Woodlots group goes up against J.D. Irving

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/wood-marketing-board-irving-appeal-court-1.4634984

Woodlots group goes up against J.D. Irving before Appeal Court

Sussex-based marketing board tries to win back right to negotiate prices for members

Connell Smith · CBC News · Posted: Apr 26, 2018 6:00 AM AT

  41 Comments 

Commenting is now closed for this story.

 

 
William Roberts

Good luck with that. The deck is stacked and the Empire has the financial power to bankrupt would be contesters and competitors. A good part of that power comes from tax payers in the way of subsidies, grants and tax concessions. We are contributors to our own demise and enslavement.

David Amos

@William Roberts YUP Trust that I was not surprised when these people did not want my help arguing the Irving Empire. Methinks their lawyer knew they were losers out of the gate N'esy Pas?

John Jude

@Rob Bourque

I can't imagine David Coon being bought and paid for if elected.
I'd be happy to find out though.

David Amos

@John Jude Methinks you should ask me about that after you Google our names N'esy Pas?

 
William Roberts

Irving is always the elephant in the room and could careless who they step on to dominate how the rules are set. And worse yet it is getting worse by the day.

David Amos

@William Roberts True However

Methinks nobody should deny that I am the annoying black fly that making the elephant crazy. N'esy Pas?

 
Alex Forbes

I hope they win. Irving has had a monopoly over NB for far too long.

David Amos

@Guido Ducatti The Irvings don't have a monopoly on forest products but they do control the circus in this province on many issues not just wood..

Paul Bourgoin

Crown land wood is not intended to generate a reduction on the buying prices for private woodlot owners’ wood which broker their wood trough the NB marketing board to protect private woodlot owners purchase prices.

Crown land wood is not a competitive asset to be used to seesaw the prices of Private Woodlot Owners forest products buying prices but to sustain them in a fair protected market buying price that does not favor either side versus the other.

Doesn’t the crownland and forest Act outlaw such a situation?
Doesn’t the Government have the last word on such a situation or are they using the courts to hide their lack of backbone in this situation in an election year?

David Amos

@Paul Bourgoin All good very questions sir Good luck getting answers from the "Powers That Be" in NB

David Amos

@Peter demerchant "you can thank Frank McKenna who got rid of the primary scource law"

Oh so true However

Methinks Bernie Lord promised to reverse that malicious nonsense when he got elected N'esy Pas?

 
Redmond O'Hanlon

If any one here is "abusing their power" it's not the marketing board. Wealth and power become an addiction to some and they use those to crush anyone/thing that threatens that wealth and power. Private woods goes to the empire because there is no alternative and the government fully supports it.

David Amos

@Redmond O'Hanlon "Private woods goes to the empire because there is no alternative and the government fully supports it"

Methinks the folks have Irving's buddy Brian Mosher to thank for this appeal N'esy Pas?

 
Rosco holt

Vote for anything but Liberals and PC.

David Amos

@Rosco holt Methinks to be fair the folks should not vote for the Green Party incumbent either N'esy Pas?

 
Peter demerchant

JdI works hard to keep nb poor and desparate, using their news papers to try and tell people how much the province depends on them. Yes they employ people and that's good, but does not excuse the strong arming, blackmailing and very suspicious influence on government. Does not excuse the agressive one sided forest management methods that are literally destroying nb's greatest asset at huge expense to nb tax payers. Easy to see why the U.S. says we subsidize the forest companies... because we do, very blatenly. Irving says they are buying more private wood than ever, yes... Irving paper is buying it from Irving woodlands, one company to another. Nb has had 200 years to make the forest sector profitable benefit to all nb ers and has failed miserably, any wonder there is so much resistance when other resource projects are proposed. This province will stay in the same state forever as long the Irving family has final say on everything government does.

David Amos

@Peter demerchant I agree

 

stephen blunston

haha marketing boards what a scam just another way to inflate prices and keep some middlemen in a system that doesn't need middlemen, don't like a lot of things irving does but I agree with them on this , now lets do away with the poultry and dairy boards

Bobby Burke

@Daniel Rawlins - Are you really calling the "Empire" a consumer??? They've got a job for you also!

