Rolling the dice on Quebec’s infrastructure
Have you seen so many Transport Quebec trucks in one place in your life?
Infrastructure is one of those things - nobody pays it any attention to it until it fails. People have better things to worry about, so they don't think about their water pipes, their electricity lines, their building foundations or their roads or bridges, so long as they're working properly. But when something goes wrong, any of these can suddenly become a top priority.
For this same reason, those who are in charge of infrastructure tend not to prioritize it. If the people don't care, why should the government? Making a working thing still work is not going to win you as many votes as making a brand new thing. And that's a logic that's not reserved for inept governments. Given the choice between paying a professional engineer to do an inspection on that seemingly innocuous crack in a home's foundation and spending that money on a new big-screen TV, which do you think is going to be the more common choice?
2 comments:
Ahhhhhh Human Nature Perhaps................lol Cheers ! HF&RV - Les
Hey in case you thought the wheels of business were not working , this article in tonights Gazette ,points out that Mr Corruption himself ( I can't tell you his name,but the following article has all the letters in the alphabet to spell his name ...hint: starts with 'A' just like the alphabet. HF&RV - Les
QUEBEC – A loophole in Quebec’s laws adopted to crackdown on corruption and collusion in Quebec’s construction industry has allowed a company controlled by Tony Accurso to continue bidding on and winning public-sector contracts in spite of guilty pleas in December 2010 by two Accurso companies on charges of tax fraud, says Nicolas Girard, the Parti Québécois transport critic.
Girard went on the attack for third straight day Thursday, asking Transport Minister Pierre Moreau how it could be that a new Accurso company has been awarded $180 million in public-sector contracts since the 2010 guilty pleas, including a new contract for almost $11 million this January for construction work on the McGill University Health Centre and an $11.6-million contract on Autoroute 15.
Simard-Beaudry Construction Inc. and Construction Louisbourg Ltd., both controlled by Accurso, both admitted in 2010 to evading $4.1 million in taxes, which would exclude them, under Quebec’s Bill 73 and Bill 35, from bidding on public contracts for five years.
But a new Accurso company called Louisbourg SBC, which gives its address as Suite 3700. Place Victoria, the address of its law firm Fasken Martineau, is free to bid on public-sector contracts.
“The transport department fully applies the laws we are given,” Moreau replied to Girard. “Now you certainly cannot accuse the government of doing things to favour Mr. Accurso or his companies since steps by the government, including the creation UPAC, (Quebec’s permanent anti-corruption unit) led to the arrest of Mr. Accurso.”
Girard noted since it was created in 2008 as a holding company, Louisbourg SBC has won $265 million in Transport Quebec contracts.
According to Quebec’s corporate registry, Louisbourg SBC is controlled by Simpler Networks Inc., a company engaged in “manufacturing of telecommunications products.” And Antonio Accurso is president of Simpler Networks, which in turn is owned by Simpler Networks Corp. of Wilmington, Delaware, although it gives its business address as “1840 TransCanada Highway, Suite 100, Dorval, NY.”
Labour Minister Lise Thériault told Girard that organized crime “transforms itself” over time and it is up the government to adapt laws “to close the doors.”
“And if we have to modify our laws again, we will do so,” Thériault said.
................................................................................Cheers ! HF&RV - Les
See all is well in Labelle Province "Business as Usual"
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