stretching from a few weeks to months for Manitoba soldiers seeking psychological help, say officials at a Winnipeg clinic.

Referrals from the Canadian Forces are up 78 per cent over last year, officials at the Operational Stress Injury Clinic in Winnipeg said Friday.

Operational Stress, sometimes known as combat stress, is the term used to describe any persistent psychological problem resulting from military service, including post-traumatic stress disorder.

SEE:

Harpers War Costs Another Canadian Life

Kandahar

Afghanistan

War



Job Protection for

Canadian Reservists

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Contracting Out Harpers War

Canada quietly has expanded the use of contracting out and privatization of military operations for Harpers War. Not only is Tim Horton's a private contractor working at taxpayer expense in Kandahar so is SNC Lavalin.

It is Canada's version of Bechtel and Halliburton. And like them it too has been rocked by scandals.But unlike them it is also a war-profiteer making weapons systems and small arms. It processes depleted uranium for weapons use in Iraq and Afghanistan. And your pension dollars help support them.

As this article points out if you want the real date that Canada will remain in Kandahar till, try 2012.

Since Canadian troops deployed to southern Afghanistan in the spring of 2006, the number of contractors working in support and logistics roles has more than doubled to nearly 200.

The privatized support dates back to Canada's multiple deployments in the former Yugoslavia in the late 1990s. Anticipating more overseas mission in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the federal government turned to defence-engineering giant SNC Lavalin, which won a five-year, $500-million contract that has renewal options running until 2012.

The federal government has already quietly opted to renew the contract, which has set renewal dates of 2007, 2009 and 2011.

In Afghanistan, for example, SNC Lavalin-PAE was given a five year, $400 million contract by the Canadian Department of Defense to build and maintain Camp Julien and provide laundry, food and other services to Canadian occupation forces there. And to meet the increasing demand for Quebecois bullets, SNC is building another artillery testing range on Cree land in Waswanipi, Quebec. Opposition to the project is rising in Waswanipi because the range will disrupt an important trap-line used by Cree hunters.

We even have our own version of Blackwater happening in Kabul.

Canada's diplomats in Kabul and visiting high-value targets like Prime Minister Stephen Harper are protected by a group of heavily armed gunmen hired by Saladin Security, a British firm with a long history of secretive and clandestine operations.

Department of Foreign Affairs officials in Ottawa are tight-lipped about the deal struck with Saladin, whose gun-toting employees provide perimeter security, operate checkpoints, serve as bodyguards and form a heavily armed rapid-reaction force designed to move quickly to thwart an attempted kidnapping and rescue survivors of suicide attacks or car-bombings in Kabul.

The department won't even confirm that Saladin's most recent contract - which ended in June of 2007 - has been renewed, but observers of the Canadian embassy in Kabul say Saladin employees remain on guard. Some Saladin guards, in baseball caps and paramilitary uniforms, openly patrol the road outside the Canadian diplomatic compound in Kabul.

But details of the extent of Canada's reliance on a private firm for diplomatic protection are even more scant than the now-controversial U.S. deal with Blackwater Security, the American firm whose hired gunmen killed 17 Iraqi civilians last month while protecting a diplomatic convoy.

Saladin Security, Ltd. is a private military company based out of London and headed by industry veteran Maj. David Walker. The company was orginally established as a subsidiary of Keenie Meenie Services, and financed by John Martin Southern of Blackwall Green, Ltd., in 1978 to handle local contracts. As KMS disappeared from the global stage, Saladin began taking on contracts in the Middle East and Sri Lanka.

They provide military training, weapons procurement, logistical support, post-conflict resolutions, commercial property security, and risk analysis.

Saladin trains the Omani troops and runs their airforce which is flown and maintained almost completely by British personnel. RAF bases in Oman were used as launching pads for American flights into Afghanistan. Saladin, along with KMS, aided the CIA and British Intelligence in arming and training the Mujahideen in the war against Soviet imperialism.

Saladin is currently operating in Iraq.

In 1984, KMS was approved by the British government to train the Special Task Force arm of the Sri Lankan military against the Tamil rebels. The STF was widely reported to have been committing atrocities against the Tamil population and by 1987 KMS had moved their two hundred personnel to Latin America. The British press had reported, though the company denied it, that employees for KMS were quitting their jobs because the Sri Lankan troops were out of control.

During the Iran-Contra investigations, KMS was accused of repeatedly carrying out sabotage operations in Nicaragua that included mining the Managua harbor and destroying enemy camps, buildings and pipelines.

