Another 30 days of debate in the legislative assembly yielded no change in the way the Yukon's politicians conduct themselves.

Premier Dennis Fentie continued to tout the Yukon Party government's decisions he feels strengthened the territory, Liberal Opposition leader Arthur Mitchell said neither the government nor Fentie can be trusted, and NDP Leader Liz Hanson was left disappointed by both.

"You had the government which was really just running their platform the whole session ... and this constant hectoring from the Liberals about the same issues over and over again,” Hanson told the Star yesterday.

One of these issues was the aborted deal to privatize the Yukon Energy Corp. which Fentie attempted to orchestrate back in 2009.

The premier denied such a deal was on the table, but four corporation directors resigned in protest and cabinet minister Brad Cathers left the Yukon Party cabinet and caucus over the affair.

Cathers accused Fentie of lying to the public and his caucus, and said liquidating public utility assets was in fact on the table.

On Monday, Mitchell defended his question period attacks on the government over the scandal, now nearly two years old.

"I think it's important to remind people because they will have an opportunity to choose the next government,” Mitchell told the Star, alluding to the next election, which Fentie must call no later than Oct. 14. "And if this Yukon Party government has done it before, they'll do it again.”

The Liberals also attacked the government over the botched $36.3-million investment in asset-backed commercial paper.

Three years later, the bulk of the money remains tied up in an 11-year restructuring deal, Auditor General Sheila Fraser said the investment broke the law and Mitchell and his Liberal colleagues didn't let the premier forget it.

The Opposition also harped on the government's decision to allow the Yukon Hospital Corp. to borrow $50 million for two new hospitals, made without presenting a business case.

At the beginning of March, Fraser was once again in Whitehorse, this time to deliver a performance audit of the Department of Health and Social Services, and slammed the department for failing on this particular count; to provide business cases for new programs, services and policies.

However, Fentie dismissed the attacks from the Liberal benches and suggested that was all the Opposition party had to offer.

During the spring sitting, Fentie chided the Liberals on this count for "running on empty”, and after the spring sitting concluded – the last sitting before Yukoners go to the polls – he said there was not much to dispraise.

"They don't have a lot they can criticize the government for when it comes to the economy, and to the infrastructure investments,” said Fentie. "So they avert to doing something that is right out of the Warren Kinsella style of politics and that is character assassination.”

But Mitchell said there is plenty to take the government to task for, including the third consecutive billion-dollar budget in which Fentie promises a healthy $38 million surplus.

Fentie promised surpluses for last year's budget and 2009's but turned in multimillion-dollar deficits, said Mitchell.

While the Liberal leader is skeptical the government will make good on the surplus it pledged when it tabled the budget in February, Mitchell said delaying F.H. Collins Secondary School's replacement helped crunch the current numbers in the budget, passed Monday at the conclusion of the spring sitting.

And Mitchell continued to assault the government for what he calls questionable spending and borrowing.

"We could've started construction on (F.H. Collins) this year if it weren't for the asset-backed commercial paper investment,” Mitchell said.

"And if you didn't need that (investment money), why are you selling bonds to build hydro infrastructure and borrowing money to build hospitals when you haven't even proved you need them?”

The lack of answers from the government side to these questions, said Mitchell, is due to the arrogance of the ruling Yukon Party, but Fentie dismissed Liberal attacks as theatre.

"In many ways, that's a stage in there (the legislature) and a lot of grandstanding goes on in there,” Fentie said.

"And I don't see any reason why anybody in office should give a great deal of worry and concern with the Opposition complaints that they're not getting answers.”

As for the delay in replacing F.H. Collins, after several years of planning and three studies, Fentie said, "the high school is not ready for construction, it's as simple as that.”

In a rare moment of nonpartisanship, the Yukon's lawmakers did unite to fast-track amendments to the Workers' Compensation Act to designate 10 forms of cancer work-related illnesses for firefighters, as well as heart attacks up to 24 hours after responding to a call.

Hanson described the effort as "the only positive thing” to come out of the spring sitting.

The New Democrats' leader, who after winning December's byelection in Whitehorse Centre cut her teeth as a rookie MLA during the spring sitting, said attempts were made to keep the government accountable on homelessness and resource revenue sharing.

Though Hanson was slammed by both Fentie and Mitchell for suggesting the new ways to garner more revenue from resource extraction be explored – even renegotiating the 2003 Devolution Transfer Agreement with Ottawa – yesterday Hanson stood by her party's position.

"It seems nobody wants to touch the issue of whether Yukoners getting a fair return for their resources,” said Hanson. "But if you don't change the playing field, your slice of the pie is still not going to be very big because of the structure of the regime in place.”

On the homelessness issue, both the Liberals and the New Democrats pushed the government to build a permanent shelter in Whitehorse.

Mitchell called yesterday's pledge from the government to work with a local non-governmental organization on building such a shelter, empty.

"He also said he wasn't going to privatize the Yukon Energy Corporation ... and that deal didn't get finished only because he got interrupted,” said Mitchell. "I wouldn't buy a used car from this guy.”

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