Latest / Political Capital with Rob Shaw / #105 - BC Review Board, decriminalization and BC United defection

Transcript

#105 - BC Review Board, decriminalization and BC United defection · Political Capital with Rob Shaw

0:02
Check Podcasts. Hey everyone, and welcome to Political Capital, your source for
0:16
all the latest in BC politics, brought to you by our friends at Ubert
0:21
Canada. I'm your host, Rob Shaw. Welcome back after our summer break.
0:25
Hope you all had a great summer as well. Our pod squad is
0:28
rested up, ready to go as we dive back into a very very busy
0:33
world of BC politics. We have the Premier pledging to overhaul BC's review board
0:38
after a stabbing. We have BC United's new crime plan, we have decriminalization.
0:43
We have a crossing of the floor defection from BC United to the BC
0:48
Conservative. So much going on. Make sure you subscribe to the audio version
0:52
of this for all the audio extras. Bring in the pod squad here.
0:56
Just quick introduction if you're catching up with our show. As usual, we
1:00
have Alli Blades from Mash Strategies, veteran now of provincial and federal campaigns,
1:04
most recently with the Federal Conservatives and Pierre Polyevra. We have Jillian Oliver,
1:11
Green strategist extraordinaire and og pod squad member and Jeff Ferrier, Senior Vice president
1:17
at Helen Nolton and longtime New Democrat strategists. Thank you all for being here.
1:23
Jeff, look at that face. Look at a baby face. If
1:26
you're on the has anyone seen my beard? If you're on the podcast,
1:29
this is not interesting at all. But if you're watching on TV, have
1:33
you seen my beard? I can't find it anywhere. It's a reward spirit,
1:37
so we can paste it back on his face. Anyways, a lot
1:41
has changed, clearly Jeff's facial hair and other things. During our summer break.
1:46
We had some predictions in mid July of where we would be when we
1:49
return, So let's just briefly check in on those alley you were talking about
1:53
Surrey policing and the Children's Minister. How are we looking as we come back.
2:00
Yeah, So, before we took a break for the summer, the
2:01
topic of the day was the call for resignation of Mitzi Dean, the Minister
2:06
of Children and Family Development. This is for you, Elena and William.
2:09
We did not forget. She still hasn't been shuffled out. She still has
2:15
not resigned. This at the afterward a tragic incident with a First Nation's child
2:22
in foster care, and like this is truly hypocritical because the BCND called force
2:29
then Stephanie could use resignation in twenty sixteen, and now nothing's happened. So
2:35
we have not forgotten, and let's see what happens this fall. We could
2:38
still happen. Possible, we might get a cabinet shuffle this fall. Nobody's
2:42
really sure, you know, now, it would kind of be the time
2:44
to do it, but we don't know so that so far, Jeff,
2:47
you talked about housing and interest rates reaching a political peak. I think we're
2:53
still there. That's that was a good prediction. Hey, we're the session
2:57
that's coming up all supposed to be about housing, interest rate hikes. I
3:01
think one of the premier's smartest moves this summer was when he went after the
3:06
Bank of Canada over the interest rate hikes, pointed out that certain families here
3:09
in British Columbia that the rate hikes themselves are what is fueling inflation and many
3:15
respects, and I think that resonated really well, and I expect to see
3:20
more of that from him. In the days I had David Eby and Doug
3:23
Ford populist political brothers from another mother. I guess they for the people,
3:29
for the people. Baby, all right, Jillian, you talked about climate
3:34
change emergency management reviews, and this is before we even knew we were going
3:38
to have a record wildfire season, so we were right on the money there.
3:43
Yeah, and I think we'll still be talking about that a lot when
3:46
session starts in a couple of weeks. We've got the Premier who announced a
3:51
new task force. We're still waiting for details on who's going to be on
3:53
that and the timeline for it. The opposition is going to be talking about
3:59
it, for sure. I think we'll CBC United and the Conservatives talking about
4:02
how disconnected local communities have been from the response and some of the issues that
4:09
we saw in Shoe Swap and some of the other regions where there was really
4:12
bad fires this year. And I think we'll see the Greens talking more about
4:15
prevention and the climate change side of things, getting back to basics on some
4:19
of their corey shoes when we had intersession. For sure. It's politics moves
4:23
so fast. If we had been back on this show like a week or
4:26
two earlier, we would be spending the entire show talking about the wildfire response
4:30
and the wildfire summer. But it's now just kind of at the tail end
4:34
and all these other things are happening, so we'll try and loop back and
4:36
chat a bit more about that into the show. Okay, So on to
4:41
the past week. We had BC United come out with a very detailed public
4:45
safety plan which they were hoping to get some obviously publicity for. But we
4:49
also had a horrendous triple stabbing in Vancouver's Chinatown allegedly by a man with a
4:55
history of violence out on an unescored a day pass from our forensic hospital,
5:00
spite the BC Review Board flagging him as a significant risk of public safety.
