Delays and Distractions By Clark- Says Weaver
Prince George, B.C.- The BC Legislature is to resume one week from tomorrow, and the first matter of business is to select a Speaker, but the NDP and Greens accuse Premier Christy Clark of muddying the waters and “making mischief”.
In a news conference in Victoria this morning, Green Party leader Andrew Weaver accuses Clark of instructing the elected Liberal MLAs to not serve as Speaker, a position that must be voted on by all MLAs. Weaver says Clark has instructed her team that if one of them is elected to the post, that they resign “If she has instructed her MLAs that they must submit a piece a paper or resign, then frankly that is constitutional crisis, because that is undercutting the whole essence of what the role of the Speaker is.”
He says it’s time for the Liberals “recognize you’ve been put in a time out, and let us get on with the business of governing”.
Horgan adds “It’s outrageous that they are clinging on to power rather than actually going to the legislature and having a confidence vote quickly.” He says the issue about the Speaker “Has become an issue the Liberals are stretching and stretching and stretching.”
Horgan says it’s time for the Legislature to resume and face the confidence vote that would clear the way for the NDP and Greens to move into power. “The speaker will be elected on the 22nd, and what happens after that we will deal with.”
Comments
Who would have expected anything else from Clark.. she is becoming BCs trump…
Is she doing anything illegal?
Is she doing anything outside of the rules of the Legislature!
Is she doing anything that falls outside of her current position?
Is she doing anything that falls outside of her current responsibilities?
Is she doing anything different from what Weaver and especially Horgan would do if they were in her current position?
Clark is doing exactly what she should be doing at this point in time and in light of the current situation!
P Val, the fact that you don’t like her and the Liberals, and have never liked her or the Liberals for that matter is of little consequence to what she is doing!
Suck it up, Buttercup! We are going to have to live with Dumb and Dumber soon enough, so you should be able to handle things the way the are for the next week, or two, or three or however long it takes for this to work itself out!
I do appreciate you blindly following her like a sheep..
This from the guy who probably has Horgan and Weaver’s posters on his bedroom wall, haha!
Okay, they’re right. Tradition says the speaker usually comes from the governing party and Clark has made it clear at this moment in time they are the government.
But, once the NDP/Green coalition defeats the government, and then becomes the government, tradition says the Liberal will resign as speaker and they will have to put forth one of their members as speaker. And this is where it get’s interesting.
According to Gary Collins in the Times Colonist today.
“Once an NDP-Green government elects a Speaker and deputy speaker, they’ll find themselves with one seat fewer than the B.C. Liberals in Committee of the Whole and Committee of Supply. As a result, every bill and supply motion the NDP-Green alliance introduces will find itself stuck in the mud of a committee, open to amendment and possible defeat.”
So basically, no one will be able to govern. Too bad the Greens hadn’t of held their noses and supported the government, then at least we would have had a government, but a government that couldn’t do whatever it wanted. Now we have a government that can’t get anything done – but then again, if it’s going to be NDP – maybe that’s a good thing.
This is why the Lieutenant Governor may send us back to the polls. The coalition can’t really promise the ability to form a functioning government.
The deputy speaker still has a vote, so the scenario above, if a NDP or Green MLA is the speaker, the official opposition has the same number of votes as the coalition government. However, the speaker holds the tie breaking vote in the event of a deadlock. The tricky part is if Horgan is away on official business or an NDP/Green MLA is sick while the legislature is in session, then in theory the Liberals could topple the government on a confidence vote. Interesting times ahead.
Also the speaker doesn’t have to be elected by law. It would be an extreme measure, but I think that might be where it ends up… If Clark can not get a ndp or green MLA to step up.
I think Clark blew it in her cabinet announcement. If she could have put forward a true coalition cabinet, I think in the long term she might have been able to govern from the middle with a coalition government of MLA’s. Now that would be very difficult to achieve and she will likely be on the outside looking in within weeks. I can’t see Clark putting up good policy that the greens and ndp would find hard to vote against in confidence.
Good, I hope she distracts these 2 nimrods for 4 years or an election, whichever comes first! LOL
Considering that Gary Collins was a Liberal MLA for a number of years, perhaps he is more into wishful thinking than actual fact.
Once a bill returns to the legislature the Government can return it to the Committee of the Whole for further discussion.
What we could end up with is a situation where the Liberals will be seen as acting childish and trying to impede needed legislation. This would not bode well for them if it caused another election to be called.
I think if an election were called, we would see a different result. Its hard to imagine it being any worse than this deadlock is predicted to be.
Can we have a referendum asking if we should abolish the concept of political parties altogether? Just kidding.. kind of…
As far as I could tell, the Liberals won a very scant victory – let them govern the province, with the NDP in a strong position as the opposition. Jail or re-vote any MLA that switches sides after being elected. The Speaker could be one of the Greens, as a tip of the hat to their party which has gained a lot of traction in this latest election. Let the speaker have his/her vote.
Party coalitions make more sense to me to happen before the election, not after. Otherwise it has the appearance of shady, underhanded, backroom deals where a coalition party that did not exist while people were casting their ballots has somehow managed to gain power.
You made some very strong points Spidey. The fact a coalition is formed after an election is very underhanded, plus a slap in the face to the voters of the parties who formed the coalition. If I voted green I would expect that I could hold those Green values, not the values of an NDP government, because they may very well get that if a second election isn’t called.
