Hey Pat, Shirley, pass this message on to your boss.
You gotta be kidding! You are the government that tears up legal contracts. You are the government that breaks the law according to the Canadian constitution. But now you say, we’ve hammered you into the ground, illegally, but let’s let bygones be bygones. You gotta be kidding Clark.

The only “bye” gones are you despicable Liberals…out on your butts next May.

Then let’s see some negotiation towards an agreement that is workable for the people of BC, their children, BC teachers and the government.

“Hello” she lied. Is there anyone left in BC with an IQ over 70 who believes a word that comes out of the her mouth?

Shari Green needs a baggage handler for her trip to China – Christy Clark.. she ought to be kidding or else she is on a “high” or am I reading this article totally wrong.. a government that has ripped up Collective Agreements and has broken the law now wants “bygones to be bygones”.. the “bye” will be her next May.

You guys talk as if the NDP will be some sort of improvement. Think again.

What I don’t understand is if they have negotiated a contract for a period of time, and it includes cost of living index, why do “they” have to negotiate a new contract with new parameters?

Sign a two year agreement, then renew it each term. Fricken simple!

Unless there are things like greedy, money grubbing unions and stingy, financially strapped employers always trying to bend over the other, without the courtesy of grease.

The BC Liberals have been the worst, most vindictive government this province has ever seen. I do not believe the NDP is anywhere near like you Liberal supporters say, but no matter what the NDP is like, they will still be an improvement over this mob!

“Unless there are things like greedy, money grubbing unions and stingy, financially strapped employers always trying to bend over the other, without the courtesy of grease.

Hey Loki you forgot to add a few of your descriptors to the employers side of your statement.

Should have read…Unless there are things like greedy, money grubbing unions and (greedy, money grubbing), stingy, financially strapped employers always trying to bend over the other, without the courtesy of grease.

People Mad.
Liberals Lose
NDP “Wins”.

BC Loses.

NDP will run this thing into the ground so fast your heads will spin. We are in for a good old fashioned reversal of fortunes. Then watch when we have to suck up to Alberta to pay our bills when we become a have-not province again. We will be begging the Chinese for pipelines.

We are in for it folks.

Will someone please tell me what Adrian Dix’s stance is on anything? His idea of politics is to keep his mouth shut and not rock the boat. Well that will get this province nowhere.

I did not forget. I intended to differentiate between the two parties as they have different perspectives, and different goals which tend to be opposing.

For those that cannot understand my statements, let me be clear.
Both parties in this bargaining fiasco have done their best to get the better of the other to the detriment of those they serve, our children.

The issue here is not 2 year contracts or 10 year contracts. The issue here is an ACCOUNTABLE government that truly respects the terms of these negotiated agreements with teaching unions. A government that does not break the law to justify the breaking of the legal agreements and it functions in the framework of law, not above the law.

The universities have longer 3-4 years contracts with the teaching staff, but the situation is far worse than the 2 year contracts of teachers. Look at UNBC for example, no accountability from government side when the university violates the terms of agreement or cherry-picks the terms of agreement and only implements those terms that it likes. The hon. minister … of BC government has no oversight whatsoever and even protects and encourages these violations.

As a result, no FOUR YEAR contracts in UNBC for the past 5 years and only temporary shorter 2 year agreements signed 2 years late after the expiry of the previous agreement.

Is Christy advocating this failed mode now? Who is responsible for this failure? The minister? the premier? The weight of History?

This is all about Government Workers, negotiating with Government Workers, to get a deal to be paid for by taxpayers.

Who wins?

a. The Government, because they pay the teachers with tax dollars.

b. The Teachers because they get paid by tax dollars.

Who loses. Taxpayers, because they have to pay for the teachers, and they have to pay for the Government workers who negotiated the agreement with the teachers.

Maybe its time to go to private schools, with those people who cannot afford the cost being subsidized by the Government (Taxpayers) That way we might get a better bang for our buck.

Correct Palupu!

So PGguy1234 explain to us how Alberta can pay our bills?

Alberta is the potentially richest province in the country, problem is they are in the middle of the biggest oil boom in their history and they are broke. The Alberta Conservatives have led this oil boom only for the companies harvesting the oil, and that the province doesn’t need any money from oil.

Therefore PGgu1234 Alberta cannot pay BC bills no matter which party leads BC, NDP, Liberal, Conservative, or Green as Alberta cannot pay their own bills. The Alberta Conservatives have lead this tar sand oil boom right into a string of record setting($3 Billion) deficits.

Gotta love Conservatives, most don’t have a clue where money comes from!

For 40 years Alberta has had uninterupted Conservative government, with for the most part an economy that even the most corupt dictatorships in the world become unbelievably rich based on oil.

So with the combination of an economy based on oil and an uninterupted Conservative government, why is Alberta losing money?

After 40 years, and such great government with the greatest ideology ever thought of, you would think Alberta would be so rich they could at least pay their bills?

Perhaps there is a brilliant Conservative out here that could explain to me why after 40 years of uninterupted Conservatism, the Conservatives in Alberta cannot seem generate money and manage the money they do have?

Sometimes people are so hung up on the politics, that they can’t see reason, can’t see the forest for the trees.

