MLAs Elenore Sturko and Lorne Doerkson: NDP government putting pitiful amount of funding towards crime issues in BC

Following daily pressure from the Conservative Caucus of BC, the government announced that they are allocating funding for new policing technology and increased patrols to address crime in BC’s downtown centres.

However, the NDP government will only be providing up to $5 million across the entire province – an insufficient amount to address the open drug use, theft, robbery, property damage, public indecency, and wielding of weapons now seen on the streets in nearly every city and town in B.C.

“The only short-term bed-based detox centre in Williams Lake has been defunded and is about to close down, while the NDP has added exactly zero net new treatment beds in this city” ~~ Lorne Doerkson

“This is a drop of water in the ocean when we look at our needs province-wide. Williams Lake alone needs $5 million,” said Elenore Sturko, MLA for Surrey-Cloverdale and Critic for Solicitor General and Public Safety.

“While any investment in policing is positive, this is far too small of an investment in safety to achieve the results our province needs. You can have success with targeted enforcement, but $5 million is simply inadequate.”

“It is offensive to me to think that one dollar per head in B.C. is going to solve this entire problem,” said Lorne Doerkson, MLA for Cariboo-Chilcotin.

“Prolific offenders continue to be released onto the streets days, or even hours, after committing heinous crimes. We need a commitment from the NDP government to keep these repeat offenders incarcerated, or treat them, or both.”

“The problems that we are seeing in communities like Williams Lake originate with untreated mental illness, brain injury, and addiction. If we truly want long-term success, the mental health and addictions crisis must be addressed,” added Sturko.

“And yet,” said Doerkson, “the only short-term bed-based detox centre in Williams Lake has been defunded and is about to close down, while the NDP has added exactly zero net new treatment beds in this city.”

“Moreover, since 2012, there have been zero net new RCMP officers added to our province. The government has only been filling existing vacancies, when we need to increase the base number of officers,” said Sturko.

"This new $5 million program may work to discourage something like shoplifting, sure – but it also increases the number of reports to Crown counsel and the number of court cases, and we don’t have enough Crown prosecutors to do this work.”

“This initiative may not even result in prosecutions, because the courts don’t have enough prosecutors,” said Sturko.

“Considering BC’s broken bail system and lack of treatment facilities, and looking at the disordered state of downtown Victoria, Duncan, Nanaimo, Williams Lake, Prince George, and so on – how can the NDP possibly think that $5 million is anything other than pitiful?” said Doerkson.