5:03
So the NDP has been dealing with that, the Premier promising a review there
5:08
from a retired Abbotsford police chief, and then the issue of decriminalization, the
5:13
NDP moving to create fifteen meter buffer zones around playgrounds, BC United in their
5:17
crime plan having their own call for d krim. We put all this together.
5:23
I was a very very busy week on the public safety file, Jeff,
5:27
How did you think it all landed? As we look back on it
5:30
now, I thought it was going to land really well, especially with Falcon
5:36
announcing his crime plan right on the heels of those terrible events in Chinatown,
5:43
and he seemed off seemed to miss the mark, and I think that's because
5:48
of some other things he might have had on his mind at the time that
5:50
maybe clouded his judgment and made it so that he wasn't nearly as sharp as
5:59
as you'd expect him to be on an issue that he's been campaigning on for
6:03
quite some time, and that's Bruce Bahman's defection. We'll talk about that later.
6:08
I think David Ebe had one of his premiership's finest political moments this week
6:14
when he expressed his white hot anger at the BC Review Board's decision to give
6:17
a day pass to that violent offender who went on the stabbing spree. You
6:21
know, many is the time that government politicians feel obliged to defend anything any
6:29
government affiliated body does or decision. It makes you believing that expressing anger and
6:35
disappointment, you know, reflects badly on the whole apparatus of government. So
6:40
there's a reluctance. But sometimes angry folks want political leaders to get angry along
6:46
with them, and that's what Premier you Be did here. In addition to
6:49
hiring the Abbotsford former Abbotsford police chief who has a work history of dealing with
6:59
issues like this to get his elbows up going into there and find out what
7:02
the heck those folks were thinking when they approved this day pass. It shouldn't
7:05
happen. Yeah, I agree with you. It was a premier like moment
7:10
by David eb that sort of buttoned down lawyer persona that we have in our
7:14
minds, and he just got really kind of uncharacteristically angry at this. Yeah,
7:19
we've seen him like that on ICBC, We've seen him like this on
7:23
money Laundering. It's it's one of the best versions of him, and so
7:28
it was interesting to see this week as well. Yeah, Now, Ali
7:30
BC United Crime Plan has a lot of stuff in it that in any other
7:34
week, or even in a different version of this week, would have got
7:39
a lot of attention on its decriminalization promises prosecutors, an alternate method for secure
7:46
treatment in jails, all sorts of things. The crime Plan is fascinating.
7:49
We didn't end up talking about it a lot, and with all the other
7:54
things going on, how do you think that worked or didn't work for BC
7:58
un ended. Well, we still have a long runway to go. Just
8:01
because they announced it doesn't mean it's we're never going to talk about it.
8:03
Ever, again we'll have the fall session and still lots of touring around the
8:09
province to really get this out there, and of course a lot of media.
8:13
I'll argue with Jeff here in that this was a really solid moment for
8:18
Kevin Falkan and Eleanor Sturko that like they have been working on this for months,
8:22
there was a lot in this a safer BC plan, and so it's
8:28
a lot to put out there. I will say this too, though,
8:31
that this is when the premier is talking about getting white hot angry. It's
8:37
like the new thoughts and prayers. Meanwhile, the opposition was actually putting forward
8:43
real solutions and ideas and that's what people want to hear. And so there
8:48
are two things that the BC United did really well here. They had their
8:54
better as possible plan put out earlier this year, and then with this extensive
8:58
plan as well, they're they're showing voters of BC that they have a plan
9:03
and that they are that the top two issues in the province are the most
9:07
top of mind. But yes, there was a lot in this plan.
