Really ...
is all we get are political parties like the BC
Liberals, or the NDP? I want a choice ... and so, I believe, do many British Columbians when it comes to who we will have the opportunity
to vote for next May.
For cryin
out loud, just look at these excerpts, from just a small sample of news stories
about the BC Liberals, in only the past two months.
A sudden flurry of school district
funding announcements by the B.C. government — after several years of all but
ignoring the complaints of cash-strapped school boards — boils down to a very
simple political calculation from Premier Christy Clark: Education will be a
ballot box issue in next year’s provincial election.
Clark said as much in an interview
with The Vancouver Sun two weeks ago, citing people’s satisfaction with their
kids’ education as one of the key questions voters will ask in deciding whether
to re-elect her government.
In politics, there is a time to
admit a mistake before it is too costly. Then there is a time when it is just
too late. Let’s assume in this case we haven’t crossed the line – that we can
make one last plea for decency and sanity before the point of no return.
In last February’s provincial
budget, someone came up with a bright idea and someone came up with a few
horrible ideas for people with disabilities. The bright idea wasn’t even really
that bright. It was overdue and not terribly generous; a $77 monthly increase
starting this fall in their $906.42 benefits, the first increase in nine years.
... there are 20,000 people who receive a $66
transportation subsidy. They’ll lose that. Their net gain is $11 monthly.
“Do whatever it
takes to win.”
That was the overriding credo of
life inside the Christy Clark government when Tim Duncan worked as a
high-ranking political operative in Victoria.
Duncan, the former executive assistant to Transportation Minister Todd Stone,
is the guy who blew the whistle on the document-destruction scandal that rocked
the Liberal government.
The scandal — in which the
government was caught deleting internal emails to prevent their release under
freedom-of-information laws — led to charges against a key government insider.
“The culture from government
managers was, ‘Just do whatever you have to do to keep us in power,’” Duncan told me Wednesday...
The B.C. government should go
further than looking at recommendations on changing how political contributions
are reported — it should undertake full-scale reform of campaign financing. The
taint of corruption will hang over B.C. politics — and government — as long as
there are no restrictions on donations to political parties. ...
... Democracy shouldn’t be — or
even appear to be — for sale to the highest bidder.
All the party talked about before
the 2013 was jobs, jobs, jobs. Little has changed since then.
When the campaign begins less than
a year from now, Clark will dust off her
trademark hard hat and her tour of industrial work sites around the province.
At each stop, she will ridicule the NDP as being hopeless on the jobs issue,
even as that party throws darts at her over things like political fundraising.
Turpel-Lafond has challenged the
validity of information that the ministry provided to her. Most recently, her
challenge resulted in the admission that 116 children in care were housed in
hotel rooms last year, not 23.
In 2010, she took the government
to court to get documents that the ministry had no right to withhold. Perhaps
this is why the B.C. government seems hell-bent on making Turpel-Lafond’s final
months as miserable as possible, and getting rid of her position as
quickly as possible.
As I’ve said before, I don’t know how important this issue is for
voters, despite what the polls may say. When it comes to electoral reform, I
tend to subscribe to the view held by Independent MLA Vicki Huntington, another
fierce advocate for change. When asked to comment on why B.C. seems to be
averse to making the kinds of changes other provinces are enacting on this
front, she said: “We are like dinosaurs when it comes to moving into the modern
political age.”
Sadly, she’s right.
Surely we
can do better than this ... who's ready to step up to the plate? Shakespeare said, "Now is the winter of
our discontent", but with time running out before BC's provincial election
in May of next year, this should be the "Summer of our discontent",
and a demand for better.
In Kamloops, I'm Alan Forseth.
In Kamloops, I'm Alan Forseth.
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