Alan Carter, the Global Television bureau chief at Queen’s Park, has never been one of our favourite reporters. He tends to be something of a wiseass. He redeemed himself the other day though by doing a fairly stand-up job of a year-end interview with Ontario’s Premier. While the Premier did seem a little apprehensive, it was a better half-hour than was expected from either.
Carter tucked his smarminess in his pocket and the Premier gave fairly straightforward and brief answers. The most fun was watching her try to walk around her faux pas in telling the media about her last meeting in December 2013 with the Prime Minister of Canada. Saying that Mr. Harper had smirked when she was trying to get some answers on fixing the Canada Pension Plan was bad politics and rude. And she wonders why she has been unable to get another meeting since?
She has a good point that it is not about their personalities. As the premier of Canada’s largest province, she should have a better working relationship with the Prime Minister. And she will certainly button up about his facial expressions if she ever gets another chance for a meeting.
In one way, she and the Prime Minister are very much alike. Alan Carter brought up the time earlier in the year when he was having a problem getting an interview and he ambushed her when out for a run. He found out where she would be running and joined her to do the interview while both were running. She considered it a breech of the rules—hers, not his—but went along with it because he was obviously a novice runner. Only the Prime Minister’s Office has actually enforced rules on the news media and gotten away with it. Premiers who want good coverage are expected to allow for some give and take.
One subject that was not well answered had to do with the Pan Am Games in 2015. While neither the president nor the chair of the Games organizers would be expected to see the detail of expense claims from such a large and complex organization, the premier replaced the president of the games at the beginning of the year. There were just too many complaints about improper expenses. Having organized many, albeit smaller, events around the world, there is always a tendency in political jobs to be casual about expenses. We always found that it was the chair that set the standards and kept the petty stuff from becoming issues.
Other than that, there were the usual platitudes in the interview about conditions for a growing economy, concern for the downturn of the tar sands economy, the need for healthcare savings, investment needs … and have a Happy and Prosperous New Year.
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Copyright 2015 © Peter Lowry
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