Nova ScotiaQuestions about Nova Scotia Power dominated the first day of the fall sitting at Province House on Tuesday, and the top of the legislative agenda of all three major parties included proposals born out of scrutiny of the utility.Scrutiny of the utility inspired bills from all partiesTaryn Grant · CBC News · Posted: Sep 24, 2025 11:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: 2 hours agoThis file photo shows Nova Scotia Power’s Tufts Cove generating station in Dartmouth. (Andrew Lam/CBC)Questions about Nova Scotia Power dominated the first day of the fall sitting at Province House on Tuesday, and the top of the legislative agenda of all three major parties included proposals born out of scrutiny of the utility.The opposition NDP and Liberals both spent a good part of question period calling on the Progressive Conservative government to address rising power bills, this year’s cybersecurity breach and the utility’s failing performance standards.”We understand the pressures that families are feeling,” said Premier Tim Houston. “We’re taking the steps we can to support families in sustainable, meaningful ways.”Later in question period, Energy Minister Trevor Boudreau elaborated by highlighting that the province took on $117 million in unrecovered fuel costs for the utility last year and helped it secure a $500-million federally backed loan. The bailout put off a power rate increase that was estimated at 19 per cent.Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston says the province is doing what it can to make energy more affordable in ‘sustainable’ ways. (Taryn Grant/CBC)In response to questions about the utility repeatedly failing to meet performance targets, Boudreau said Nova Scotia Power is indeed missing the mark on both affordability and reliability.”We are continuing to push that envelope to make sure they’re investing in transmission, vegetation management … because that’s an important part of making sure that Nova Scotians have the lights on when they need them,” he said.The same topics were present in a handful of bills tabled Tuesday, less than a week after Nova Scotia Power applied to hike power rates for many of its customers.They included provisions that would attempt to hold Nova Scotia Power’s feet to the fire, lower power bills and tighten privacy rules that factored into the utility’s massive cybersecurity breach earlier this year.Earlier this month, Nova Scotia Power applied to change power rates for all its customers — raising rates for some while dropping them for others. (The Canadian Press)The governing Progressive Conservatives tabled an omnibus bill that includes restrictions on the collection of social insurance numbers by private companies.Growth and Development Minister Colton LeBlanc said the need for such a provision was proven when thieves stole personal information belonging to hundreds of thousands of Nova Scotia Power customers.The breach revealed that Nova Scotia Power had been holding social insurance numbers of some customers for years.While the incident may have inspired the legislative change, LeBlanc said it will not apply retroactively to compel Nova Scotia Power to delete the information.”I think it doesn’t go far enough,” said NDP Leader Claudia Chender. “There is a suite of legislation and policy required to ensure that this never happens again.”The NDP tabled a bill that would, among other things, require companies holding customer data to have more protective measures against data breaches and delete the information by an unspecified expiry date.In the case of a breach, the bill would enable people to have their credit frozen and put companies on the hook for a fine of up to $30 million or four per cent of their worldwide annual revenue, whichever is higher.NDP Leader Claudia Chender says Nova Scotians should be able to access credit freezes and companies should be fined for privacy breaches. (Taryn Grant/CBC)A separate NDP bill proposes a one-time 10 per cent rebate on power bills. Chender has previously pegged the cost at $150 million but her party said Tuesday the updated estimate is $140 million.Meanwhile, the Liberals tabled a bill that would ramp up the frequency and detail of reporting by Nova Scotia Power to the energy board, and improve notifications to customers on outages.Another Liberal bill would require an adjustment to how much profit the utility can earn on projects when their equity ratio differs from the norm of 40 per cent.Interim Liberal Leader Derek Mombourquette says Nova Scotia Power needs to be held accountable through more stringent reporting requirements to the energy board. (Taryn Grant/CBC)The proposed change reflects an ongoing issue before the energy board over the Nova Scotia-New Brunswick intertie. A consultant submitted to the board that the utility stands to profit too much. The utility recently refuted that evidence, saying the economist’s analysis was “fundamentally flawed.”The same Liberal bill also proposes that any new transmission line that would cost $50 million or more should go out for competitive procurement, rather than automatically being assigned to Nova Scotia Power.”We’re at a point right now where these conversations moving into the future are really going to transform not only how energy is produced in Nova Scotia, but actually who owns it,” said interim Liberal Leader Derek Mombourquette.ABOUT THE AUTHORTaryn Grant covers daily news for CBC Nova Scotia, with a particular interest in housing and homelessness, education, and health care. You can email her with tips and feedback at taryn.grant@cbc.ca
Opposition parties target Nova Scotia Power to kick off fall sitting
