Talk:Stephen McNeil

photo avail. in commons
There's a photo available at. B.S. Lawrence (talk) 15:30, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

"Gondek Affair"
I am removing the reference to the alleged Gondek Affair until some sort of reputable source can be provided. I am not sure it is encyclopedic anyway, but the merits can be debated once there are sources. The source provided links to a Hansard for the House of Assembly in which the only reference to any Gondek is a congratulations to a player on a high school soccer team. I am not sure it is encyclopedic anyway, but would be more willing to accept something in the article if there was some reference material. A Google search found no reference to the alleged affair. For the record, I am from Nova Scotia and follow politics there and have never once heard of this alleged affair. Sethpt (talk) 04:58, 9 February 2012 (UTC)

small business ownership
I removed the unsourced reference to Stephen McNeil being a small business owner for over 18 years. It now reads McNeil was a small business owner for 15 years, which is the data the Registry of Joint Stocks has on his small appliance repair business. Arcadian ns (talk) 22:52, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

This is an attack on Stephen McNeil. By all accounts Stephen had been a onwer of the business for 18 plus years and the commercial states this clearly. Bobby33NS (talk) 22:29, 26 August 2013 (UTC)

This is not an attack on McNeil. It is simply a fact. He was not an owner of a small appliance repair shop for 18 + years. It was 15. No matter what a Liberal commercial states, the Registry of Joint Stocks has the facts. Arcadian ns (talk) 22:52, 26 August 2013 (UTC)


 * McNeil's biography on the Liberal Party website also states he was a business owner for over 18 years, which is the same number of years that CBC reported on it's election website in 2009 Are you sure this is the only business that is connected with his name? I've never actually seen a bio of his that says the name of his business, just the number of years. By the way, the reference to Registry of Joint Stocks should link the page that has the info being sourced, all you did was link the homepage where the reader then has to search for the information. Cmr08 (talk) 03:12, 27 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Yes, this is the only business Stephen McNeil owned. It's called McNeil Appliance Service. He worked as a small appliance repairman in his shop from 1998 until 2003, when he sold it. His commercial states that he was a small business owner for 20 years, but this is incorrect. According to his own Caucus site, it was 18 years, but this is also incorrect. The Registry of Joint Stocks has this information, including his business registration and the date he sold it. It was 15 years. (Arcadian ns (talk) 01:34, 29 August 2013 (UTC))

What a didiculous attack on Stephen. He is the next Premier and everyone knows he was a very well respected owner of a premuim business. This attack can not be allowed to stand. This is an abuse of Wikipedia. GondorfNS (talk) 22:37, 29 August 2013 (UTC)


 * Please don't resort to edit wars and make accusations about attacks. When an editor provides sourced information, it's not an abuse of Wikipedia, it's not an attack on the subject, it's actually following Wikipedia policy which is to verify info. I myself, have provided two sources that show over 18 years, one of which wasn't a party website but I too was ignored and a reference was added not to the actual page showing the result, but to a search engine where the reader has to search through the archives just to find the info. To use the argument "He is the next Premier and everyone knows he was a very well respected owner of a premuim business" isn't going to help you here. Unless you have a crystal ball, there is no way to know what will happen in the future, and the rest of your sentence is just your pov. There have been attacks made on the subject in the past, of which I removed, so if you check the history you will see that what your claiming is an attack is not even close to being one. Cmr08 (talk) 23:07, 29 August 2013 (UTC)

I have edited the years Stephen McNeil owned his small appliance repair shop back to 15 years, from 20 years. I also fixed the dates of this ownership back to the info on the Registry of Joint Stocks. Arcadian ns (talk) 11:54, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Correction: Stephen McNeil owned McNeil Appliance Repair for 20 years. Source is his video "Why I want to be Premier." GondorfNS (talk) 11:19, 6 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Using a Liberal YouTube video is not considered an independent source. While Stephen McNeil did say he was a small business owner for 20 years in the video, this may have been simply a poor choice of words on his part - an exaggeration. McNeil Appliance Repair opened in 1988 and McNeil sold it in 2003. This is confirmed by the Registry of Joint Stocks website - an independent source.

