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The BC United Liberal Party | Political Capital Daily · Political Capital with Rob Shaw

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  Speaker 2: Now on to the show.
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  Speaker 1: It's Friday, September 11th, 2026, and this is Political Capital Daily. Well,
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  Speaker 1: good morning.
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  Speaker 3: Good morning.
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  Speaker 2: Happy Friday to you.
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  Speaker 1: You've made it to the end of the week and
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  Speaker 1: it's the Friday double shot for Political Capital. You've got
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  Speaker 1: the morning with Political Capital Daily and then Political Capital
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  Speaker 1: Prime in the afternoon on Sundays on check on YouTube
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  Speaker 1: and on your audio feed later this afternoon. So much
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  Speaker 1: Political Capital. Your cup runneth over of Political Capital. And
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  Speaker 1: to double it up, Jeff Ferrier from Political Capital Prime
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  Speaker 1: joining me this morning.
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  Speaker 2: Good morning, Jeff.
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  Speaker 3: Great to be here. I'm so happy it's Friday. I
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  Speaker 3: think I speak for many when I say that.
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  Speaker 1: It's always so good to reach that end of the week.
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  Speaker 1: But I have to be up front with you here, Jeff.
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  Speaker 1: I have a question for you. It's a question that
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  Speaker 1: I've been meaning to ask you all week. And it's
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  Speaker 1: an important one. Dare I say the most important question
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  Speaker 1: that you've been asked in a long time. And it
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  Speaker 1: goes a little something like this.
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  Speaker 2: Are you ready to rock?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah!
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  Speaker 1: Jeff?
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  Speaker 2: That song's been in my head all week, man. I
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  Speaker 2: can't get it out. What do I do?
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  Speaker 3: I don't know if you can do anything. I heard
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  Speaker 3: that it's Canada's greatest rapper.
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  Speaker 1: I don't even know his name. All I do is
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  Speaker 1: moments of silence and quiet. It should be quiet introspection,
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  Speaker 1: and all I hear is this guy rapping about the Poutines.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah. That's all I have to say about that.
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  Speaker 2: I don't like it.
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  Speaker 1: I don't like how it makes me feel, all warm
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  Speaker 1: and fuzzy and patriotic, like I should be putting on,
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  Speaker 1: like I should be hugging the Canadian flag in some way.
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  Speaker 2: It's, uh, it's wrong.
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  Speaker 1: I know.
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  Speaker 3: Friday's gonna turn to the worst. That's all I have
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  Speaker 3: to say.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I agree with you. That's, uh, O.G., R. Centilla?
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  Speaker 2: I don't know what his name is. I can't remember.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, well, now that we've got through that, that collective
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  Speaker 1: trauma has been shared by us all, let's walk you
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  Speaker 1: through the day in BC politics. A light day, thankfully,
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  Speaker 1: on a Friday. The Premier back from his northern tour
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  Speaker 1: back into the Lower Mainland. Doesn't have any events on
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  Speaker 1: the schedule that are public-facing, but in North Vancouver, the
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  Speaker 1: infrastructure minister, Bowen Ma, returning from her maternity. after having
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  Speaker 1: a baby in July for her first press conference, announcing
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  Speaker 1: some type of capital upgrade at a North Vancouver elementary
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  Speaker 1: school as she returns to her workload as a minister.
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  Speaker 1: There have been some folks filling in for her while
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  Speaker 1: she was off having a baby. The other event on
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  Speaker 1: the schedule today, Energy Minister Adrienne Dix making an announcement
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  Speaker 1: at an elementary school in Surrey that I'm told is
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  Speaker 1: the first All-electric school in BC, Jeff.
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  Speaker 2: Now, I'm not an engineer, and I don't claim to be, but.
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  Speaker 1: I'm assuming that this school uses sophisticated machines to harvest
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  Speaker 1: the bioluminescence of our children and turn them into kilowatt hours.
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  Speaker 1: That's what I'm assuming an all-electric school is, but I
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  Speaker 1: could be wrong.
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  Speaker 3: I'm just glad that they've stopped using the children to
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  Speaker 3: soak the coal fires in the school to keep going.
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  Speaker 3: So this is progress.
