After reading this story in the Winnipeg Free Press on the Conference Board of Canada's support for Manitoba Hydro's (MH) ambitious $20 billion expansion plan, I wondered how much the Conference Board has received from Hydro over the years.

I then filed an FOI and got a response back noting a combined $280,760 from January, 2008 to March, 2013. You can see the FOI response by clicking here.

You'll notice the response also includes details on how much the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) received from Hydro over the same period. For those who aren't familiar, the CCPA is an "independent" think tank that regularly cheerleads for higher taxes, more regulations and more government spending. And yes, they support the disastrous plan to build Hydro's new Bipole III power line down the west side of the province.

Although the CCPA's funding from Hydro is significantly less than the Conference Board's ($6,000 in 2011; including $5,000 for a "membership"), I figured it was worth a mention too. After all, a well-known journalist in Winnipeg once tweeted to me that he was surprised the CCPA received any money from the government. I figured that it was common knowledge that the government had been shoveling funding towards like-minded think tanks that churn out documents in support of the government.

Do a quick scan through the provincial government's 2011-12, 2010-11 and 2009-10 Public Accounts documents and you'll see the CCPA has also received over $123,025 from various provincial departments. It would be interesting to see how many other government organizations (if any) have been funding the CCPA.

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