Thunder Bay Hydro must lobby, president says

Paying to lobby the government is just the cost of doing business, says the president of Thunder Bay Hydro.

Rob Mace responded to the provincial NDP’s releasing of documents that show Thunder Bay Hydro paid lobbyist David Angus of Ottawa’s Capital Hill Group. While the lobbyist registry document shows a termination date of April, Mace said the public utility company hasn’t used the lobbyist since 2003.

Mace said Angus is looking into why the termination date is there.

"This stuff is wrong coming out of the NDP," Mace said.

Mace said he didn’t remember the exact reason why Thunder Bay Hydro hired the group in 2002, but said at the time there was a lot of talk about making a more open-market hydro industry. Mace said lobbying the government, through Thunder Bay Hydro or contracting outside lobbyists, is essential for the company.

"I say absolutely we should (lobby). We’re a large corporation. We’re highly dependent on government policy and government policy that comes out that affects us poorly can financially affect both us and out customers so we lobby all the time," said Mace.

Every industry lobbies levels of government, Mace added.

While the NDP have stated that the practice should not be at the expense of the rate payer, Mace said rate payers always have to pay.

"Ultimately everything is at the expense of the rate payer. If you’re paying me and I fly down to Toronto so I can meet with a minister so I can tell him ‘I think you’re policies in Northwestern Ontario regarding conservation are hurting us’ ultimately the rate payer pay for that," said Mace.

"It’s easy for customers who don’t really understand how complicated the industry really is to say ‘you’re wasting your money if you have to pay to talk to government’ but the reality is you have to spend some money in order to protect your business interests."