David Amos

@Bobby Burke Methinks the Empire is a definite consumer of many of our assets N'esy Pas?

 

John Jude

Irving is a cancer.

Bobby Burke

@John Jude - Yes cancer, a good way to describe it. Lung Cancer, (Both Lungs)...."Empire's" Pulp Mill, & Empire's "Irving Paper"!

William Roberts

@Bobby Burke that refinery has killed it's share to Bob and now we have to live with all the emissions from rail cars scattered throughout and passing through Southern NB. Everyone one of these cars has functioning release values or at least we hope they function. Slow death for you and your off spring so they can salt it away off shore.

David Amos

@William Roberts Oh My

 

Paul Bourgoin

The kingdom of New Brunswick is controlled by the Royal Family from in St. John. Their Loyal Fredericton Soldiers disguised as trailblazers, ground-breakers listen while following the Royal wishes are outlined as orders. Their demands are the law; their Soldiers are Dedicated while New Brunswick residents become penniless and their children walk towards a new horizon to prosper out in the Canadian west leaving family and a poor New Brunswick.

David Amos 

 @Paul Bourgoin "New Brunswick residents become penniless and their children walk towards a new horizon to prosper out in the Canadian west leaving family and a poor New Brunswick."

Methinks somebody else explained that N'esy Pas?

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/woodlot-marketing-boards-irving-1.4257693

"The marketing board may be there in name, but if [forestry companies] are able to do an end-run around it, and then favour certain larger contractors, what you'll probably see is a consolidation of smaller woodlots. There will be a few winners and a lot of losers in that process."

Parenteau said the issue is about wood prices and who controls those prices.
Toll on rural communities And it is already contributing to the "emptying out" of rural communities, he said."

 

William Roberts

"Irving showed 'disdain' for law, court hears in wood-marketing case"
Really? Guess that is just par for the course with Irving!!
When will we see this in our City of total disdain for the law?

https://www.rt.com/usa/425241-casualties-wisconsin-oil-explosion/

David Amos 

@William Roberts "Irving showed 'disdain' for law, court hears in wood-marketing case"

I doubt they have distain for the courts. Methinks the Irvings knows how to use the courts quite well N'esy Pas?

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/j-d-irving-woodlot-lawsuit-trial-1.3992584

"Justice William Grant dismissed arguments by SNB Forest Products Marketing Board and its sister group, the SNB Wood Cooperative, that JDI lacked standing in the case and that the application was an abuse of the court process.

JDI wants a contract between the two groups representing southern New Brunswick woodlot owners declared unlawful by the Court of Queen's Bench. The forestry company says the marketing board has unlawfully delegated its powers to the co-operative."

Grant found there was enough disagreement over the facts to warrant a trial.

"Clearly there are disputes of fact in this case," the judge said.

"Commission chair Brian Mosher told CBC News on Tuesday that the two-day hearing will likely take place in private. Commission hearings are, by default, open but can be closed if members agree."

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/nb-hearing-irving-court-of-appeal-1.4637279

Irving showed 'disdain' for law, court hears in wood-marketing case

Marketing board's 2015 order to industry at centre of hearing in New Brunswick Court of Appeal

Jacques Poitras · CBC News · Posted: Apr 26, 2018 6:50 PM AT | 

 

J.D. Irving Ltd. bypasses the marketing board in southern New Brunswick to make most of its private wood purchases directly from woodlot owners or industry contractors. (CBC)

 
The province's largest forestry company was accused of showing "disdain" for the law Thursday during a New Brunswick Court of Appeal hearing on the future of New Brunswick's wood-marketing system.

Lawyer David Duncan Young argued J.D. Irving Ltd. had repeatedly "ignored or challenged" the authority of SNB, the Sussex-based wood marketing board for much of southern New Brunswick.
The board finally issued a firm order in 2015 that woodlot owners must sell their wood to the board and Irving can only buy wood from the board — an order that was the subject of Thursday's hearing.