Arcadian ns (talk) 11:30, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

Is there any justification for the "Profession	trades person" entry in this profile? I don't believe small appliance repair is a recognized trade in the jurisdiction, but I may be wrong. Also, by definition, a trade is specifically not a profession. If anything, it seems his profession is "politician".

Johndowning (talk) 12:13, 9 October 2013 (UTC)

I'm going to go ahead and remove the "profession" field, if anyone objects feel free to comment.

Johndowning (talk) 23:55, 10 October 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia: When You Wonder What To Do
When I joined Wikipedia, and editor kindly advised me to read What Wikipedia is NOT (see WP:NOTNEWS).

This passage is what I keep in mind when editing the Stephen McNeil page:

"When you wonder what should or should not be in an article, ask yourself what a reader would expect to find under the same heading in an encyclopedia."

And that is why, when editing, I add only significant stories that made the news for more than a day. These will be fair and balanced (the good and the bad but always significant enough to be in an encyclopedia. CameronCamera (talk) 17:07, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Premier
Note: a new user, created on February 14th, deleted the passages involving both Glennie Langille, and the Premier's brother, and well as other passages. Deleting cited passages without cause are a cause for concern.

When editing the Premier's wikipedia page thus far, I have included news stories that have spanned multiple days in the press, and given both the point and the counterpoint to the news story. I will continue to do so, to avoid political partisanship from entering into the equation. CameronCamera (talk) 00:46, 16 February 2014 (UTC)


 * I wouldn't worry too much about this. It was picked up right away by another editor as removal of sourced information. I even went through and checked the sources and I can't find anything there not covered by them, which was one of the reasons that new editor removed them. The other reason the editor claimed was partisan edits, which seems like a joke considering it was a newly created account that appeared to be created for the same reason he was accusing you of. Cmr08 (talk) 01:56, 16 February 2014 (UTC)

Some non-encyclopedia worthy info has been added to this entry, padding wiki for the Premier unnecessarily.

Also, partisan info "unlike the previous NDP government", shows bias and should be written from a neutral point of view. CameronCamera (talk) 01:05, 26 February 2014 (UTC)


 * I agree with you, the added text does sound partisan, and reads more like an editorial than an encyclopedia article. The editor is new here, so maybe he doesn't fully understand that articles have to be written in a neutral tone, but regardless, the content should not be written in this manner and you did the right thing by removing it. Cmr08 (talk) 07:38, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

This is completely a didiculous attack on the best Premier Nova Scotia ever has. Ivany report says we must all put aside politics and support direction of governemnt and Stephen McNeil now government.

I am deleting mention of Glennie Langille as she qualified for job and no matter what you say she now has job and is now qualified. She has been doing it for months for Stephen. Truth NS (talk) 22:43, 26 February 2014 (UTC)

I place my vote with Scotia 14 and Truth NS. Thank you for altering me to this attack on the Premier. All of us must stick together against this for the future of NS. We must be warty of people who do not understand what is happneing for Nova Scotia for the public good. Valley girl NS (talk) 23:57, 26 February 2014 (UTC)


 * These new editors would be best advised to learn more about what Wikipedia is about before turning this article into a partisan party gathering place. Wikipedia articles are not official sites belonging to the subject or to the subjects party. Anyone can edit Wikipedia, including people who are not members of the party. While I disagree with the way Liberal supporters are removing content, I do find the removed content more trivial than anything that has a lasting effect on the government and probably shouldn't be here. However, that being said, Wikipedia is supposed to tell the story from all sides, not just a partisan piece promoting the subject, so calling content that is properly referenced to reliable sources an attack on the subject is not going to help your cause here. The fact that one of these editors has used the talk page to tell us that Stephen McNeil is the "best Premier Nova Scotia ever has" shows that the editor has more than a passing interest, especially since he has only been the premier for 4 months. It now appears that editors are recruiting other party supporters to watch the article and remove anything that doesn't promote the subject, providing another example that they are more concerned with promoting their premier than contributing to Wikipedia. No subject or party can dictate what content gets added or removed from their Wikipedia article. The appropriate action here should have been to take the discussion to the talk page and state your case why the sourced content should have been removed. Had you done this, I would have agreed that the content was trivial and should be removed, but it certainly isn't an attack on the subject or anyone else. Cmr08 (talk) 04:29, 27 February 2014 (UTC)