9:11
We what didn't come across very much was the fill for police vacancies, and
9:18
they think there will be an opportunity to talk about that in the coming months
9:20
as well. Yeah, Kevin Falcon has said before, and we've talked about
9:24
his Addictions plan, that he intends to bring these really big, policy heavy
9:28
kind of planks up until next year's election out on different issues and their details
9:33
and their costed And this was another example of that that you know, you
9:37
could have written about for days, Jillian, all politics is such a weird,
9:43
uh, you know, profession and that the best laid plans are just
9:46
dragged off into entirely different directions. What did you make of all this as
9:50
you've watched it play out this week? Yeah, I mean I agree with
9:54
Jeff. I think the premier really stepped up to the plate and managed to
9:58
sort of capture back the attention. Looking at the headlines at the end of
10:01
the day, they were all about eb statement and very little about about the
10:05
BC United plans. So I think he was really effective and sort of you
10:09
know, starting to show more confidence as a as a top politician in the
10:13
province. I think though, you know, I also agree with Ali that
10:16
this isn't going away. BC United really clearly staking out clear opposition to decriminalization.
10:22
They said in their plan they would end it immediately. I think the
10:26
government got lucky where they also got the modification from the federal government this week
10:31
where there's now a fifteen meter exemption to decriminalization in places that kids are going
10:37
to be basically play structure as pools and that sort of a thing. So
10:41
that I think was another win for the government. It'll be interesting to see
10:46
where the public falls on that, because we're obviously not done having this debate
10:50
about whether decriminalization is working, whether it's having the intended effect to destigmatize addiction
10:56
and to really accomplish the governments I think very worthy goal of treating the toxic
11:01
drug crisis as a public health crisis and not a criminal issue. It's going
11:05
to be interesting to see how those conversations happen over the next year. I'll
11:09
just say on decriminalization, if you, you know, if we were to
11:13
go back a few months ago, back when Jeff had a big, full
11:16
bushy beard on his face, people who questioned whether decriminalization and we needed this
11:22
buffer zone, we're kind of gas lit by the NDP government. They were
11:24
sort of told, you know what, you don't support people recovering, you
11:28
want to put stigma on them you want a fear monger. That was quite
11:33
a and this is a massive climb down by the government this week to put
11:37
fifteen meter buffer zones in on an issue that it required NDP mayors in the
11:43
province like Brad West to come out and say, you know what, you're
11:45
wrong. There is something happening on decrim. There's an unintended consequence. There's
11:48
more people in parks. Our bile officers aren't able to deal with it.
11:52
We need provincial help. And I think the announcement today or this week was
11:56
pretty good. I don't know how they came up with fifteen meters half of
12:00
basketball court. You can still do drug sixteen meters away from from a playground,
12:05
I guess, but at least it was something. I just it's fascinating
12:09
to watch how it played out, this kind of like refusal to talk or
12:13
admit that it was an issue until it was an issue. And I don't
12:16
know, Jeff, I can see you chomping at the bit now that I
12:20
see champming. What do you think it's not. It's not chomping. It's
12:22
champion with an a folks at home many at the time and journalism when my
12:26
editors got mad at me for saying chomping instead of champing A no look at
12:31
I think the premiers indicated that this has been a concern of his for a
12:33
number of months. Uh, folks will say, well, if it's been
12:37
a concern of his for a number of months, why didn't he do anything.
12:39
It's because it was in the It's the responsibility the federal government to set
12:43
the rules around these things, and so the federal government finally came through with
12:48
the rule. I think it's absolutely correct that there were people who are in
12:52
the decriminalizing space who who said the things that that you said there, and
12:56
uh, that's cool. I I I liken this too. Pucci on the
13:01
Simpsons, I don't know, folks remember the introduction of Pucci. But Pucci
13:07
was a bad idea that was attached to a really good idea, the Itchy
13:11
and Scratchy cartoon. Folks realized soon after the launch of Pucci that it was
13:16
a bad idea and the jettisoned Puucci because in this case, boy, this
13:22
is a tough analogy. But people didn't like around the schools. I didn't
13:31
like it being in the schools and around playgrounds. The government didn't like it.
13:33
I'm glad it's gone, but I'm glad that we still have decriminalization because
13:39
that's going to save lives as part of a broader policy that also incense,
13:43
uh you know, safe injection harm reduction and treatment expansion, which the government
13:50
is in the process of doing and announced more beds in the North this week.
13:56
So goodbye puucci. But let's keep itchy and scratchy. All right.
13:58
You champed that one really good, Jeff, Yeah, that's right. All
14:01
right, Let's let's get another. I mean, there's massive topics this week.
14:05
Let's get onto this other topic we would normally start our show. But
14:09
that is a massive defection within BC politics of Abbotsford South MLA Bruce Bandman from
14:16
BC United crossing the floor to the BC Conservatives, the major effect of which
14:22
is that now with two MLAs, the BC Conservatives are an officially recognized party
14:26
in the legislature. They get hundreds of thousands of dollars for staff, for
14:31
research, sitting on all the parliamentary committees, time and question period. They
14:35
effectively become the equal of the BC Greens in terms of resources in the legislature.
