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The only time the debate really caught fire was when Murphy asked Rankin “what is the future of Owls Head under a Liberal government?” The Owls Head provincial park along the Eastern Shore had been on a proposed list of protected places until the Treasury Board de-listed it after an American developer expressed interest in buying the land to develop a golf course. Rankin was minister of the Environment at the time; before he entered government, Rankin obtained a diploma in golf club management.

Smith said she’s deeply concerned by the growth of open-net salmon farming in Nova Scotia, and the Liberal government’s delisting of Owls Head Provincial Park as a potential site for protection. The decision was taken, she added, “sneakily and quietly” to make way for a sale to a company that wants to build a golf course there.

“I’m looking at issues that I think are really important for the future of our province, not just sort of short-term gain for corporations in this province,” she explained.

Candidates touted their parties’ platforms at a debate held by the Ecology Action Centre… On questions about the future of Owls Head — a 285-hectare coastal property on the Eastern Shore — Cooley defended her party, while the other three candidates attacked the Liberal decision to remove the land from a list of Crown properties pending legal protection.

Burrill said it “defies credibility” that Rankin presents himself as an environmental champion after his government gutted its own biodiversity protection bill.

Houston, meanwhile, told Rankin “you can’t really call yourself an environmentalist and do what you did at Owl’s Head,” referring to the Liberal government’s decision to sell the crown land to a developer.

In the timely decision, Brothers wrote that if citizens have a problem with politicians’ decisions, they should head to the polls.

“In such circumstances, if a remedy is sought by the public, the proper recourse in our constitutional democracy is not through the courts, but at the ballot box.”

In a decision released Friday, Justice Christa M. Brothers acknowledged the public outrage following the discovery of the provincial government’s actions, which were first revealed by CBC News. 

… “In such circumstances, if a remedy is sought by the public, the proper recourse in our constitutional democracy is not through the courts, but at the ballot box,” she wrote.