Tory paid $91,000 for oral advice, Hydro says

Ontario utility and Harris insider at odds over work produced for corporate-strategy contract

Globe and Mail - March 9, 1999
by Martin Mittelstaedt

Leslie Noble, campaign manager of Ontario Premier Mike Harris's winning 1995 election bid, received about $91,000 under a consulting contract with Ontario Hydro for which she produced no written records of any kind, according to the utility.

The Globe and Mail submitted a request under the Freedom of Information Act for the records of what Ms. Noble produced under the contract, but Hydro said it had no documents to divulge because Ms. Noble provided only oral advice -- an assertion Ms. Noble disputes.

"There is no recorded information responsive to your request. There was no requirement for reports or studies. Information was provided verbally to individuals at Ontario Hydro," the utility said in a statement to the paper.

But Ms. Noble says Ontario Hydro's statement isn't true. She said in an interview that she provided it "with a lot of stuff. . . . We did volumes. We had like three people working on that file for them for some time."

When told that the utility said she produced no records, she said: "I can't really comment on what they would say. Between us, it's not the case."

She said confidentiality agreements with the utility prevent her from releasing the material. "I just wonder whether it's all been ditched or something, which is quite possible. I haven't any idea what they do with their stuff once they get it."

The consulting contract, which was with Ms. Noble's company Strategy Corp., was cancelled last year. Ms. Noble was hired for six weeks, starting on April 15, 1997, at a fee of $14,000. After the initial period, her services were retained for about a year at $7,000 a month, plus expenses.

(Ontario Hydro's executive vice-president of finance at the time, Eleanore Clitheroe, signed the contract. Ms. Clitheroe is scheduled to become president of Ontario Hydro's new electricity-distribution utility when it is set up next month.

Under another freedom-of-information request, the paper had earlier received a copy of the contract Ms. Noble wrote setting out the type of work she would produce for Ontario Hydro.

The contract indicated the utility was to receive advice that might have been expected to lead to some written work.

Among other things, Ms. Noble said she would offer "assistance in the preparation of materials for government and public use." She also said she would offer "assessment[s] of the potential political and public relations impacts of Hydro/government decisions," offer assessments of the province's electricity policy and create what she called a "war-gaming session" for key Hydro and government officials to review the utility's corporate-development strategy.

Visit the Globe and Mail newspaper
View It