14:41
A big shift, Allie. Let's start with you on this, I
14:45
didn't, I guess I maybe I would have had Bruce Bandman down on my
14:48
list. There's a couple other names if I was thinking of floor crossers that
14:52
might come first. Is there is this? How significant is it and what
14:54
do you think it means for BC United? I mean, congratulations to John
15:00
Rusten and Bruce Bandman for now creating the official party status within the legislature.
15:07
This is good news for them. What essentially happened here the political landscape for
15:15
the BC United and BC Conservatives, It seems to be that it all started
15:18
with this main Street poll that everyone was talking about in the middle of the
15:24
summer, where BC United and the BC Conservatives were neck and neck, so
15:28
potentially put in some pressure on BC United MLAs to either step up or figure
15:35
out where home is for them. And then there was another pole, this
15:41
lege pole that the BC Conservatives were actually taking from the BC United, They
15:48
were taking from Green's and the NDP. So again still really good for the
15:54
BC Conservatives. So like they have been having a good few months. And
15:58
then I've just found this one very interesting. Since we're on the topic of
16:03
polls, check News also did a poll and the BC Conservatives came up with
16:07
forty percent to the BC and DP thirty eight percent. So if you're talking
16:11
about Poles and following polls, that's the one to watch. Margin of accuracy
16:15
on that one is pleasant, but it's absolutely and so like all of this
16:22
really started with the Poles is where I'm where I'm getting at. And then
16:26
for BC United, like they were just the leader was zigzagging all across the
16:30
province with the new name recognition of BC United as well, right, So
16:36
that was his focus this summer and he was he was out there, he
16:41
was doing what he needed to do. And then at home within the caucus,
16:45
it seems that there was an upset person and potentially some more down the
16:51
road, who knows. So I have a theory about this. When the
16:55
in that in Falcon was supposed to be doing what he was doing this summer
17:00
in zigzagging across the entire province doing what he was doing in sharing the new
17:04
branding and the name recognition, the fall actually goes to House leader todd Stone.
17:14
Like if if it's described as Falcon going off for a business trip hoping
17:18
that everything at the house is taken care of, he comes back to this
17:22
fiery mess where we've had in MLA go to the BC Conservatives and so if
17:29
if, if there was a solution in mind, there's a potential that since
17:34
it's someone's fault, to do a reshuffle of the House leader. It's an
17:40
interesting point, and caucus management can't be done entirely by the leader when he's
17:45
off doing those type of things. Yeah, it's a good point, Jillian.
17:49
How significant do you think this is and what does it mean for VC
17:52
United? I think, you know, absent the polls that Ali was talking
17:57
about, as well as the results in Lankford, Juan de Fuca or the
18:00
Conservative surprised everyone in came in second, this would you know, we might
18:04
say this doesn't mean much and is kind of chocolate up to personality differences,
18:10
but it certainly is starting to seem like a trend. And I think,
18:14
you know, we're seeing sort of some of the long term effects of the
18:18
politics that's been happening in the VC Liberals play out where they've had to boot
18:23
some people from caucus, both with back to lur thrownus in the twenty twenty
18:29
election for his social conservative views and then John Rustad who's the Conservative leader now
18:33
for his climate skeptic views, and I think we're starting to see, you
18:37
know, the results of those sort of views that used to be sort of
18:42
a little bit more comfortable lee under the VC Liberal or VC United banner being
18:48
so toxic. And I think, you know, Falcon made a clear choice
18:52
that that wasn't acceptable, that he was going to sort of, you know,
18:55
have zero tolerance for those sorts of things, and these are the consequences.
18:59
I think the question is, can be C United successfully rebrand itself as
19:03
a more centrist party that is in line with the view of more mainstream voters
19:07
and recapture some of the NDP vote. I think that Falcons so far has
19:11
struggled to really stake out a clear identity. He's talked a lot about crime,
19:17
sounding very conservative, really moving to the right on those issues. I
19:19
think, you know, to the extent that we see the Federal Conservatives doing
19:22
really well, that's because they're talking about housing and inflation and cost of living
19:27
rather than you know, more more social issues. So and I think also
19:33
we saw the BC Conservatives have success in Langford went if we could talking more
19:37
about practical issues rather than social issues. So it'll be really interesting to see
19:41
you know both where the BC Conservatives fall, where what kind of issues they're
19:45
talking about. Banman said his reason for leaving was the Trucker Convoy, a
19:48
vote that was forced about that in the last session. So are they gonna,
19:52
you know, succumb to temptation and talk about those issues. Are they
19:55
going to have broader appeal like the federal Conservatives are right now? Or is
19:57
BC United going to be able to do that? If actively A lot of
20:00
questions to see how this plays out when we come to the next election.
