Martel’s fate reflects Ontariop mining’s fortunes

Ontario mining representatives have advised Premier Bob Rae that he may not be serving the industry well if he asks Northern Development and Mines Minister Shelley Martel to resign from cabinet over comments she made at a cocktail party.

In a recent letter to the premier, Prospectors and Developers Association of Canada President Fenton Scott said “the PDAC wholly endorses your support of Ms. Martel and we urge you to resist the pressure for her resignation.” Scott says the letter was written because he believes it would be highly disruptive for the industry to have yet another new minister in the mines portfolio at a time when it is facing serious problems.

A rising star within the New Democratic Party, Martel became the sixth minister in five years to be handed the mines portfolio when she succeeded Gilles Pouliot following a cabinet shuffle in August, 1991.

Scott believes Martel is sympathetic to the mining industry because she was raised in the heart of the Sudbury nickel belt and became MPP for Sudbury East in 1987 after her father, Elie, had represented the riding for 20 years. Martel initiated changes to the Ontario Mineral Incentive Program (OMIP), making all qualified exploration programs in Northern Ontario eligible for a grant equal to 50% of expenses to a maximum of $300,000 (But the 28-year-old mines minister has been fighting for her political life since she allegedly divulged confidential information about a Sudbury doctor during a heated argument at a Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum function in Thunder Bay, Ont., Dec. 5.

Martel, who declined requests to be interviewed by The Northern Miner, has told the Ontario legislature that she lied about having had information about the doctor’s billing habits.

On Feb. 10, a legislative committee headed by former Liberal solicitor general Steven Offer, will begin to determine whether confidential information was leaked to Martel by Ontario Health Insurance Program officials.

Her future will remain in doubt until after the committee presents its recommendations to the provincial legislature April 15.

Steve Parry, president of the Porcupine branch of the PDAC, says he would support the recommendations of the probe if there is hard evidence of wrong doing in relation to the use of confidential information. “But if all we have here is innuendo, that’s another situation.”

“We have just spent six months educating Martel and for us to spend another six months educating another mines minister would not be in the best interests of the industry,” Parry told The Northern Miner.

“It is always a concern when cabinet ministers keep changing,” added Patrick Reid, president of the Ontario Mining Association.

Ontario mining officials are concerned about the situation because they fear they are about to lose someone they regard as more than competent. “She is the only one I have ever known who meticulously takes notes when people are talking to her,” said Todd Sanders, president of the Northwestern Ontario Prospectors Association.

In his letter to the premier, Scott added, “While Ms. Martel’s responsibilities in the Northern and Development and Mines portfolio commenced only recently, we are impressed by her obvious intelligence, sensitivity and penchant for hard work.” Rae later surprised the PDAC president by reading from the letter during question period in the Ontario legislature.

“I like the fact that she has a sound understanding of the business and is prepared to take direct action to change things,” said Parry. “That is more than can be said for many of the mines ministers we have had in the past 10 years.”