Credibility is not one of Bruce Strachans strong points Rafe.
Just consider the source!

Reasoned thinkers understand this issue well. The difficulty is the ability of getting the major media organizations to communicate the majority opinion in the hard hitting manner it needs to do, and has the responsibility to so do.

Alcan uses their legal fees, to effect the results in the courts, as a tax right off. Our provincial government is using our hard earned taxes dollars to support Alcan in the courts. Those attempting to defend the citizens of BC against the corporate takeover of our provincial resources, by multi-nationals, must first pay taxes on our earnings (which Campbell then seditiously uses against us), then we get to use our after tax dollars to pay lawyer fees which are yet again taxed by the Provincial Government.

I refer to this as a triple play.

Our Provincial Government is acting against the interests of the people of the Province. There must be an ability of the people to level a charge of treason against this group of crooks. The Legislature was raided, drugs, bribes, corruption, sell off's and more.

Just what do they (the Liberals) have to do before the Citizens rise up and storm the legislature? Start public executions? Suspend elections? Will no major media organization actually ever expose the criminality? Are they all so greedily attached to the profiteering that they are prepared to sacrifice every last beneficial resource of the Province?

Thank you Rafe for keeping the issue alive.

Can I reprint your writings in my paper?

Merv Ritchie, Terrace Daily

Well said Merv!
I have always felt that the present Liberal government will destroy itself from within at some point, and with the speed they are traveling at in the push to the Olympics,that may be sooner than later!
I too wonder just how much it will take for the people of this province to stand up and push back.
Alcan is just one issue of many that need a complete re-think.
The media is the key to it all and yet they never seem to dig deep enough.
I can't help but wonder why?

Look, Rafe Mair once referred to Gordon Campbell as "an unrepentant drunk" and he wasn't too far wrong, my biggest concern is, with whom can we replace him?

Is it time to bring Social Credit back online as we certainly don't want the N.D.P.

At least with Social Credit this province prospered and their concerns, for the most part, lay with the overall prosperity of the province and not the Liberal politicians or their N.D.P. ilk.

Very good question netsurfer.
It's one that I have asked myself a lot.
So far,I haven't come up with an answer but I do know that we need serious change and soon.
I also think that the B.C. Liberals under Campbell will eventually devour themselves.
Campbells arrogance is showing more and more all the time.
Where we go next remains to be seen but, perhaps a new party or even revival of the Social Credit party under new management may be in order?
(ohmygod...I never thought I would ever say that!)

Hey Campbell isen't going anywhere soon unless he wants to. As long as the lower mainland think they are making money he will stay in. Look at all the scandals Campbell and government have survived. Generally as long as people think they are making money they have no morals. Lets wait until after the olympics and see if the bubble bursts. If it does burst just blame it on the NDP.

Poor old Rafe; when logic and evidence fail him, his only resort is personal attack. First, my column on the Nechako and KCP was based solely on the report of 1994 B.C. Utilities Commission Review. Commission membership included Dr. Peter Larkin M.A., D.Phil., LL.D., D.Sc., F.R.S.C. Dr. Larkin(now deceased) was a distingushed fishery biologist. The report called for greater fishery protection on the Nechako and that KCP would provide opportunities for that protection. I have a tendency to accept Dr. Larkin's scientific findings over Rafe Mair's ramblings.
Second, during all the 1990s debate over KCP, it's curious that Ben Meisner failed to admit he was the president of a land development company with extensive holdings on the Nechako River.
Third, as a cabinet minister, I did not attend any Chamber meeting where Rafe was speaking.
Finally, I'll put my legislative accomplishments up against Rafe's sorry cut-and-run-record any day.
Cheers, Bruce Strachan

Bruce I have a few questions:

What did you propose to ensure that all the stakeholders in the watershed had their concerns protected by Alcan and Alcan commercial interests?

Why did you not support BC Hydro involvement in managing the watershed?

In your economic analysis how did you see this having any benefit for Northern BC?

What was your interpretation of how KCP would help to protect the salmon and what assurances did you envision guaranteeing that?

I figure Rafe has the stronger argument on this issue. Your argument is not clear and looks like a passing of the buck off onto the selected experts to avoid accounting for what your position on the matter was. No different than Gordo and his pay raise.

-------------

On the issue of a political party that represents?

That was killed by the same Bill Vander Zalm that killed the Social Credit party of Bill Bennett. Let us not forget that it was Vander Zalm that wiped out the NDP bring the BC Liberals to power in a monopoly position by killing the Reform Party of BC. It was Vander Zalm that over spent as a Reform BC Candidate and then a compromised Elections BC that ruled the entire Reform Party of BC could not run in the next election only weeks away even though 28% of British Columbia citizens supported that party at that time. With 28% of the populist right leaning electorate up for grabs all Gordon Campbell had to do was promise fixed elections dates and he would get their vote for one election. The Reform Party of BC was effectively dead, and Gordon Campbell had a virtual political dictatorship in a two party province with Bill Vander Zalm and Elections BC the king maker.

Bill Vander Zalm assured us the Social Credit Party was a one off in BC history to this point. What BC needs is a new W.A.C. Bennett that can bring us a new party of citizen representation. It will surely have a different name, but it would be the policies that should be most important. Vested interest politicians killed the proud BC populist past and that should be of primary concern when re-building and putting forward the next Social Credit type party in BC's Future.

In the long term I think a party constitution like the one the BC Democratic Future Party has is the constitution most likely to bring democracy to BC. In the short term I think supporting the BC Citizens Assembly recommendations have the best shot at the Citizens of BC getting control back over our political process.