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  Speaker 1: It is progress, because those little kids, their hands are
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  Speaker 1: too small to get the right amount of coal. into
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  Speaker 1: the furnace. So you always end up with, uh, with
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  Speaker 1: a cold school. And really that, that pleases no one.
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  Speaker 1: The only one to be happy with that would be
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  Speaker 1: OGR Centilla and he'd be rapping all about it.
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  Speaker 2: And I don't like that. And you don't like that.
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  Speaker 2: And it makes the kids cry. So, uh, that's it.
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  Speaker 1: That's it for today's, uh, we got some stuff from
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  Speaker 1: yesterday to, to get through. Let's just take our quick
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  Speaker 1: mid-show break here, uh, this morning. Well, Political Capital Daily
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  Speaker 2: Back to the show.
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  Speaker 1: All right, some news from yesterday. A big report out
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  Speaker 1: from an economist hired by a coalition of unions and
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  Speaker 1: marine shipbuilding associations to put some numbers to what the
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  Speaker 1: economy missed by BC Ferries' decision to go to China
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  Speaker 1: to build four new vessels at a Chinese-owned shipyard. This
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  Speaker 1: report indicates the economy in British Columbia is missed out
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  Speaker 1: on $ 1. 2 billion towards GDP that would have been multiplied
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  Speaker 1: through the supply chain if we had built those four
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  Speaker 1: ships locally here in the province. It would have generated
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  Speaker 1: more than 9,000 person years of employment and more than
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  Speaker 1: $ 400 million in revenue to the federal and provincial governments
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  Speaker 1: if those ships had been built in British Columbia. Part
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  Speaker 1: of the Build Them Here campaign, the group trying to
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  Speaker 1: pin down Premier David Eby, and BC Ferries, after the
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  Speaker 1: Premier said, in the wake of the backlash over the
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  Speaker 1: Chinese ferry deal, that the next ferries would be built
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  Speaker 1: in British Columbia. And the associations, including a shipyard, saying, great,
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  Speaker 1: tell us when, tell us how many ships, and we'll
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  Speaker 1: work backwards to make sure that the shipyards have the capacity,
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  Speaker 1: there's trained workers, we'll get it all ready for you,
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  Speaker 1: and encouraging the government to get that going.
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  Speaker 2: It has not got going.
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  Speaker 1: Although I did hear from Jobs Minister Adrian Dick's who's
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  Speaker 1: acting jobs minister, yesterday saying he appreciates the report and
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  Speaker 1: the government's going to take it seriously. So I don't know, Jeff,
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  Speaker 1: a big economic impact that could have happened if we
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  Speaker 1: had not signed away to the absolute lowest cost jurisdiction, China,
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  Speaker 1: and had built those ferries in British Columbia. So I
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  Speaker 1: guess in the one sense, that's not surprising in a report,
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  Speaker 1: but in the other sense, there's some actual numbers put
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  Speaker 1: together by economist Jim Stanford and some others there.
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  Speaker 3: I think it's a valuable contribution to the public debate
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  Speaker 3: over these ferries. I think it's a bit of a
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  Speaker 3: no-brainer that these should have been built in British Columbia
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  Speaker 3: and that future ones ought to as well. And I
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  Speaker 3: think that's especially true now that we're in a trade
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  Speaker 3: war with the United States and can use every job,
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  Speaker 3: every investment in British Columbia that we can possibly get.
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  Speaker 1: I guess the question will be whether, you know, the...
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  Speaker 1: everything lines up. We don't really know what BC Ferries
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  Speaker 1: is going to buy next and when they're going to
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  Speaker 1: do it and how that all kind of comes together.
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  Speaker 1: But this coalition seems to be on top of that and, uh,
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  Speaker 1: trying to push for some sort of commitment, dare I say,
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  Speaker 1: pushing the premier to follow through on a promise he made,
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  Speaker 1: which is probably the oldest, um, political activity of time
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  Speaker 1: of time, trying to force a politician to follow through
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  Speaker 1: on a promise. I haven't heard anything from the government
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  Speaker 1: on how they intend to build a marine shipbuilding industry, but, um,
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  Speaker 1: A question for the Premier in the days ahead about that.
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  Speaker 1: I do not think BC Ferries is going to be
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  Speaker 1: able to build anything outside of Canada in the foreseeable
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  Speaker 1: future in this climate, Jeff. We went through the period
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  Speaker 1: of sending it to Germany and other places to build cheaper.
