Is Canada’s Stephen Harper legally bound to investigate the sale of Nortel?
If you happen to be a subscriber to the liberal party of Canada’s way of thinking, they are. The release goes on to point out that every sale over 300 million dollars is subject to an automatic review. Okay, I get that. They might even be right when they say so. But, the article makes it out like Ericsson, who purchased Nortel for over a billion US, is just going to take the company and go screaming off to Sweden or somewhere with it. Which it very well might–and should be entitled to do. Nortel was, after all, a global company with offices in both the US and Canada among other countries. That shouldn’t change simply because their headquarters may or may not move.
The liberals’ big thing though, and this is what makes me scratch my head a little, is that so much of Canadians’ tax dollars have gone into funding research projects undertaken by Nortel. Tax dollars earmarked for Nortel by the liberals while they were in power, of course. Something that, whether it happens to be true or not, the opinionated fool really has to wonder just what a good idea that is. Government should not be funding a private corporation–least of all using money that could have been much better spent, maybe, preparing Canada for a possible recession. It sucks when a corporation goes under and takes your well wasted tax dollars with it, doesn’t it Michael?
A similar story happened in 1995, when national iconic coffee chain Tim Horton’s sold its assets to Wendy’s, and engaged in a partnership with them that saw its corporate headquarters move south of the border, while stores north of the border ended up partnering with their Wendy’s counterparts–go for a sandwitch for lunch, then move on up to the next counter for a doughnut for dessert. And the liberals saw nothing wrong with it. Guess they weren’t funneling enough tax money into the company for them to complain about. But, in spite of the fact they moved their headquarters south of the border–and, for the record, they recently announced they’ll be bringing it back north–the company never left Canada. Canadians could still go and get their hands on their coffee and doughnut fix before work. In fact, the company even tried to expand into the US–and is, from what I hear, having a degree of luck. So what’s the problem?
It comes down to the almighty dollar. The liberals pumped a ton of them into Nortel, and Nortel promptly imploded. So now, they’re concerned. And rather than let things play out, they want Stephen Harper’s conservative government to step in and start knocking around the private industry. I’ve said it before, although that was pre-website, but I’ll say it again. Government should never get its hands into the private corporation pie. Once it does that, it effectively rules out any sort of competition. Of course, there are some things you just shouldn’t hand over without question to private corporations–healthcare for the entire country, anyone? But, when you bail out the auto makers, when you bail out technology research giants, when you bail out a television network almost no one who wants to watch something decent on TV actually watches, you remove a lot from the competitive nature of private business. And, you escentially remove the real choice your country has when it comes to who it deals with. And then you still have problems not unlike what we’re seeing here.
