Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams appears to be staring down critics upset about new legislation that will expropriate water, timber, and hydroelectric assets in the province currently leased by AbitibiBowater Inc.
Williams' Progressive Conservative government wants to end a deal -- signed more than a century ago when Newfoundland was still under British rule -- that gave a U.K. company resource rights in exchange for setting up a mill in Grand Falls-Windsor.
The mill has since exchanged hands a few times, with the latest owner, AbitibiBowater, saying it will shut it down this spring. That will throw hundreds of people out of work.
The shutdown announcement prompted the province's Tory government to revoke the company's rights to the resources. The province also wants to put the mill's power plant under the control of a Crown corporation.
Williams says it just makes sense that the province have the rights to its own resources considering AbitibiBowater will no longer operate in the province.
"These resources belong to the people of my province and they're going back to the people of my province," Williams said, noting the mill was part of the original 1905 deal in exchange for resource rights.
He says the company may be compensated for power related capital assets, and it will also be allowed to use provincial resource assets until March 28, when the mill is slated for closure.
Williams told CTV Newsnet Wednesday that he's not worried the move will scare off investors and private companies.
He said the province has shown it works effectively with corporations that make profits for themselves and provide a benefit for the residents of Newfoundland and Labrador.
"We work very well with big business when they come in and they use our resources and they make profits from our resources. We just ask for fair partnerships, equitable partnerships," he said.
"If a company that came here to do a milling and logging business decides it's no longer going to do that business. Do you think the province should allow it to leave with the rights to its water and the rights to the land?"
AbitibiBowater has threatened legal action and even suggested the province's move may harm NAFTA and lead to protectionist barriers being erected by the new U.S. administration next year.
"What essentially, you've done, is add a burning log to a pile of kindling here, because the Obama administration had already expressed some reservations about the NAFTA agreement," company spokesman Seth Kursman told CTV's Mike Duffy Live on Wednesday.
"This is certainly another iron in the fire, which is unfortunate for Canada," he said.
The company has had to close a number of mills in North America over the past few years because of shrinking demand, Kursman noted.
"We really have a strong track record of working with the community," he said. "And this kind of adversarial approach certainly is not in the best interests of anyone."
