Ernest Fage (born August 15, 1953) is a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

politician who represented the electoral district of

Cumberland North Cumberland North is a provincial electoral district in Nova Scotia, Canada, that elects one member of the Nova Scotia House of Assembly. Prior to 1993, it was part of Cumberland East. The communities of Amherst and Pugwash are within its bounda ...

in the

Nova Scotia House of Assembly The Nova Scotia House of Assembly (french: Assemblée législative de la Nouvelle-Écosse; gd, Taigh Seanaidh Alba Nuadh), or Legislative Assembly, is the deliberative assembly of the General Assembly of Nova Scotia of the province of Nova Scotia ...

from 1997 to 2009. First elected as a Progressive Conservative in a 1997

by-election A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...

, Fage served various cabinets as Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, Minister of Economic Development, Minister of Human Resources, Minister of responsible for the Public Service Commission, Minister of Emergency Management, Minister of Natural Resources, and Minister of Energy. Fage was forced to take a leave of absence from the party caucus in January 2007 after allegations that he had engaged in criminal behaviour following a car accident on November 24, 2006. Fage was subsequently charged criminally with leaving the scene of an accident. Witnesses reported that Fage smelled of alcohol at the time of the accident, but he was not charged with an alcohol-related offense due to lack of evidence. He was found guilty of leaving the scene of an accident, and fined $800, on December 18, 2007, and it was subsequently announced he would not be allowed back into caucus. Prior to the verdict Fage said he planned on running in the next election. He continued to sit as an independent MLA until the 2009 election, when he was defeated by

Brian Skabar Brian Skabar (born February 25, 1952) is a Canadian politician, who was elected to the Nova Scotia House of Assembly in the 2009 provincial election. Skabar won the riding of Cumberland North for the New Democratic Party. He obtained 40 per cen ...

— notably, however, Fage finished in second place ahead of Keith Hunter, his replacement as the Progressive Conservative candidate. Nine months before the accident, Fage was also involved in a controversy around a government loan to a potato farm with which he had a personal business connection. As a result, he resigned from his cabinet post as Minister of Economic Development."Fage resigns over potato loan"
cbc.ca, February 16, 2006.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fage, Ernie 1953 births Progressive Conservative Association of Nova Scotia MLAs Nova Scotia Independent MLAs Living people People from Cumberland County, Nova Scotia Members of the Executive Council of Nova Scotia 21st-century Canadian politicians Farmers from Nova Scotia