• Woodlots group goes up against J.D. Irving before Appeal Court
• Marketing board to appeal decision in Irving case
• JDI victorious over wood marketing board, but new rules coming

Irving challenged the board's order, and last December the New Brunswick Forest Products Commission ruled in the company's favour. The board now wants the commission ruling overturned.

Young argued that Irving and other forest companies are trying to undermine a system designed to put small woodlot owners "on a level playing field" with the large companies that buy wood.

Law is clear

"That is obviously not something that those who espouse the free market, including some of the respondents, were in favour of," Young said.

He said the law is clear, and he quoted sections saying all producers of private wood "shall sell the regulated product to the board" and all buyers of wood are "prohibited" from buying and processing product "not sold by the board."

Irving started going around the SNB in 2012, negotiating wood deals with landowners or contractors individually and paying a levy to the board. The company argued that gave it greater "certainty of supply."

The company later expanded the practice to elsewhere in the province, bypassing other regional marketing boards.

Young told the panel of three justices Thursday that Irving's repeated circumventing of the board forced it to issue a firm order.

"Is it an abuse of the board's power to try to get J.D. Irving to come back to the board to negotiate?" he asked.

• At loggerheads: J.D. Irving and other forest companies take an axe to the longtime marketing board system

One of the justices, Barbara Baird, seemed open to Young's argument that the board only acted after years of frustration.

"There's definitely a backdrop here," she said, noting the "tenor" of correspondence between the board and Irving became increasingly tense over several years.

"The wheels started coming off the cart, so to speak, when that order was issued, but it was building up before that," she commented.

Order flawed, argues Irving lawyer

But Irving lawyer Paul Steep argued the board's order was flawed because it was too vague and left "a huge amount of discretion" with a board employee who also worked for the co-operative of woodlot owners selling to the board.

"You start with a very basic conflict of interest," he said.

 

 

SNB chair Bill Richards said there were lots of 'good questions' from the panel of three justices at the Court of Appeal hearing. 

 

He said the order did not give Irving or woodlot owners any direction on what to do if there was a surplus or shortage of wood.

In the case of a surplus, there was no guidance on which woodlot owners got to sell to Irving first. In the case of a shortage, it was not clear how to allocate a limited supply of wood among mills owned by Irving and their competitors.

"All of these are issues which are unaddressed by the order but which are essential to giving the order any meaning," he said.

Given all that, the forest products commissioner's decision to overturn the board order was reasonable, Steep argued.

"This is not a fair process. It did not produce a fair outcome. … The commission did the right thing here."

'Good airing of issues'

Justice Raymond French seemed to agree with Steep.

"To enforce [the order] in the absence of precision would be arbitrary," he said.

J.D. Irving says negotiating contracts with individual woodlot owners is a much more efficient way to get wood than going through a marketing board. (Jacques Boissinot - Canadian Press)

 

 

But Young said the law "could not be more precise" in requiring all sales to go through the board.

Steep refused to do an interview at the end of the hearing. SNB chair Bill Richards called the hearing "a very good airing of the issues" with lots of "good questions" from the panel of three justices.
He said Baird's questions were relevant.

"This board order that we put out in 2015 was not just a one-off reaction to one issue. It's a culmination to a series of moves and changes which have taken place over several years."

The panel of three justices reserved its decision in the case and said it will rule at a later date.

Woodlots group goes up against J.D. Irving before Appeal Court

Sussex-based marketing board tries to win back right to negotiate prices for members

Connell Smith · CBC News · Posted: Apr 26, 2018 6:00 AM AT

More than 80 percent of the timber harvested from private woodlots in southern New Brunswick goes to JD Irving Ltd. Mills (CBC)

A Sussex-based wood marketing board will square off today against forestry giant J.D. Irving Ltd. before the New Brunswick Court of Appeal.

SNB is hoping the court will overturn a December decision by the New Brunswick Forest Products Commission that found in favour of JDI and its practice of sidestepping the board in wood deals.

