Tough Sledding Expected for New BC Government
Prince George, B.C. – A veteran of political wars in the central interior is looking forward to a change in government in B.C. but is apprehensive about how difficult it is going to be for the NDP and Greens to keep a government together once the Liberals fall.
Lois Boone, chosen by voters as the New Democrat MLA for Prince George North from 1986 -‘91 and Prince George-Mount Robson from ’91 – 2001, says her mixed feelings are “not about the Liberal government coming to a close, I’m very happy to see that ending because I don’t think that they’ve been a good government that has looked after the average person. We’ve seen costs go up for so many things that affect everyone.”
“However,” says Boone “when I look at the terms of (the NDP) coming into government with a majority of one with the Green Party (support), I’m thinking man, I don’t know if I’d want to do that. We had a majority of two when we were last in government and that was very, very difficult and hard to do.”
Post-election all three party leaders spoke of co-operation in the legislature “for the people of British Columbia.” Boone says “I think you’ll see co-operation from the Greens and the NDP, which is good, but I don’t think you’ll see much co-operation coming from the Liberals, any more than we saw co-operation coming from the Liberals when we were in government from ’96 to 2001. It was very much knives out and looking for any opportunity to overturn us and I would think that would still be in existence now.”
Boone, who held cabinet posts in four ministries as well as the position of Deputy Premier, looks forward to legislated “changes on proportional representation and with regard to big money being in politics. That is the type of thing that is long overdue so that a wealthy party can’t just buy an election, which has happened in the past.”
“I think they need to try to make B.C. more affordable for everybody by freezing increases that were planned for hydro under the Liberals and making sure things such as ICBC rates don’t go up. They’re not based on how much money you make. So, if you make minimum wage, which I would like to see go up, you still pay the same increase as someone who is making $200,000 a year. I’d really like to see some of those issues addressed.”
On the question of jobs in the north she says “given the fact that we’ve seen a loss of 30-thousand jobs in the forest sector since the Liberals have come into government and we’ve seen mills closed as a result of the changes that they’ve put into place with the pertinency clause and the access to timber, I don’t see how any government can be much worse for our region than the Liberals have been.”
“Yes, they’ve been doing well up in the Peace, but that’s because the oil and gas prices have been high and if prices decrease, so will the jobs. It’s amazing when every time there’s a job loss when the NDP is in government it’s all the NDP’s fault, and when the job losses occur when the Liberals are in government it suddenly becomes a problem because there’s a world-wide recession.”
“I don’t think you’ll see the NDP government making any changes that are going to drive away jobs in this area, rather a government that is looking to enhance forestry, trees re-planted, jobs flourishing. I would caution people to not light their hair on fire because (the NDP) has made commitments to the forest sector, to resource industries, we’ve also made commitments to keeping our environment clean and I think we can do all of those things and not lose jobs.”
Asked whether it will be tough for the new government to top Clark’s 2013-promised tens of thousands of LNG jobs, $100 billion prosperity fund, elimination of the PST and the provincial debt retired, Boone says with a chuckle “it will be. That’s amazing that people still see this government as one that creates jobs when in fact everything that they’ve ever talked about has fallen flat on their face.”
“We can still do a lot of the things, we don’t need to, from my perspective, spend huge amounts of money on Site C. I think we can spend money on other, smaller projects, wind and solar projects, still producing jobs but not at the cost of the environment. I don’t think you’ll see the new government basing all of the jobs on one particular project, such as an LNG project which never appears.”
Comments
And we wonder why this Province, with the natural resources and skills and knowledge possessed by our people is witnessing increased poverty in the midst of an ever expanding plenty.
A plenty far more than capable of giving each and every one of us a standard of living far in excess of the level it’s at now, and do so without taking a dime off anyone who’s attained a standard of living in excess of any most of us would even dream about having.
Lois Boone isn’t alone in her myopic view of a world totally governed by ‘money’.
Her counterparts exist in every Party. From those on the right who blame all our ills on those who don’t, or won’t work at all, let alone harder and longer to try to pull themselves up by their own bootstraps, all the while pretending against every shred of physical evidence available that all the additional ‘production’ their employment would engender could then be sold ~ somewhere, to someone, for something, but it’s never quite clear as to where, or who, or how; to those like Lois who would universalise poverty in the mistaken belief that misery will always be palatable so long as it has lots of company.
It’s been said that people get the government they deserve. And it seems we’re still determined to prove that statement true. Too bad, what an utter waste of human potential as we fight over and over again a battle in which there’ll never really be any winners, save for those who promote the continuance of the fight itself.
I like this post socredible!
“…to those…who would universalize poverty in the mistaken belief that misery will always be palatable so long as it has lots of company.”
Thank you for pointing out the obvious! They do not grasp the reality of the world they are living in. The world thrives on competition. People compete for advancement, better jobs, better living conditions, for a better present and future for themselves and their children. Countries have been (and still are) competing for land, resources and leadership in trade, business and scientific advancement as long as human
history exists. Can one province change this? Of course not!
We may see again a well-intended but misguided experiment to shape this province into something which is driven by idealism rather than by working within reality.