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  Speaker 1: That doesn't feel like we're going to get there again.
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  Speaker 3: Poland too. Don't forget Poland. I think the way that
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  Speaker 3: you build that ship industry is you signal to local
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  Speaker 3: industry that there's going to be procurement opportunities for them
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  Speaker 3: and that they would need to have what level of
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  Speaker 3: infrastructure and what kind of workers. And I think that's
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  Speaker 3: part of what the report was getting at. If you
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  Speaker 3: get in front of it, give a private sector enough
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  Speaker 3: notice in a sense that they'll have a real chance
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  Speaker 3: at winning the procurement. We could very well build a
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  Speaker 3: strong shipbuilding industry here in British Columbia.
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  Speaker 1: Which is technically in the NDP government's look west plan
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  Speaker 1: is to have that marine shipbuilding industry.
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  Speaker 2: So it's not like the government doesn't want to do it.
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  Speaker 1: It's just directing kind of BC ferries and everyone to
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  Speaker 1: get on the same page about that. So that was
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  Speaker 1: a report making its way through the news cycle yesterday. Also,
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  Speaker 1: this was an interesting one, Jeff. A kind of statement
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  Speaker 1: out from a former executive of BC United saying, hey,
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  Speaker 1: guess what? We're starting a new movement called Unite Liberal
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  Speaker 1: BC to get Liberal and United members to come forward
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  Speaker 1: and try and take over the kind of moribund United
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  Speaker 1: Party that's sitting there with a paper leader, Kevin Falcon.
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  Speaker 1: Take it over, throw them out, fire up the old
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  Speaker 1: engines of BC United, sputter it back into activity and
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  Speaker 1: present it as an alternative to the collapsing BC Conservatives.
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  Speaker 1: for centrist voters, uh, as another option. Maybe it's BC liberal,
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  Speaker 1: maybe it's BC United. Um, I don't know. I don't
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  Speaker 1: know what you thought when you saw that, but that would,
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  Speaker 1: by my count, be the sixth center-right alternative vehicle if,
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  Speaker 1: if they were successful in getting BC United going again, uh,
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  Speaker 1: six potential parties at play at this point.
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  Speaker 2: That's quite spectacular.
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  Speaker 3: So, so then you'd have, uh, BC conservatives, uh, the
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  Speaker 3: Peter party, uh, center BC, uh, this one, uh, the people's,
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  Speaker 3: the people's liberals united front liberals unite BC people's front,
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  Speaker 3: the liberals unite BC popular people's front. Oh, that's sorry.
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  Speaker 3: I was thinking of a 1970s movie.
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  Speaker 2: It's, uh, it's not far off though.
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  Speaker 1: Like, There's a lot of, you'd have one BC, which
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  Speaker 1: technically exists in a sense, ultra far right, although they
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  Speaker 1: don't like being called ultra far right. But, and then
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  Speaker 1: you would have the white spot party that is supposedly
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  Speaker 1: springing up from alumnus of the liberals and, and so forth.
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  Speaker 1: So you'd have this kind of like, I don't know, just,
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  Speaker 1: And then my favorite, because I was looking through names
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  Speaker 1: of registered political parties in British Columbia that exist right now,
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  Speaker 1: even though we don't talk about them a lot. And
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  Speaker 1: you have like the Libertarian Party and the Christian Heritage Party,
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  Speaker 1: the Communist Party. And at the bottom of the registered
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  Speaker 1: parties list for elections BC is the Party of Citizens
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  Speaker 1: Who Have Decided to Think for Ourselves and Be Our
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  Speaker 1: Own Politicians Party by Gordon Watson, who lives in Victoria.
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  Speaker 1: It's a registered political party. The party of citizens who
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  Speaker 1: have decided to think for themselves and be our own
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  Speaker 1: politicians party.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, you know what? Get her going. Fire it up.
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  Speaker 2: See where it goes.
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  Speaker 3: Throw it in the mix. You know what? You know what?
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  Speaker 3: If there's a day that I need to cede my
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  Speaker 3: seat on the audio political capital to get Gordon Watson
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  Speaker 3: on the show to talk about his party, I'm ready
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  Speaker 3: to do that.