The commission struck down an attempt by the marketing board to regain control over how wood from private woodlots is bought and sold across much of the south of the province.

It abused its power and interfered with JDI's legitimate interests in pursuing individual contracts with wood producers.- JDI submission on marketing board order

In the SNB marketing board's region, more than 80 per cent of the logs from private woodlots go to Irving mills.

"It's the marketing board system, in essence, that we are trying to uphold here," the SNB board chair, William Richards, said of the appeal.

The board system was established by provincial legislation in the early 1980s to give woodlot owner groups access to markets and the ability to negotiate prices with forestry companies that also have access to Crown forests. Each board is operated by the woodlot owners in its territory.

"We're hoping for a clarification of the of the [Natural Products] Act, so wood from private woodlots will have to be sold to and purchased from the board, rather than buyers and processors and so on doing an end-run around the board," Richards said.

Under the marketing board system, landowners sell their wood to local boards that, in turn, sell the logs to mill owners under negotiated terms.

Rejected board system

JDI stopped the practice of buying its wood from the SNB board in 2012 and introduced a new way of doing things.

The company bypasses the board, requiring landowners or forestry contractors to negotiate wood prices and sales on an individual basis. A levy on each sale is then paid to the SNB board.

This new system, although introduced after decades under the marketing board system, is "established practice," the company says in its Appeal Court submission.

A lot is at stake for New Brunswick's seven woodlot owners marketing boards in a case pitting the SNB board against J.D. Irving Ltd. (CBC)

JDI argues that working around the marketing board gives the company "certainty of supply," accountability and transparency, and says there were times when a board failed to fully deliver on contracts.

Irving expanded its "direct contracts" system to other regions of New Brunswick, throwing the province's 40-year-old woodlot marketing board system into turmoil.

SNB eventually issued an order saying all logs from private woodlots in its territory had to be sold to the board and, in turn, bought from the board by the mill owners.

Sought ruling from commission

In response, Irving, AV Nackawic and a group of contractors and smaller companies turned to the Forest Products Commission, claiming SNB overstepped its authority.

In its December ruling, the commission found, among other things, that the SNB order was an "improper" attempt to use its regulatory powers to force Irving to once again negotiate with the marketing board.

In the SNB submission to the Court of Appeal, lawyer David Duncan Young countered that the board has been granted — by provincial legislation — the power to issue the order, and that it applies to "all buyers and sellers," not just Irving.

J.D. Irving Ltd.'s forestry and forest products companies include Irving Pulp and Paper in Saint John. (CBC)

"The only consideration of the Board in making the Order was a desire for fairness, uniformity and predictability in order to facilitate the efficient promotion, control and regulation within its regulated area of the marketing of the regulated product," said Young.

The JDI submission to the court describes SNB's attempt to make the company purchase logs directly from the marketing board as "improper."

"In doing so, it abused its power and interfered with JDI's legitimate interests in pursuing individual contracts with wood producers."

More wood purchases

A company spokesperson said she wouldn't comment on the SNB appeal because the matter is before
the courts.

But in newspaper ads, J.D. Irving has said the direct contract system is "responsible" for a 300 percent increase in the volume of wood purchases in SNB territory since 2009.

The company claims it bought more private wood in the 2016- 2017 operating year, than ever in its history.

JDI attributes a 300 per cent increase in southern New Brunswick wood purchases since 2009 to its bypassing of the marketing board, but Natural Resources Canada reports suggest other big factors. (CBC)

But Natural Resources Canada records suggest strong lumber and paper product sales are likely a big factor.

Lumber exports nationally jumped from $14.1 billion in 2009 to $21.3 billion in 2016.

SNB says there are also fewer companies sharing the wood supply in the south of the province today.
Thirty-five companies purchased wood in SNB territory in the 2004-2005 operating year. In 2017-2018, there were 19 buyers, with 83 percent of the wood going to Irving.

About the Author

Connell Smith

Reporter

Connell Smith is a reporter with CBC in Saint John. He can be reached at 632-7726 Connell.smith@cbc.ca