I voted Lib by the way and I wouldn’t want a coalition with either the NDP or the Greens. I wish we did have a second right leaning option though.
At its heart this is about political parties injecting themselves into the legislature, where our system was not designed to account for political parties, but rather independent MLA’s. We didn’t even have parties on the ballot until the 70’s. This is a party manufactured crisis.
The coalition parties would like to take it even further and bring in proportion representation that would further inject the rights of parties in the legislature over that of representative government by elected MLA’s with their plans to have party insiders appointed to list seats with no term limits for party partisans making up as much as half of our legislative seats.
So banning political parties for this legislative session seems the most appropriate solution to defend our democracy at this point.
Interesting comment on the front page of today’s Vancouver Province:
Green Leader Andrew Weaver says New Democrats assured him in negotiations that it would be ‘no problem for them to find a speaker from within the B.C. Liberal’s ranks.’
Say what??
So Horgan made promises that he might not be able to fulfill!
Who’d a thunk it, haha?
Maybe there is no problem. We will have to wait and see. I think initially they thought Sam Sullivan would be available because of his dislike for Christy Clark.
We’re going back to the polls. I guarantee it….
Gee! I hope so. Now would be a good time!
Hart Guy…you have hit the nail on the head. Based on how Horgan is sniveling he did not consider that if a Liberal was elected as Speaker they would just stand down and decline. I guess strategy isn’t his strong suit.
Baaaaaa Haaaaaa …. way to funny!
Can you say GRID-LOCK!
Oh and yes Merc…. we are going back to the polls!
It’s delay but not distraction . It’s about the money . The first week of the delay put $300,000 dollars of donors money into the libcons coffers .should be a million or more before Adrew and John put an end to that part of her scam . Always keep your eye on the money . That’s where all the answers are when it comes to the libcons .
ataloss
Time to face reality that the greens and ndp are no better be it accepting over 600k from the steelworkers union or the greens putting the squeeze on property developers for 20k or 30k contributions.
Seems you always vanish when this is brought up. Can’t handle the truth?
No sparrow , I disappear when I have more pressing concerns. As for your tripe about the greens as you put it the greens putting the squeeze on a property developer for money ? Why would you low ball the so called amount ? And where did that meme come from . If true ? Why has it not made it to the courts ? After all what you are accusing The Green Part of BC is extortion . Is it not ? I have not addressed the accusation because it is tripe . As for the NDP ? They are playing the hand dealt by the libcons . Why even mention that to me ? You know I’m Green because I’m about the money . There’s a lot of green in going green . Just not all of it going to the corps and the libcons .
Greens openly admitted that that this happened as reported in G&M story.
The attached article begins:
“While BC Green Party Leader Andrew Weaver was insisting he was the only one of the three leaders running in the recent provincial election with “clean hands” when it came to campaign donations, his party was hitting up a prominent member of the Vancouver development community and major BC Liberal Party donor for a $30,000 contribution.
The Greens confirmed the overture occurred but said the person, whom they refused to name, turned them down. The party said it approached “three or four” people about the possibility of donating up to this amount.”
Could it be 3 or 4 hundred? Who knows¯＼(º_o)/¯
Turns out that the bc green party is just another…gulp….political party. You will just have to soldier on through life known that that fact.
Tripe on your supper menu tonight…..don’t choke on it:P
theglobeandmail.com/news/british-columbia/bc-green-party-sought-cash-from-developer-despite-calling-for-campaign-finance-reform/article35069680/
Some interesting reading. Clark leaves Honey Do List from Hell for incoming premier Horgan.
I get the impression that BC is a very Conservative area – we’ve voted for the Liberal (Conservative) government many times in a row.
I think we’re seeing a large backlash against that party, even though most voters would identify with the Conservative (ie. Liberal – economy focused) party, they have made mistakes. The de-funding of public education in particular is a very hard pill to swallow. The Supreme Court agreed, and that carries serious weight.
If the BC Liberals seemed to regret that event and if they HAD done an independent review of the Site C dam project before bulling forward BECUZ JOBZ, those things alone might have changed the election. 12Billion can buy many permanent jobs in other ways that would be more cost effective.
As it stands most developed economies are starting to tear down dams, not build new ones. The reason is simple: rivers are just too valuable as they are. Power can be generated other ways. Farmland and salmon species can not be replaced once destroyed. Now that we’re $2Billion into the construction is not an ideal time to stop the construction project. The mistake was in taking BC Hydro’s word for the need for Site C, even though it had been rejected by reviews previously, and even though we are currently basically dumping our electricity to the USA grid for pennies on the market price, while WE pay market price, plus all these mysterious fees. I’ve heard rumors that in fact the USA doesn’t pay ANYTHING for the power we’re sending them. Say it aint so!
I have changed my tune about pipelines though. They are far more efficient than rail or road transport, and with our modern societies so addicted to plastics, the need to extract oil will not stop in the near future, even once the need to burn gas/oil for energy has passed.
Maybe Christy won’t be able to resist the siren call of the extra pay for being a speaker and apply for the job herself?
Christy is shaking like a leaf. Finally someone else is going to be taking a look at the books.
Ayup!
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