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  Speaker 2: Okay.
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  Speaker 3: Gordon, give Rob the show. Let's get you on the show. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, look, they're They're one seat away from being
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  Speaker 1: as legitimate as 1BC. So, you know, like, that's, you
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  Speaker 1: never know in BC politics these days.
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  Speaker 2: So we're watching that.
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  Speaker 1: And also, this one just kind of amused me in
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  Speaker 1: a sense because I, you know, I like these kind
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  Speaker 1: of things. But ICBC and the BC government yesterday announcing
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  Speaker 1: they're replacing a bunch of intersection safety cameras, which are
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  Speaker 1: apparently needing to be replaced, those red light cameras.
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  Speaker 2: Did you know, Jeff?
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  Speaker 1: That 35 of the red light cameras in BC are
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  Speaker 1: actually photo radar cameras. I don't know if I, at
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  Speaker 1: some point, maybe I was aware of this and it
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  Speaker 1: was scrubbed from my brain. But since 2019, 35 red
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  Speaker 1: light cameras have been taking pictures of speeders and mailing
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  Speaker 1: them tickets in the mail.
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  Speaker 2: And now they're going to get replaced.
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  Speaker 1: And so my question to ICBC was, are you guys
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  Speaker 1: just going to like slowly kind of take those 35
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  Speaker 1: and say, well, all 140 intersections now are speed camera
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  Speaker 1: photo radars. They say, no, they're not doing that. I didn't,
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  Speaker 1: you know, it's probably a wink wink there. Who knows,
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  Speaker 1: who knows where that's going. But I was, I was surprised.
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  Speaker 1: I didn't know that there are red light speed cameras, uh,
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  Speaker 1: at 35 and they're listed online.
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  Speaker 2: You can go look at them. It's not like they're
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  Speaker 2: hidden or anything, but, um, You got to get.
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  Speaker 3: Hip to the Apple Maps. The Apple Maps. I don't
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  Speaker 3: use the Google Maps anymore because of the whole Lake
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  Speaker 3: America thing.
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  Speaker 2: Are you on MapQuest?
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  Speaker 3: The Apple Maps. Yeah. MapQuest. Yeah. Yahoo Maps.
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  Speaker 1: That's right.
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  Speaker 3: MySpace Maps.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: They'll tell you. You'll get a notice. Speed camera up ahead.
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  Speaker 2: Will they?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah. Huh.
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  Speaker 1: Well, there you go.
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  Speaker 2: This is a learning endeavor. I didn't know.
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  Speaker 1: I feel like maybe I should have known this at
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  Speaker 1: some point and I didn't, but I- I guess I'm
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  Speaker 1: not looking at that. So I don't, and I, I
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  Speaker 1: don't know anyone who's ever got a ticket in the
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  Speaker 1: mail for one of these things for speeding, but apparently
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  Speaker 1: I was asking for some numbers from government and I
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  Speaker 1: think there was like 20,000 speeding tickets, uh, mailed in
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  Speaker 1: a given year. I'd have to look for those numbers,
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  Speaker 1: but a surprising number and people just get them and
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  Speaker 1: pay them, I guess.
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  Speaker 2: Um, anyways, people, things you learn. If, if I'm learning something, I.
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  Speaker 1: Feel obligated to share it with you from poutine related
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  Speaker 1: wrap items to, uh, Red light speed cameras. So it's
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  Speaker 1: just a little free service I provide to you each
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  Speaker 1: and every morning. That's pretty much it for the show.
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  Speaker 1: We're going to take a bigger picture, dump into some
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: stuff on Political Capital Prime later today. So I don't
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: want to tire you out, Jeff. I don't want to
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: use up all your hot takes when we've got more
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: tape to fill, more 9mm tape ready to record later today.
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  Speaker 2: But I appreciate you being here so early in the morning.
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  Speaker 1: And showing up for Political Capital Prime later today.
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  Speaker 3: You betcha. Looking forward to the big show. Everyone tune in.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and thanks to everyone for listening this morning and
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  Speaker 1: listening for a shorter week because of Labor Day this week,
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  Speaker 1: but we'll be back next week for all the latest
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: in BC politics here on Political Capital Daily.
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  Speaker 3: Thank you.