@princegeorge . You are confusing the creative mindset with the competitive mindset . The competitive mind is destructive to the losers of the competition . The creative mind grows families , relationships , new products and more of everything needed for growth . Every living thing wants to grow . The competitive mindset is the one that produces the keeping up with the jones syndrome that is reeking havoc with the debt to income ratio .
“The creative mind grows families”
That is a false truth.
The largest families are still found in poor countries where the more children one has the greater the advantage of a family’s survival since they become part of the production “team”.
It is a matter of survival …. survival of the fittest ….. competition.
The other mind that grows families are those who, because of their religion beget large families. I would not call those who are religious people creative. They are dogmatic and far from those who have an objective, open and creative mind.
Creativity, inventing, patenting, finding a better way are part of competition. For instance, in the competition for cleaner energy there will be the fossil fuel burning losers – that is a good thing, as you yourself know very well! Would you see that as a positive or as destructive?
The keeping up with the Jones syndrome is mostly based on envy and feelings of inferiority.
In paragraph 7, the word “pertinency” should be “appurtenancy”.
It is a legal term meaning an accessory or adjunct that is attached and incidental to something that has greater importance or value.
As applied to real property, an object attached to (timber) or a right to be used with land as an incidental benefit but which is necessary to the complete use and enjoyment of the property.
If that notion had not been placed into the practice of manufacturing forest products from the raw timber feedstock, we would still have small mills every 50 or so km along the CN railway from McBride to Prince George.
It makes eminent economic sense and has been the cause of the world urbanizing for a hundred and more years.
“given the fact that we’ve seen a loss of 30-thousand jobs in the forest sector since the Liberals have come into government”
Show the cause and effect. Liberals in power is the cause of 30-thousand forest sector jobs. Easy words to say but very difficult to prove.
Manufacturing the world over has been becoming more efficient and more mechanized for hundreds of years. There will be a time for each industry when one there is no longer a benefit to increasing automation…….. until the next bright idea comes along.
As socredible so often points out, we still have not been able to harness the increase in productivity into more leisure time for the citizens of a country and the world.
Some countries are doing better than others in that area of human creativity. It is hard to break the WASP tradition of human labour is required to advance economically.
When the NDP was in power for a decade it blamed the change of B.C. from #1 *have* province in Canada to #10 *have-not* province on an Asian economic flu!
It refused to admit that it had anything to do with how they mismanaged the province. Now, anything that does not meet the expectations of the NDP critics is claimed by them to be the fault of the Liberals! Global external influences are dismissed! Go figure!
Remember, this country was explored by trappers for the animal fur. That was the basic economy which drove colonization in the beginning.
How much of the economy does trapping for fur participate in these days? Which party caused the failure of that? oops …. it was the crown. So the family had to point fingers at each other….. LOL
well with the Green party leader selling out his party, and the NDP leader thinking the is BC’s version of Trump and of course the Liberals being emotionally scarred since they got their wake up call, we are in for trouble.
I don’t think any of the parties are going to be honorable and do what they claimed
I prefer to call her LOCUST BOONE. She was a great part of the NDP reign of mismanagement from 1991-2001. Her and that draft dodger Paul Ramsay. Why even ask that twit her opinion
Paul Ramsay, was an American so what did you expect from him
He would have had to get Canadian citizenship to run for office.
He was one of many who dodged the draft by moving out of the country.
People would be pretty hard pressed to give us a list of what the Liberals actually did for us for the last 16 years.
Feel free to start the list anytime. I am betting that it will be quite short, and somewhat overblown.
I think that we could say that the Liberals have in fact done nothing but look after their friends for the past 16 years.
they paid off a long list of favors for political donations.
People would be pretty hard pressed to give us a list of what the Liberals, the NDP, the Social Credit and any other party actually did for us since 1950.
Did we even advance? How does one measure advancement.
Any question like that has to be posed with some guidelines and definitions.
Without that it is a useless fee-for-all.
You really do not know how it is done Palopu? Or are you just baiting us?
Boone says “I think you’ll see co-operation from the Greens and the NDP, which is good, but I don’t think you’ll see much co-operation coming from the Liberals, any more than we saw co-operation coming from the Liberals when we were in government from ’96 to 2001. It was very much knives out and looking for any opportunity to overturn us and I would think that would still be in existence now.”
======================
If the tables were turned, I don’t think you’d see cooperation from the NDP either. IMHO, our political system is severely lacking the type of leadership and cooperation that is needed to grow and advance our country.
Every party is too partisan, we have far too much bickering back and forth between political “teams” and their supporters, and we seem to focus more on talking about doing good things instead of actually doing them.
We need a rework of the system and with the behaviours of our elected representatives. It’s devolved into something that is large on spectacle and short on results.
agree totally. Adversarial system might work in courts, but even there other approaches are used.
Don’t recall Boone getting much done when she represented this area, even though she held a couple of cabinet posts. When Ramsey was in we got the John Hart Bridge twinned and that was about all.
Christy is going to put her name in for the speaker position. She heard it pays an extra $50,000.
Don’t forget, she is a single mom.
and she needs the money to take her child to the pub with her when she goes….. the only thing I can remember her doing on her families first campaign . Quite the legacy .
Comments for this article are closed.