Let’s just note that the vast majority of children in our schools graduate with a good education. A good proportion of them then go on to colleges and universities to train as engineers, doctors, dentists, nurses, physiotherapists, pharmacists, mathematicians, physicists and a whole host of other professional, semi-professional and just plain highly educated occupations.

Our educational system is not in dire straits. In fact it works quite well. Certainly, it could be better, but I am not in the least upset with the quality of education that my three sons got at schools in Prince George, colleges in Prince George, and universities in Prince George, Vancouver and Victoria. All three got good degrees and are now comfortably settled in their respective occupations (urban planner, pharmacist and corporate executive).

Sometimes, I think we need to take a step back and actually look at what we have. It is often a surprise. There are many countries where students would love to have our institutions. In fact, many come here from their own countries to attend them, regardless of which political party forms the government.

Even poor countries like Afghanistan have public education. If you want to argue for privatization, privatize ICBC and not primary schools.

The problem of Canada is not public education (or public health), the problem is this archaic government system imposed from the UK which has no division of power among executive, legislation and judiciary. Add to it the inefficient wasteful provincial assemblies and provincial governments and you get the present dysfunctional system of government acting like a mob and oligarchy in a banana republic. Current liberal governments in Ontario, BC and Quebec have a worse record of mismanagement than federal liberal governments.

A solution could be merging BC with Alberta and Saskatchewan and saving taxpayer money by (1) erasing provincial debt and saving on the interest and (2) saving on salaries and pensions of 2 less premiers and tens of MLAs.

@Taxed Out! Alberta reduced in 12 years its provincial debt to $0 in 2005. In contrast BC province pays $2.5 Billion each year on interest for BC provincial debt of more than $51 Billion. In 2007, BC debt was $33 Billion.

BC is far more broke and with additional $600 Billion federal debt of Canada, each of us in BC have a $30,000 share of Canada’s national debt.

I am in no way defending BC’s political economics, univ. The question I ask is as Conservatives and their supporters boast is that Conservatim is the perfect government economic money generaters and managers of any political ideology worldwide, why is Alberta broke? Lets not forget that 2005 Ralph was using money generated from the Heritage fund to help balance the books. So clearly even his great Conservative ideology was not being sustainable. 40 years is plenty of time to show that your ideology to prove its worth. An economy based in oil as Alberta’s and ran by one political party, Alberta’s econmic troubles clearly show Conservatism is a failure

MRS GREEN. Take Christi Clark with you to china. Maybe she can show you were she bought her tax funded necklace you love. I think both of you must have jumped into a swimming pool with no water in it.

Clark says in an effort to create a stable environment for students, she wants the Ministry of Education to look at ideas such as negotiating a 10 year contract “Imagine”

10 years of zero, zero and zero. Bye Bye Christi.

Enjoy China Mrs Green. You will not bufflo me again.

The fiscal failings of the Conservatives in Alberta is not unique to that Party, Taxed Out! Their failings, as with ALL the other current political Parties nationwide, are their refusal to do anything to correct an ever growing problem.

It’s a result of not having a proper system of accounting in government. One similar to the accounting used by any other private provider of goods and services to the general public. One that has a properly constructed Balance Sheet, showing Assets and Capital, which we never now see, not just the Liabilities (public Debt) that we do.

The way that government accounting currently functions makes a Provincial or National Debt a necessity, because such debts act as “distributing agents” for necessary new money entering the economy.

At present, no modern industrial economy is fully financially ‘self-liquidating’ ~ and with ongoing labor displacement in favor of the increased use of Capital they tend to increasingly less so. What this means is that without the government increasing its indebtedness, (which it’s supposed to try to recover in taxes, but really can’t ~ anywhere), private businesses couldn’t fully recover all their costs in prices, and maintain a level of profitability to ensure continued necessary access to Bank credit to carry on in business.

It DOESN’T *have* to be that way. And a proper set of accounts would quickly reveal that we are indeed TAXED OUT, or very quickly will be. When, in all likelihood, we should be getting money back from the government, rather than continually running up more debt collectively giving them more of the little income already left us.

Do girls get an education in Afghanistan? Private schools are subsidized by taxpayers and you will not find any kids there with issues.
So loki with your rant you must have a reasoned solution. This aught to be good.

That was not a rant, it was questioning the logic of rewriting contracts regardless of duration.

What I mean is, if they had negotiated a certain wage and benefit package, and the term had expired, why do they need to make up new stuff to negotiate.

For example, A first year teacher gets $60,000 per year salary (just a number, not a fact), and each year said teacher gets an increase due to experience and tenure, then why do they have to add or change stuff to the contract currently being negotiated?
Cost of living indexes are SOP. Benefits are as well.
Why the big argument? If you are a 10 year teacher, you get $x per year plus your ten year increases and bonuses for high achieving students or what ever they bonus teachers on.

A red seal trades person gets an industry set rate, plus whatever the employer thinks they are worth over that. Do the same for teachers and stop putting our children’s future at risk.

Teachers, health professionals, and government employees are all unionized because in the past employers were notorious for poor working conditions and wages. Now it has swung too far the other way.

cheese

You ever talk to a teacher?