Bond Apologizes For Her Absence
Prince George, B.C.- Minister of Jobs, Tourism and Skills Training, Shirley Bond, has issued an apology to the workers and families who gathered outside her constituency office yesterday.
About 100 people took part in the march that made a stop in front of the WorkSafeBC offices then made its way to Bond’s constituency office. The gathering was to mark the 2nd anniversary of the Lakeland mill explosion and to press for a public inquiry into that blast and the one which leveled the Babine Forest Products Mill just three months earlier.
In her apology, ( issued about an hour after the actual event ) Minister Bond says she only received notice of the planned march late on Monday, and that “regrettably at that point I was unable to change my out of town work schedule in order to attend.”
But while the families and workers are pressing for a full public inquiry, Minister Bond stands firm on the calling of an inquest “I know the families want answers. So do I, and so does our government, which is why I asked the Attorney General to direct Chief Coroner Lisa Lapointe to conduct an inquest into the explosion at Lakeland Mills – a process that will help all of us get a full accounting of the facts. The Chief Coroner is doing that inquest, and has said that a Coroner’s Inquest is the best venue to address the many important questions and concerns raised about the explosion and resulting deaths.”
Her statement concludes with “In the end, our actions will not change the tragic loss for these families. However, we will do everything we can to ensure that families and British Columbians have the answers they deserve.”
But an inquest is not enough for Rhonda Roche. Her husband Glenn died as a result of injuries sustained in the Lakeland explosion and she says a public inquiry is necessary “It is something we need to continue on in our healing.” The Chief Coroner has indicated the two inquests, ( Babine Forest Products and Lakeland Mills) may be combined, and Roche is not convinced that is a good idea “They should not be combined, they are two separate incidents, similar, but an inquest is not going to give us the answers a public inquiry would give us. We need to know more about what happened along the way, before, the night of and after the explosion.”
Steelworkers Local 1-424 President Frank Everitt is part of the push for a public inquiry “People who have lost their loved one, or have been seriously injured are looking for additional answers for what caused it, what happened and how can we prevent it from happening again. We believe a public inquiry will lead us to some of those answers right now, we’ve just got everyone in limbo.”
Everitt says sometimes the recommendations from an inquest are not binding and may be ignored “We’re looking for something that gets acted on.”
Comments
I for onwe don’t believe her , as far as I know she has conveniently missed every march that has shown up outside her office door.
as has Mike Morris and so did Pat Bell when he was in. Seems to be a trend don’t you think?
It’s a Fiberal thing “No guts no glory “
For Shirley it would not be a smiling photo opportunity so she had an excuse – what was her out-of-town commitment?
Shame on the local MLAs not to be even seen on such a sad day!
I’m not a fan of public inquests. I’m sure the families want as many answers as they can get, but do they really think that an inquest is going to get to those answers?
Most of the time an inquest seems to come to a set of conclusions and makes some recommendations. Forgive the comparison, but it’s similar to the City getting a core review. The accounting firm got paid a pretty good dollar to come up with some recommendations and the City adopts a couple changes and shelves the rest.
Public Inquests are a costly affair. I would bet if they went ahead and started one the costs would be in the hundreds of thousands if not millions.
Inquiry, inquest … inquiry, inquest …
So an inquiry gets more action you say …
remember the inquiry into Missing and Murdered Women?
Lots of action there. Seems to me I just read an article somewhere that there was a recommendation of a shuttle bus ….. but we see no shuttle bus. So why could that be?
Cannot blame her. Its the staff who should of been on top of this and telling her way ahead of time. They are very busy representing us.
Shirley Bond is one of the hardest working politicians on the planet. She is as up front and honest as they come. You folks never get into mix ups? At least she is acknowledging it. How many of you naysayers would?
i agree with opinionated. I’m no Liberal, far from it, even a card-carrying NDP’er for a while. I don’t even like Bond all that much, but I do believe that she works her tail off for her constituency and listens to the people that live here. I think that she is one of the few politicians that got into this gig for the right reasons. think about all that Bond has done for the community and contrast it with that lifeless dinosaur Dick Harris that purports to represent this area in Parliament…a useless waste of oxygen in the House of Commons….
There have been lots of Inquests and the recommendations are just that recommendations with no teeth, Public inquiry will bring a lot more information and that’s what’s needed
How about an inquiry as to why politicians are never around?
Its easy to blame the politicians after the fact but the truth is the union membership and Union are as much to blame as well as the owners.
After the first explosion at Babine did the Union heads and membership and owners sit down and decide no more work till the rest of the mills are made safe.
These are decisions that should have been taken to prevent the next tragedy.
We have people requesting an inquiry that were in a position to stop any more work until it was safe.
DID they.
never on, you hit it right on the head. Isn’t that what the union is for. If the membership is complaining and management isn’t listening, than its everyone that owns a bit of the blame. Owners, union, union membership and worksafe.
one of the little rules is, the workers have the right to refuse unsafe work.
Was Bond’s office given advance notice, did they even check ahead of time if she would be around, or do people mistakenly expect politicians available at a moment’s notice .
Seems to me that she had two years notice… wasn’t this on her agenda planner?
seamut,I think what one of the problems are…. is letting someone who you are going to protest against with advanced notice you are going to do so…nothing like letting them know with enough notice that they can find something to do elsewhere….and the Liberals are famous for it….
with me, I find Bond can talk for an hour and at the end you still don’t know what is happening…
Wasn’t Shirley Bond the Attorney General two years ago? Why didn’t she request an inquiry at that time?
If you give them notice and there is avoidance with no viable reason that should be obvious. So showing up at her door without announcement and she is not there, she is in the wrong. Please explain further?
She did offer an apology which is this case was not required. What do you folks want, sitting in the doorway 24/7? Lots of emotion here but short on facts.
opinionated -“Shirley Bond is one of the hardest working politicians on the planet.”
So WERE the deceased and injured workers the hardest working individuals on the planet.
She has been a no show to deal with average Joe problems in PG. You cannot get hold of her or most of the politicians in BC unless you have paid at least tens of thousands to their election campaigns.
BC has turned into a (B)anana Republi(C).
There is this “Peter principle” in management that says people are promoted to their level of incompetence and they remain stuck in that level. For Bond that level is Minister level. Whatever portfolio she is given, she makes a big mess out of it. Just look back at the failure trail she has left in the cabinet from riots in Vancouver (Minister of public safety) to that UNBC wood building scandal in PG (Minister of justice). The $20 Million annual waste and financial imbalance in UNBC also started in her tenure as advanced education minister and talk about mayors’ mutiny while she was transportation minister.
She is something, nah?
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