20:04
They're great questions. I don't know what Falcon is going to do on those
20:08
issues, and if he should have allowed that free vote on the Trucker Convoy,
20:12
the Freedom Convoy. A bit of mischievous political theater by the NDP to
20:18
put that motion out on the floor and try to pressure the the United Party
20:22
on that. Jeff, just a minute left here. What do you think?
20:26
Well, the first thing to note is that there is a huge surgeon
20:29
autocorrect in Victoria on people's cell phones from Badman to Batman. So it was
20:36
probably a scary for Kevin Falcon when Batman cross this distraction, as you know.
20:41
But I could see Bruce Collimpton's like, hey, I've crossed the floor.
20:45
Kevin Falcon, congratulations. Your mission to create a new opposition party with
20:49
momentum is a smashing success. It is the BC Conservatives, though not yours.
20:55
It's not just you know, the poim. It's the strong BI election
20:57
showing. And the word I'm here in from Victoria is that the MLA defections
21:02
aren't over yet and that there are more to come. We shall see.
21:06
But the defection that Kem Falcon needs to worry about is not the defection among
21:10
MLA's. It is the defection among voters. And what we're going to see
21:15
over the next twelve months is a pitched battle between BC United and the Conservatives.
21:19
I'll call it a right wing primary, where we're going to see the
21:23
Conservatives and those two parties fighting to convince voters who's true blue, who's the
21:30
one party that can take on the BCNDP. And the big challenge for BC
21:33
United and will be that the people that you need to get on side to
21:37
win that primary aren't necessarily the people that you need on side to win the
21:42
next provincial election. So we'll see what happens. Okay, interesting point,
21:47
Jeff All right back to the issue of wildfires. And we talked before about
21:52
how any other time of the summer, if we had the show, we'd
21:55
spend it entirely on how government responded to the wildfires across the province. The
22:00
Premier as a task force that he has announced, Jillian, let's go back
22:03
to you on this. The task force is supposed to examine wildfires, our
22:07
next emergencies coming up on drought and flooding, and then back to wildfires again
22:11
outside experts given the Premier advice he can use right away, right approach.
22:18
What do you think, Well, definitely, I mean I think this was
22:22
somewhat of a reactive move because we were starting to see so many tensions boil
22:26
over in communities that were so dissatisfied with the response, coming into conflict with
22:33
the Wildfire Service, not having confidence in the government's response, which is really
22:38
dangerous during an emergency. So the Premier went up to tour and made an
22:42
announcement we have reports that haven't been acted upon, as well as programs that
22:51
have not been successfully implemented. We saw the Forest Minister Ralston get into it
22:56
back and forth with local governments at the height of the season. Him blaming
23:00
them for not taking up the government funding that's available for fuel treatment, which
23:07
is essentially forest thinning and removing those really flammable materials from the forests. Local
23:12
government saying that you know, they don't have the resources to do that,
23:15
and that they're running into all kinds of bureaucracy when it comes to accessing provincial
23:19
lands, which is where the majority of this fuel is. And the minister
23:23
had to backtrack on those on those comments and sort of, you know,
23:26
say it was his responsibility to make sure the programs were successfully implemented. So
23:30
clearly a lot of sticking points that need to be looked at and dealt with
23:34
immediately if we're gonna hope to limit the kinds of damages that we saw to
23:41
communities like Cologna this summer, which is just absolutely devastating to lose that number
23:45
of homes in a single season. So I think we're gonna, you know,
23:51
hopefully this will lead to more quick action that we haven't seen in the
23:56
past, but of course remains to be seen because as the government hasn't been
24:00
able to do that so far. I think, you know, we're starting
24:03
to see more examples from other jurisdictions of where they're doing things better. California,
24:11
for example, has extensive wildfire prevention plans that they've actually implemented. I
24:15
think this year they're at eighty percent of implementing their goals, and BC doesn't
24:21
have sort of comprehensive, holistic plans as well as you know, public transparent
24:26
reporting tracking the progress. Obviously, government doesn't always want to do that because
24:30
you know, it just creates opportunities for the opposition to say, hey,
24:33
you haven't done this, But if we don't have that accountability in place,
24:37
you know, it's clearly not getting done. So I think, you know,
24:41
it would be great. We'll see how binding the recommendations that come out
24:47
of this new task force are and how quickly they come because as we've seen,
24:52
you know, we can't afford to fall behind any longer. The costs
24:56
are just becoming so massive every year. We could be talking about major reforms,
25:02
as you mentioned, Gillian, because California, Australia, there's lots of
25:04
other places that do wildfire fighting slightly differently than British Columbia with its seasonal,
25:10