I have added information on Stephen McNeil's first spring session as Premier. I included only the 2 most important controversies, the budget, and the 2 most newsworthy pieces of legislation (stories that received national coverage, or provincial coverage for several days) CameronCamera (talk) 16:04, 3 May 2014 (UTC)

I have reverted 3 edits by GondorfNS and I encourage that editor to discuss the issue here. The edits you made "for brevity" seem to just have deleted phrases that showed the opposition of nurses and students to decisions made by Stephen McNeil. When I add information to the Premier's page, I add only significant info that garnered a lot of media attention, and I give both the point and counterpoint to any controversy. You seem to have upset that balance to undo any criticism people had of decisions the Premier made. Please discuss your reasoning here if you disagree. CameronCamera (talk) 01:09, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

Unfortunately, my changes were reverted back. Here was the original passage: "The second controversial legislation was the Financial Measures Act, which eliminated the Graduate Retention Rebate - a tax rebate given to graduates who stayed in the province to work. The government said the program was not working and that student groups wanted it cut. But student advocates said they had asked the Liberal to redirect the funds into student assistance, which did not happen, and graduates said the program helped them financially."

Now, the last line has been cut. Once, for "brevity", and once because it included the word "but".

These edits seem very strange to me. CameronCamera (talk) 01:48, 28 July 2014 (UTC)


 * Strange? See WP:WTA and WP:NPOV as well as my response on my user talk page.   Collect (talk) 02:01, 28 July 2014 (UTC)


 * In light of the Chronicle Herald article about edits to the Premier's page, I would like to suggest this wording: "The second controversial legislation was the Financial Measures Act, which eliminated the Graduate Retention Rebate - a tax rebate given to graduates who stayed in the province to work." CameronCamera (talk) 02:14, 28 July 2014 (UTC)


 * I think I have seen everything now, was it a slow news day for the Herald? It was me who reverted the removal mentioned in article, but the reason behind the revert was simply because an editor removed content without an edit summary explaining why. I never thought something as trivial as that would make it into the news. Every edit I have made to this article was done in good faith and neutral. When someone removes content or adds partisan language, it's obviously going to get reverted, if not by me, than by another editor because the article has to be written in a neutral point-of-view. Look at the edit made earlier today, changing the word "difficulty" to "partisan attack" with an edit summary saying the edit was made "to be less politically motivated." How does that make it less politically motivated? Calling it a "partisan attack" sounds like it's making it more politically motivated, only now it's on the other side of the spectrum. I stand behind anything I have done that involved this article, which over the years has included removing personal attacks made against the subject, but they don't run to the media with those reverts, only the ones where the information is actually sourced. CameronCamera has tried to make the article neutral when adding content, and I hope that editor continues to do this because someone has to. I edit Wikipedia because I enjoy it, not to make the newspapers, so I will stick to other articles from now on, but like I said above, I really can't believe that someone actually ran to the media about this. Cmr08 (talk) 06:13, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

External links modified
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Mother first female sheriff?
I've added a "citation needed" tag for the statement that his mother was the first female sheriff in Canada. The recently deceased former sheriff of Weyburn, Saskatchewan, is normally credited as being the first female sheriff in Canada: see Obituary of Wendy Dammann. Does someone have any information about when his mother was appointed a sheriff? Damman was appointed in 1977.
 * According to this Globe and Mail article, MacNeil's father died in 1977: "But that didn't stop her from later becoming the high sheriff of Annapolis County – the first woman to hold such a position in Canada."  If she entered the workforce after her husband's death in 1977, that suggests she was appointed sheriff after 1977 - and after Dammann became Sheriff in Weyburn.  Cite:  "The family ties and civic ambitions of Nova Scotia’s premier-to-be", Globe and Mail, October 8, 2013.
 * But this CBC article puts his father's death in 1973, and says that she was appointed sheriff "four years later". Sounds like about the same time as Dammann in Weyburn, but would be nice to nail it down one way or the other. Liberal leader's mother dies of cancer

Successors-to-be in lameduck infoboxes
Please note an RFC was held on this matter & the consensus was to not show the successors-to-be, in the infoboxes. GoodDay (talk) 20:29, 15 January 2021 (UTC)