It should be no surprise that the Green Party of BC joined the NDP and the BC Liberals in opposing the BC Citizens Assembly recommendation as all three parties oppose BC'S populism past in favour of vested interests that control the party. The BCDFP is the only party that supports the BC Citizens Assembly recommendations that received 60% support in the last referendum with no promotional budget in the last election. The other three parties will not accept the will of the majority because they want to have control over what candidates are allowed to run with organized party support in our electoral process so as to serve their vested interest groups.

Time Will Tell

Isn't it interesting that Rafe can't bring himself to name the NDP as the government who listened, so deeply ingrained is his prejudice, yet he expects the NDP to listen to his advice on other occasions.

To Netsurfer's call for reviving the Socreds, please remember that the current provincial Liberal government has a significant number of the previous Socreds as MLAs. Campbell's mob are the inheritors of that party. Also remember that it was that group who laid the foundation for the current debacle by Alcan by not adequately considering the effects of the agreement they made years ago. Bringing back the Socreds would be putting the perpetrators in control of the jailhouse again.

Chadermando's comments about proportional representation and the political parties opposition to the system recommended is a little exaggerated, I thought. I understood that the NDP's objection was that they wanted a system where the party appointed some members based on the proportion of votes that party got. That is a common proportional representation system in other countries. In other words, they agreed that proportional representation was desirable, but wanted a different system. I think the other parties felt the same way, but am not sure.

As it happens, I do not agree with this viewpoint and fully support a voter driven system. I think that any system which "appoints" representatives conflicts with democracy, and I am opposed to it. Other than that, I agree with Chadermando that proportional rrepresentation would solve a lot of the representation problems facing BC.

Despite that, the next election will be between the NDP and the Liberals. More of Campbell's sell-off of our property and the province's economic capital at fire-sale prices, or Carol James' reasonableness and respectful approach to improving the lives of every British Columbian.

You are absolutely right Bruce, I did have shares in a subdivision on the Nechako, but
let’s apply a little common sense here. Would it be easier to sell lots along the Nechako if there was never to be a flood (as Bruce suggested had Kemano two gone ahead) or try and sell them by telling people there is always a possibility of a flood.

I appeared before The City Council Of Prince George on five different televised occasions to seek approval for the subdivision and to hand over to the city more than a hectare of land along the river I love so dearly. There was another more than 50 hectares handed over to Natures Trust to guarantee that no politician will ever be able to destroy that section of the river and escarpment.

Does that sound like someone in hiding?

Permit me to inform our readers however Bruce something you missed... You bought a river lot from that same company I was president of, were you trying to protect your investment by trying to ensure there never would be a flood there by increasing its value?

Please don’t wave around the BC Utilities Commission report final findings without first reading the terms of Reference. I spent many an evening with Dr. Larkin pounding back a pint in which he talked of the panel’s inability to go beyond the terms. Its an old trick and you should, as an old cabinet minister, know how it works, set out the terms to your liking and get the result that you want... it’s a bit like the inquest that I attended in Houston all of last week.

You of course didn’t attend all of the hearings because if you had, you would have also head the testimony from leading fishery scientists in the world, like Dr Gordon Hartman who is recognized the world over, Dr Harold Muncie, Don Alderdice, Thomas Gordon Brown, Dr .Cole Sherrill, (who by the way risked being fired from Federal Fisheries where he worked to testify) Bill Schoenberg (another Federal Fisheries scientist who paid the penalty for talking) and a few others who attempted to have a total picture shown of the problems of Kemano two.

Unlike you Bruce, I listened to everyone, not just the pleadings of your friends at Alcan.

Meisner

Ammonra, I respect your support for BCSTV, but you have it all wrong in regards to what I support. I do not in any way support Proportional Representation. I oppose that concept of electing our government because it means someone with out a majority support can be elected to make decisions for all. IF BC had a regional senate to protect the regional interests I could support a small amount of PR in the legislature, but that is a big if.

Carol James came out after the 60% support for the BCSTV and said she would back Gordon Campbell in not implementing the majority will of the people, because in her view she supported proportional representation and nothing less. Carol was a supporter of the party list concept of proportional representation. She did not make her views public before the election.

The BCSTV is not proportional representation. It is a single transferable ballot which requires a 50% majority to elect a politician. It circumvents the party control over the nomination process by combining ridings so that the electorate can vote strategically picking the candidates that they support and not being forced to support party selected candidates. (eg Dick Harris federally)

If a candidate does not get 50% of the vote through the preferential ballot process then they do not represent in parliament.

A proportional representation system is a system where the hitlers and molesters can get representation in parliament with as little as 5% of the public support dividing the political system in a balkanized process of partisan politics and unethical tradeoffs.

The BCSTV system, by contrast to PR, is designed to encourage politics of the middle class majority bringing together politicians for a compromise middle ground that is forced through the selection process (BCSTV voter driven) to support the will of the citizen voter and not the will of special interest groups such as multinationals and unions that pollute the political process with their money and vested interests.

The Citizens Assembly was unique in human history where for the first time a jury of citizens was able to evaluate all the options and make a recommendation for the best and most democratic system for BC. The unions and multinationals that control our current system will not stand for that and that is the voice Carol James speaks to as she made so clear AFTER the last election. It is the sole reason why I simply can not support her or the NDP party.

What I find encouraging is that the citizens of BC know that the BCSTV is the democratic option and that Carol James, Gordon Campbell and others in the party politics are on the wrong side of the voting public on this issue.