you know, full time employee kind of force during the summer Australia has volunteers
25:15
that aren't paid kind of. But I think the Premier seemed to come away
25:19
from his tours this summer realizing that there was a lot of tension between folks
25:25
and communities who have their own knowledge and expertise and skill and wanted to stay
25:29
at help and the basic Wildfire Service who wasn't listening in some cases. Alley
25:33
and I mean that tends to happen quite a bit, but it seems like
25:37
that that solving that dispute. Premier has talked about it a couple of times
25:41
now being one of the points of this review to bridge that gap between the
25:47
Wildfire Service and a lot of rural communities that don't appreciate it being a little
25:52
bit heavy handed in what it's doing. No, it was absolutely politically hated
25:59
between the government and local jurisdictions. And then we even had a BC United
26:07
MLAs in Peter Millibar, todd Stone and Greg Kilo, and Greg Kilo was
26:14
taking the full brunt of this with most of the really big fires being in
26:18
his backyard at the shoes show up and people were getting hopeless. That's essentially
26:26
what was happening. They felt that the government wasn't necessarily providing enough resources,
26:30
and with those lack of resources, were starting to feel hopeless and then being
26:34
pushed to the last resort. And they really want to emphasize that it was
26:37
the last resort and that's what created all of this political tension. And let's
26:42
not be fooled that this new committee that David eb put forward is essentially a
26:47
shield to that in a quick reaction so that he didn't have to navigate the
26:52
political tensions of all of this. But it's what he's created is essentially more
26:57
bureaucracy that won't work fast enough. And because there are reports, there are
27:03
there's already enough studies out there, we have other parts of the world that
27:07
are dealing with this, and since informing this committee, like we have no
27:14
idea essentially what they're going to do, and so I think our responsibility here
27:18
is to make sure that we continue to hold them accountable. But in my
27:22
mind this was a shield, a political shield, and just more bureaucracy.
27:26
So I guess to be fair, it's not like the NDP invented this form
27:30
of wildfire service response. It's existed for a while. The reviews go back
27:34
to the previous government, and even before that, right, we have this
27:37
entrenched annual BC Wildfire Service, you know, quasi militaristic command structure, employee
27:45
system that governments have inherited, filled with experts that we demand our politicians listened
27:51
to, who may or may not may or may not be really wanting to
27:55
change that very much. And so it kind of flows up through it.
27:59
So, Jeff, how do we grasp this kind of issue and do you
28:02
think this task force is going to be the thing to tackle it? Well,
28:06
I think it starts with recognizing how how scary this summer was in terms
28:12
of our fire season and the drought. You know, you see those images
28:17
coming out of Cologna, You see the images coming out of the Shish Swap.
28:19
You breathe in the acrid air all over the province. You look up
28:26
to the sun that it's blood red. It's the worst fire season we've ever
28:32
had. It's been a string of the worst fire seasons we've ever had,
28:37
one after another. And you know, for you know, full credit to
28:41
the Fire Service, there's people who died fighting the fires. So it's bad
28:47
and scary they were, and I think one of the reasons why we're seeing
28:55
you know, rising tensions in communities is because the challenge is getting a lot
29:00
worse and a lot scarier, and in the ability for the province in its
29:07
current form with the Wildfire Service to respond. You know, nature's winning and
29:14
the humans are haven't caught up yet. So for this task force, if
29:19
it's about finding facts and looking at studies and figuring out best practices, it's
29:26
going to be a failure. If it's about action and able recommendations that we
29:30
can put into force right now to deal with the drought that we have now,
29:34
to get ready for the wildfires that are coming next year, and to
29:40
find ways where it makes sense, as folks have raised, to tap into
29:45
other resources outside the Wildfire Service to help fighting the fires, local residents who
29:51
know what they're they're doing and have skills and a willingness and where it's safe
29:57
to do it, then it maybe it'll uh succeed. I you know,
30:07
I was struck. I was watching a YouTube video the summer about you know,
30:12
Mount Saint Helen's and what happened there and kind of before the volcano erupted,
30:18
there was a lot of the same dynamics happening between government and people and
30:27
people angry at government and government pushing back and and saying, you know what
30:33
you got to you gotta be careful. You don't know what that you know
30:36
what nature is going to do, and you might be putting yourself in harm's
30:37
way. So uh, I appreciate and I know exactly where folks are coming
30:45
from uh on that. You know, let's local folks wanting to protect their
30:52
property and protect their communities for all the for all the right reasons. But
30:56
we also have to make sure that we're facing up to what we're facing up
31:02
against and uh, not putting people's lives at risks as we're doing it.
