Truly independent oversight demands an unshakable commitment to explore every possible option.
Nevertheless, as far back as 2017 Consumer Advocate Dennis Browne urged the province to shut the door on potential customers like the United States and private industrial users for our green, clean, renewable Churchill Falls/Gull Island power and who may have been willing to pay top dollar.
Instead, Dennis Browne proposed framing the discussion around Hydro-Québec’s narrow interests by handing Quebec’s negotiating team a monopoly seat at the table.
That recommendation betrays a predisposition and a narrow vision toward limited competition and permanently compressing Newfoundland and Labrador’s bargaining power.
As far back as 19 August 2017 Mr. Browne wrote in his letter to The Telegram — “…(I)n working with the province of Quebec in a true partnership….A best efforts panel…be convened and given a mandate to meet with Hydro-québec and to inform the government as to what is obtainable.”
So here we are, even though Consumer Advocate Dennis Browne previously and publicly declared that government’s negotiators should meet exclusively with Hydro-Québec so that the panel could “inform the government as to what is obtainable”, Hydro-Quebec’s definition of “what is obtainable” became this (1969 like) December 2024 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU).
By advising NL government to approach only Hydro-Québec, Dennis Browne forfeited the very independence Labradorians and Newfoundlanders expect (and demand). By ignoring other possible options, the MOU by definition alone cannot be objectively determined to be the “best”. By definition, to be the “best”, the MOU would need to be “compared” to other options. But other than this Quebec term sheet (the MOU), no other option has even been considered.
By definition alone, the MOU fails to pass any rational thought, reasoning, comparative, business case test.
An independent chair must ensure that every clause—whether price escalators or revenue-sharing formulas—are scrutinized through an objective lens, not shaped by a preconceived (and narrow) world view.
By championing an exclusive dialogue with Hydro-Québec, government has allowed Mr. Browne’s ratepayer, more narrow consumer advocate role to telegraph to negotiators long before 2024 that his Consumer Advocate office would accept Hydro-Québec’s baseline assumptions without testing them against the wider market.
This is not the posture of an oversight panel; it is the stance of a champion for Quebec’s pre-existing terms — brought to life through the 2024 MOU.
NL’s recent history illustrates the perils of insufficient competition and weak oversight. When Muskrat Falls was conceived and executed under a flimsy public mandate, cost overruns ballooned into billions, and ratepayers were left shouldering the burden. Now, the Churchill Falls negotiations carry even greater stakes: Gull Island alone promises up to 2,250 megawatts of additional capacity. Why would we entrust its future to a chair whose past public advice would have shut out interested customers who might have driven better terms through competition?
Some will dismiss Mr. Browne’s 2017 comments as a well-meaning idea. But context matters. At the time, Dennis Browne spoke with the full gravitas of his office. His proposal effectively offered Hydro-Québec exclusive first dibs on our province’s most valuable renewable resource. That is hardly the approach of an Independent Oversight Panel Leader.
When the Consumer Advocate publicly sidelined every potential buyer but Hydro-Québec, he undermined public trust in his ability to impartially evaluate agreements. If he cannot publicly advocate for an open, competitive bidding process, how can he credibly oversee the fine print of a deal destined to shape NL revenues and power rates for decades?
I respectfully call on the Government of this great Province of Newfoundland and Labrador to see not only the weaknesses of the existing oversight structure, but the substance and narrow process that led to this MOU itself.
Our province deserves, and this time, must have a deal that secures the best possible terms for Newfoundland and Labrador—not a deal cobbled together, that bypasses competition for the sake of easing talks with Hydro-Québec.
Anything less risks repeating the mistakes not only of Muskrat Falls, of 1969 — but will leave household budgets and public coffers on the hook for decades and decades to come.