Thoughts on BC Politics and More

  Yesterday, I came across a story in the Vancouver Sun headlined, “ Illegal dumping increasing on BC farmland ” – the story stated that it’s   against the law to dump construction material on land reserved for farming but its increasingly being used as a cheaper alternative to authorized sites, which can charge more than $1,000 a load. Bruce Banman, is an MLA in the area (Conservative BC – Abbotsford South), so yesterday afternoon I sent him a text asking about the problem.   Here’s what he had to say: This is a huge problem -- and has been for a while. Abbotsford does have a few gravel pits near the airport which after extracting the aggregate, take loads of clean soil which is tested and recorded; it is all monitored. So far, it seems to be improving agricultural land. This system helped lower illegal dumps, but for some reason it has ramped up again. For a while a few First Nations had dumps for this kind of stuff (and still do), but they have either filled up, or ...

Conservative Party of British Columbia Caucus Members, Party Leader John Rustad and House Leader Bruce Banman are asking BC NDP Agriculture Minister Pam Alexis to halt the destruction of over 100 acres of prime agricultural land in British Columbia's Cowichan Valley. "This NDP government is purposefully destroying productive agricultural land in order to create a marsh. This makes no sense, we need this land to grow food for British Columbians," says Conservative Party Leader John Rustad. "Farmers in BC are worried. This NDP government is making ad-hoc decisions about agricultural land without sufficient consultation. No one in government seems to know what's going on — not even the NDP agriculture minister, who said that she was unaware of this issue in question period yesterday when John (Rustad) asked her about it," says Conservative Party House Leader Bruce Banman. "In question period yesterday, the NDP Minister for Agriculture, Pam A...

  The Agriculture Land Reserve (ALR) in BC was first created in the mid 1970s and comprises about 5% of BC's land. I have been told that when it was originally created, there was supposed to be a benefit to land owners for the impact on their rights. Protecting the degradation of farm land is significant and very important for the people of BC. But in addition, for me, another key factor to consider is the rights of land owners. Over the years, the ALR has had significant impacts on land owner's rights. I fully support the creation of the ALR, and the goals of protecting agricultural land ... but ... ... what is the compensation, for land owners, for losing their rights? It has gone so far, under the current NDP, that you aren't even recognized as a "person" under their new legislation. It defines a "person" as a local government or first nation when it comes to trying to do something with your land. I think it is time for land owners (farme...

Food security is increasingly important in a world impacted by climate change. For the second time in as many sessions the BC NDP government is amending the Agricultural Land Commission Act to increase protection of food producing land for agriculture. This is vitally important. But it is also important that government recognizes the other natural values of land such as wetlands and watersheds. Admittedly this is not my cleanest attempt at second reading, frankly it was a bit of a circus in the Chamber. Nonetheless, I support the commitment to protecting food producing land and hope to work with government to strengthen the protection of other natural values as well. [Transcript] I am trying to gather myself. I thought that it might go for much, much longer than it did. I'd just like to acknowledge the experience of the previous speaker and the ability to capture the moment, or the 90 moments or however long it was that he spoke to this...