31:07
I do want to give one positive shout out, and that's to bow and
31:11
Maw, who this summer was the Minister of wildfire Response. I think she
31:17
was pretty She was capable and smart and empathetic and an able communicator, and
31:22
I think maybe some of why you know, in September, government has been
31:29
able to to to it's continuing to work on these issues. But but but
31:34
it's it's managing this so well. Uh is the work that she did and
31:41
uh, you know, good good on her for the work that she did
31:45
as a minister well also being extremely pregnant and completely normalizing discussing that and working
31:52
with that and just making that it was a non issue. It was just
31:56
a I think I heard from lots of people who saw her up talking about
32:01
that in her briefings. You know, if I sound out of breath,
32:05
it's because there's a little human kicking inside of me kind of thing and feeling
32:07
like they really enjoyed seeing that normalize at a provincial level as well too.
32:13
So anyways, yeah, she did a good job. I think we're gonna
32:15
have to wait and see in the budget though, because these are if we're
32:19
gonna take it seriously, this is billions of dollars of forrest clearing, fuel
32:24
clearing, wildfire prevention planning money that we don't see allocated in the budget every
32:31
year. We only ever talked about how much money's put aside for fighting the
32:35
fires. And so we'll see if in the February budget, if we have
32:38
any more emphasis. You make this point, right, you make this point.
32:42
It's about on the cost issues, right, like what was the what
32:45
was the cost of not doing that stuff? Yeah, I think it's I
32:49
think what's the bill. The Vancouver Son has a really good series by Gordon
32:52
Hoaxter in this. I think the bill is like up to nine billion dollars
32:55
or something. If we wanted to put the wildfire prevention plans in place kind
32:59
of now to places that don't have them, which is a lot of money.
33:04
But on our current pace of spending for prevention, he's calculating it would
33:08
take two hundred years for BC to reach it's it's planning. So we're gonna
33:13
have to speed that up. And that's budgetary money and decisions, and we'll
33:16
see how that goes. I want to just continue to talk one more topic
33:20
here on the budget. Surrey Hospital. We talk about Surrey Hospital. We
33:24
talked about the electoral importance of Surrey all the time. A second hospital long
33:30
promised. The NDP have been kind of announcing every step of the way of
33:36
this thing. We're going to build it. We're got a business case,
33:39
we've approved, we've set it out for tender. Every time there's a press
33:44
conference with the Health minister. Was supposed to start construction in July. This
33:47
week we have a press conference saying we have not put a single shovel on
33:52
the ground. It is one billion dollars over budget and three years late before
33:57
it begins construction for the same pity one hundred and sixty eight beds with a
34:02
cancer center. Do we that did not really even make a ripple in the
34:07
week that we had. And I'm just interested in not in the details of
34:12
really the hospital announcement, but in the in the sense that does the public
34:16
care about that and our parties worried about that anymore? It's not that long
34:22
ago we used to get all exercised about the Vancouver Convention Center was over budget,
34:25
the BC Place retractable roof was over budget. Now we have a hospital
34:30
that has just exploded in cost and delays. But people want the hospital and
34:37
maybe they don't care about that. Maybe that's not a mark on government's competency
34:40
anymore, given all the pressures we see. I don't know, Jillian,
34:44
does anything come to mind on that. Does do you think the public cares
34:46
about that? Or like, do we like everyone gets it? Not?
