Sue's Blog

Tuesday, June 07, 2016

Nalcor CEO - Conflict of Interest?

It seems the information on Stan Marshall's contract remains behind closed doors as I write this today.

The past month has been consumed with outrage and calls of "we did not know" as it related to the Ed Martin platinum handshake.

The lesson for the people, media, and MHA's should be don't be blindsided again - make sure we will not end up with more problems resulting from a contract with Nalcor's new CEO.

The now infamous Martin Executive Employment Agreement (renewal) ended up being a lottery win for a fellow who does not show up much on Executive searches for jobs held prior to becoming the CEO of Nalcor. It did however contain important clauses that deserve the same level of scrutiny.

Clauses 3(c) and 4 deal with a common issue for corporate executives and the companies they work for. The issue is conflict or potential conflict of interest.

These clauses are absolutely necessary to ensure that the interests of the company they work for are placed ahead of all other professional involvements.

As such Ed Martin's contract contained the following clauses:

3(c) the Executive shall: not acquire, directly or indirectly, an interest in any firm, partnership, association, entity or corporation, the business or operations of which would in any manner, directly or indirectly, compete or conflict with the business or operations of Nalcor and without limiting the generality of the foregoing, neither the Executive nor any member of his family (this term having the same meaning as defined in Newfoundland and Labrador's Conflict of Interest Act, 1995) shall directly hold any shares in the Fortis Inc. group of companies including Newfoundland Power excepting however interests acquired in a publicly traded corporation through retirement mutual fund(s) investment vehicles.

4. The Executive may, with the approval of the Board, serve as a director or member of service clubs, charitable, recreational and community organizations and may also serve as a director of publicly traded entities which would not in any manner, directly or indirectly, compete or conflict with the business or operations of Nalcor having first obtained the approval of the Board.

Stan Marshall's background is well known particularly his tenure with Newfoundland Power and Fortis.

We need to know if these clauses were maintained in Marshall's contract and if not why not.

Further we need to know who drafted the Marshall contract - was it in house (Government) or outside private lawyers.

Tomorrow I will expand on the potential conflicts of interest that are existing.

I repeat: what I think of the appointment of Stan Marshall is not relevant to this discussion - as this discussion deals with prudent precaution regardless of the qualifications of the Executive.




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