Things heated up at the Muskrat Falls Inquiry this morning on former Nalcor chief Ed Martin’s decision not to provide government with an unofficial and uncertain estimate that the cost had gone up to $7-billion.

Politicians including former premiers and the chair of the board of director at the time have said they should have had that information, but they did not get it until September.

Julia Mullaley of the Oversight Committee told the inquiry earlier that she was shocked such key information would be withheld.

Martin maintains he did the right thing. In a testy exchange, Martin called Julia Mullaley’s comments “ridiculous.”

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The lawyer for the Muskrat Falls Inquiry zeroed in on former Nalcor boss Ed Martin yesterday for basically doing all things wrong, an allegation with which the architect of the project disagreed.

Martin’s testimony began all sweet and light but, by the time the day was over, he and Inquiry co-counsel Barry Learmonth sparred numerous times.

Barry Learmonth accused him of not doing his job well and failing in his responsibility to inform government of the true costs and projections at the appropriate time.

What happened was Nalcor did not provide government with new numbers in July 2013, four months before financial close.

Martin explained that he was not comfortable with the $7-billion number as things were too uncertain. In other words, it could have been much less.