I've Been Expecting You...

The throne speech delivered at the Legislature on Tuesday was quite a sleeper. I should know; I was there! I admit, I wasn't expecting it to be anything like Question Period, but a monotone voice (as it should be), with a lack of revolutionary ideas, was dare I say, dull. Nevertheless, there were a few noteworthy points from the speech.

For me this is one of the most interesting points: the Liberals are going to shut down B.C. Rail. After so many years of political controversy, after massive debts from years over yonder, the Liberals claiming they would privatize it during the 1996 election, causing the NDP to win, and most recently Mr. Campbell leasing it for 999 years to CN Rail, B.C. Rail is going to be shut down. For good reason to, considering the government won't get their mittens on the company until 3003, with the CEO of the company earning over one million dollars, it's about time the company was dissolved. Let's face it: a CEO of a crown corporation is really a senior civil servant, and as such, they should only receive the salary of a Deputy Minister in government, ideally about $120,000. We've been wasting money for six years with this "lease", in the words of my MLA John Horgan, "the train has long left the station."

The Liberals are also going to look into the Ferry, Translink, and Utilities to commission to allow for more transparency and accountability. Hooray, perhaps then the CEO of BC Ferries won't get about $1,250,000 per year. Yes I know, that was my argument with the last point. As you can most likely tell, I don't like it when the government privatizes (or attempt) to privatize crown corporations causing exuberant amounts of money to be drained from our wallets. The government also wishes to create a new Clean Energy Act to encourage independent power production. How shocking this is! They've hinted for years that they would LOVE to privatize BC Hydro, but they can't. So to counter this, they are going to raise the rates by 29% (and that's excluding the HST), and eliminate the monopoly. In cooperation with aforementioned initiative, we are going to encourage green transportation to be a concurrent theme on the roads of British Columbia. Montana will also assist us in preserving the natural beauty in the Flathead River Basin. Both of those previous policies aren't bad, they're just really unlikely to be put into action beyond the walls of the Legislative Assembly. Finally, a joint committee on municipal taxation reformation will be established to review the current said system of revenue. Review is the key word to take out of the plan, which could mean increase for all we know...

Overall, the throne speech wasn't terrible; it just lacked vision beyond the spring sitting. Let's face it, nothing in here is epic, nor is anything worthy of being included in this annual speech. All of these policies could have easily been introduced as bills in the Assembly without publicity, and they would have all passed. The real question is though: how does this help British Columbia? While I admit the environment is an important issue of our world, simply increasing funding for public transportation and green fuel doesn't solve the problem. We need long term vision for our province to solve the problems of not only today, but tomorrow. We need Carole James as our Premier of this great province of British Columbia.

New Brunswick '10: A Peview

We are just 226 days away from the next New Brunswick general election to take place. A lot has taken place in Fredericton since 2006. The Tories and the New Democrats have both gotten a new leader, the Greens have formed their own party, and the Liberals have dropped from a considerable lead in the polls to being neck and neck with the PCs. This one is going to be fun to watch from afar.

The average polls in 2009 had the Liberals down 7% compared to 2006, and the Tories down 8%. This obviously is not good news for either party. But what has caused this? Overall it appears that Tory support is down and that left-leaning or increasingly environmentalists who did support the Liberals last time have switched to the NDP or the Greens. After going through all of the seats with these 2009 numbers it appears that the Liberals will somehow gain another seat increasing to 30, while the Tories will lose two, with the NDP picking up the remaining seat.

Ladies and gentlemen it appears that it will be a very tight race between the Government and Opposition this time, if worse comes to worse, should the Liberals win, they might even need the support of a possible sole NDP MLA.

Join the Fight!

Remember back in the summer how we were all upset about the HST? Well today the shit is hitting the fan more than ever. Former Premier and anti-HST activist Bill Vander Zalm has been approved to launch a petition against the incoming tax. Starting on April 6th, organizers will have 90 days to collect 10% of registered voters signatures in all 85 ridings to have the referendum be held at a later date.

I'm not going to get into whether or not this is a good idea for British Columbia, but this is an opportunity to tell Gordon Campbell and the BC Liberals that we are opposed to the HST and for them to listen to us, and stop building their budgets on shaky ground. If the signatures were approved, a referendum would be held on the issue. For the referendum to pass 50%+1 vote would be required in over two thirds of all electoral districts. The hardest part of all this seems to be getting signatures, something I might sign up to volunteer for.

After all this, the government doesn't have to do a lot to work their way around this, they could simply introduce a new tax at a later date, and the $1.6 billion incentive from the federal government would have to be returned. They could also just as easily let the bill die, but that would most likely cause Liberals numbers to drop even further below rock bottom.

Regardless of whether or not this passes, this is a huge opportunity for us to let our voices be heard on this issue. British Columbians from all political stripes are joining the anti-HST team: New Democrats, Conservatives, Greens, and even some Liberals are ready to fight this harmful tax. Together we can, and together we will.