On November 22, 1987 the London Observer's Simon de Bruxelles published a three page proposal from KMS to the CIA suggesting sending small teams of instructors into Afghanistan to train rebels in "demolition, sabotage, reconnaissance and para-medicine."

KMS was accompanied by Saladin Security (a subsidiary) and Defence Systems Limited in their training programs in Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Oman.

KMS closed down in the early 1990s, and Saladin began operating more internationally.

The BRITISH ASSOCIATION OF PRIVATE SECURITY COMPANIES (BAPSC) works to promote the interests and regulate the activities of UK based firms that provide armed defensive security services in countries outside the UK.

A Fistful of Contractors: The Case for a Pragmatic Assessment of Private Military Companies in Iraq," by David Isenberg
BASIC RESEARCH REPORT 2004.

Speaking of Blackwater they are used for training Canadian forces used in Afghanistan as well as to train the secret JTF-2 special forces, which have seen action in Iraq.

Select Canadian soldiers have been sent to Blackwater U.S.A. in North Carolina for specialized training in bodyguard and shooting skills. Other soldiers have taken counterterrorism evasive-driving courses with the private military company now at the centre of an investigation into the killings of Iraqi civilians and mounting concerns about the aggressive tactics of its workers in the field.

Canadian military police trained by Blackwater operated in Kandahar last year in support of coalition special forces. Members of the Strategic Advisory Team, which operates in Kabul, also underwent counterterrorism driving training, according to a military official.

The Ottawa-based counterterrorism unit, Joint Task Force 2, has also maintained ongoing training links to the company.

Military officials did not have further details on why Blackwater would be hired, but promised to provide those. Later, however, they did not comment on the matter.

Canadian Forces spokesman Lt.-Col. Jamie Robertson said the military does not discuss its special forces training. But he noted that Blackwater and other firms have been contracted to provide services for other units.

And the Afghan security forces used to protect the PRT in Kandahar are hired guns, euphemistically called contractors, mercenaries by any other name. And they are under the control of warlords.

So what is an occupying army, huddled behind the wire, supposed to do? Well, if you are NATO then you go ahead and pay some trustworthy locals to fight for you. That is, you hire mercenaries. Under the headline, "British hire anti-Taliban mercenaries", the Times of London reports on "newly formed tribal police who will be recruited by paying a higher rate than the Taliban."

Canadian forces, too, are getting in on the action. "For five years Col. Toorjan, a turbaned, tough-as-nails, 33-year-old soldier, has been working alongside U.S. and Canadian forces in Afghanistan as a paid mercenary commander," reports Canada's National Post. "Today, his militia force of 60 Afghan fighters guards Camp Nathan Smith, the Canadian provincial reconstruction team site (PRT) in Kandahar, and guides Canadian soldiers on their patrols outside the base." Toorjan and his armed men "wield significant influence in Kandahar's complex security web", making him a treasured ally, though before 9/11 he was "in effect a warlord", said the second-in-command of Canada's Provincial Reconstruction Team.

The use of mercenaries, it should be noted, runs counter to the International Convention on Mercenaries (1989). Canada, however, along with the USA, the UK and many others, is not a signatory to that treaty.

And the contracting out continues even when our vets retire an go looking for a new job.

OTTAWA, ONTARIO--(Marketwire - Oct. 25, 2007) - The Government of Canada today announced new measures to help retiring Canadian Forces Veterans make the successful transition from the military to new civilian careers. The Honourable Greg Thompson, Minister of Veterans Affairs; Laurie Hawn, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence; and Bram Lowsky, General Manager, Right Management, formally launched the national contract for the Job Placement Program.

The value of the contract with Right Management is for up to $18.5 million over the next four years.

Right Management is a subsidiary of Manpower Inc. the temporary placement agency that has benefited from government and corporate downsizing. The Conservatives continue the policy of the Liberals of Reinventing Government by downsizing departments and contracting out. When you contract out you no longer have to worry about staffing costs like benefits, pensions, nor pesky union grievances.

Right Management is a career transition and consulting firm operating in more than 40 countries.

Founded in 1980, Right Management was at the forefront of “inventing” the outplacement industry, and expanded globally to match the footprint of its multi-national clients.

Beginning in 1996, Right Management extended into consulting services to help clients address human resource and organizational consulting needs.

Right Management was acquired by Manpower in January 2004.

Manpower Inc. operates under five brands: Manpower, Manpower Professional, Elan, Jefferson Wells and Right Management.

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