34:51
Really? I don't think so. I mean, I think there's an understanding
34:53
like about like a very broad on like understanding about inflation right now out and
35:00
that we have so much that we need to get built and that costs are
35:05
going up, like we're seeing this across the board for every single project out
35:08
there. Thankfully, we just had the federal government come and cut GST finally
35:13
for rental builds, trying to get like the drive the costs of of building
35:17
more housing down. But yeah, I think, you know, when it
35:21
comes to healthcare, after all the stories that we had earlier this year about
35:23
the like horrific conditions in Surrey, especially being you know, faced by women
35:30
in labor and things like that, I think, you know, this is
35:35
there's an understanding that this needs to happen. And I think also, you
35:38
know, BC's in a pretty good situation with its with its debt ratios compared
35:44
to other provinces as well as our credit rating. And I think you know,
35:47
we're seeing surplus after surplus, another one and ounce just a couple of
35:51
weeks ago, right, So I think I think there's there's comfort, especially
35:54
when it comes to like necessary infrastructure like housing and healthcare. Yeah, so,
36:00
Ali, doesn't that change the dynamics A traditional dynamic in politics where if
36:04
a government announces a highway or a hospital or school or whatever, and then
36:07
it runs over budget, everyone points to the government says, you incompetent politicians,
36:14
you couldn't build a lemonade stand without the thing running over budget, Like
36:17
it's such a tried and true formula, but right now it's hard to imagine,
36:22
Like how could you could you blame David eb in the NDP for this
36:25
overrun in an era of inflation where we could you can't get a home renovation
36:30
project done without the things spiraling out of control. Like maybe people get that
36:35
and the attack is not as useful anymore. Yeah, inflation is a thing,
36:39
and so you know, we can't put the blame completely on the government
36:44
for it being over budget, but seventy three percent over budget, that's a
36:50
little that's a little nuts. I think what people are going to be more
36:53
upset about is that what we were heard from there was a doctor alle just
37:00
like a mere days before this announcement that what we're paying for, which is
37:06
astronomical, what we're paying for, isn't necessarily going to solve some of the
37:10
issues that the south of the Phraser has. And one doctor was even going
37:15
on to say that there are some the resources in this new build that still
37:21
wouldn't solve the issue. And in this golden hour of treatment where you're supposed
37:27
to respond as fast as possible, that they'd still be going to Royal Colombian.
37:30
And so I think people are going to be frustrated and that not only
37:34
is it going to cost us more than anticipated, but even with the cost,
37:38
we're still not getting what the community needs. And so that's a bit
37:45
of an issue. And then if you're watching from the interior, seventy three
37:50
percent over budget means that there are less resources to go to perhaps the promised
37:55
Camloops Cancer Center. So for for what I'm trying to say is that it's
38:00
not necessarily the inflation that we're going to get mad at. That. It's
38:04
more so that if we don't get on top of planning this and getting on
38:09
top of our budget in a better way, people will lose out. And
38:13
that's what's happening. If we continue to do this, cam Loops is never
38:16
going to get their cancer hospital. Yeah, no, it's true. It
38:20
squeezes out other things, Jeff, A billion dollars overrun, Now we can't
38:22
build our new museum either, as a whole billion dollars there that we got
38:25
a whole museum. Yeah, it too soon to joke about that. It's
38:31
never too soon to joke about the museum. And once again I'll point out
38:35
really good coffee if the museum go check it out. I will say that
38:40
folks are concerned about the money, and they're concerned about the healthcare, and
38:45
they're concerned about the healthcare at the stage more than they are about the cost
38:50
overrun, because the impact of not having the hospital you need in your community,
38:55
the impact of that in your day to day life, is more than
38:59
the pounded interest on government debt and inability to invest somewhere else. But you
39:05
know, those concerns are real, and I will point out that, you
39:08
know, in terms of timelines and cost, could have built this hospital faster
39:14
and avoided a lot of the inflation if someone hadn't sold the land for the
39:19
hospital when he was the minister, Kevin Falk. That was like twenty years
39:23
ago though, right, we could have had the land, we could have
39:25
been building already. We had to get the land at the late things.
39:29
Here we are, Ken Falk, I guess, so, I guess so
39:31
I mean does it again? Kevin Falk? All right, okay, all
39:37
right, that's a good discussion. Thank you. Hold on, there's one
39:39
thing we haven't discussed. Rob Shaw, congratulations on your nomination. The Webster
39:45
nomination as BC's Political Commentator of the Year. Oh, thank you very much.
39:51
So it was an episode of this show that we submitted on the resignation
39:58
of Melanie Mark. Remember we had a big discuss about improving politics afterwards.
40:01
So all of your wonderful insight help make that show so great. But I
40:07
will accept the award and take it and all of the glory myself alone.
40:10
So that check is fortunate to have a political commentator of your caliber, and
40:15
I'm proud, We're all proud to be able to spend time with you every
40:19
week. All right, thank you for that. That's great, and thank
40:22
you for giving us your insight every week of Pod Squad, and to you
40:27
for listening. Listener, and make sure you subscribe to the podcast for all
40:30
the latest. We record on Friday's and get the ding in your podbox Friday
40:35
afternoon with all the latest and BC politics. We'll be back next week here
40:39
on Political Capitol.