Fire AEUB board

Fire AEUB board by Jeremy Loome, Edmonton Sun, August 17 2007
The Alberta Energy and Utilities Board knew for two months before it became public that its investigator at a hearing had gathered private citizens’ information and given it to senior board members. But instead of publicly admitting it had the information, and offering to fix procedures that it has alleged were for security purposes only, the board sat on the information, said NDP Leader Brian Mason. In fact, the EUB continued accepting more from the investigator for nearly a month. That alone should be enough for Premier Ed Stelmach to fire the board, Mason said. ”This was intelligence gathering,” said Mason, “and it was political intelligence gathering.” He unveiled 50 pages of AEUB correspondence yesterday showing that, while the investigators were always termed as being at the meeting for ‘security,’ they were also tasked with “intelligence gathering.” … The investigator even intercepted e-mails from sympathetic aboriginal protesters and forwarded them to members of the board. A month later, in June, the investigator forwarded details on how the AEUB could tap into protesters’ conference calls. In those e-mails, AEUB security team leader Ray Ambler indicates the board has control over the information flow from the investigator, saying “thanks for the info and you will not have to report this information, given you are not participating.”