Murphy’s Law For PEI Taxpayers

Now that Teresa Wright is finished at the Guardian, there’s a good chance lots of interesting news will never hit print or find its way onto Louise Martin’s desk at CBC.

If you really want to know about the big important decisions being made by Wade MacLauchlan you have to read the Orders in Council on Executive Council’s webpage. 

That’s something Teresa knew well.

So I thought I’d take a peek at the decisions from just two meetings: February 21 & 27 to see what struggling businesses on our mighty Island are getting the financial help they need and deserve so they can be successful like, say, the Murphy Group of companies.  Island Investment Development Inc. can authorize small loans, but need Cabinet approval for bigger chunks of taxpayer’s hard-earned money, pursuant to subsection 2(3) of the Island Investment Development Act Financial Assistance Regulations (EC2005-686):

2 (3) On the application of a person, the Corporation may, with the approval of the Lieutenant Governor in Council, advance a loan or a loan guarantee to a person if the total indebtedness of the person to the Corporation, including guarantees provided by the Corporation on behalf of that person or an affiliate of that person, exceeds $2,500,000 in the aggregate.

Surprisingly, there were only 3 loan applications to IIDI requiring Cabinet approval dealt with at the February 21st & 27th Meetings:

(A)  On February 21, Cabinet authorised Island Investment Development Inc. to advance a loan in the amount of $600,000.00 to Great George Properties Ltd [owned by Kevin Murphy] in one decision;   and another $2,140,000.00 loan to Prince Edward Island Brewing Company Ltd. [also owned by Kevin Murphy] in another decision.

(B) On February 27, Cabinet authorised Island Investment Development Inc. to advance a loan for $4,000,000.00 to company # 102163 P.E.I. Inc., [phew!….at least it wasn’t the Murphy clan again…or was it?  I checked the Corporate/Business Registry on the Department of Justice and Community Affairs website and lo and behold, company #102163 PEI Inc.  has just one director who is also the only shareholder, Paul William Murphy….Kevin Murphy’s nephew. What kind of business is #102163? Under “Business Type” all that is listed is “Business Corporation,” so your guess is as good as mine.

And that’s why on PEI we have such fondness for citing Murphy’s law: “Whatever can go wrong [for taxpayers] will go wrong,” given the fact that the Murphy’s are hard-core Liberal insiders and Wade’s remaining time to write them cheques is slowly but surely coming to a close.