The Hook

Not a big deal.

3% drop isn't much (less than 5% net loss).

If Canadians would wake up to the fact that the NDP doesn't mean much to middle Canada other than those who are union, and haven't come up with anything new since Tommy Douglas, they wouldn't give the NDP
much priority. The NDP MP we have here
isn't much he talks like an 'expert on everything he sees'.

Given a choice between the federal Liberals
and the NDP, I'd hold the nose and vote Liberal.

Well BC Boy

Come on back here in a couple of months when the Tories and Grits drop another 3%. Let's see how your NDP bashing does then.
You see, the way I figure it the big boys have had their chance decade after decade and the masses have awakened. You guys always have the same line. "the NDP can't handle the economy". Well, just have a look here in BC at how well the Liberals are handling it now.

Well let's see what happens when...

Well let's see what happens when the NDP slips in the polls.

Amazing that people comment against the opposition parties when those results are down, but these same people never complain much when their own party is down in the polls.

The NDP didn't handle the economy in 1972-75, and certainly didn't in 1995. BC was a have not province back then.

The BC Liberals are becoming a disaster, but the NDP certainly wasn't the best of the best either.

BC Boy

Actually, BC Boy:

The province was never managed better than it was under the NDP. They were handed a recession and a good sized deficit. They got the unions to work with them: they had little labour unrest. Further, service delivery improved through implementing changes that were developed through thoughtful processes while (over-time)they downsized government through attrition. BC healthcare, though not perfect, was seen as something that was good and getting better. BC education was recognized world-wide as the leader. BC was on top of Canada, and Canada was ranked first in the world acordding to the United Nations. Further, it was the secure structure put in place by the NDP that allowed the liberals to ride the province to success during the first term. The NDP handed them a surplus, and an economy in the upswing.

Yep, they goofed on the ferries - but it wasn't money shipped out of the province, out of the country! Our BC shipbuilders learned how to work with aluminum hulls, and a number of our experts got lured away to other parts of the world to deal with building new lightweight aluminum ships. Those ship builders were receiving good wages and paid high taxes. They would have had no problem building better traditional boats the trouble-plagued ferries that the Campbell government farmed out to Germany. Note that the Fast Cats did sell to a buyer in the Arab world, and from what I have heard, the company holding them made a huge profit. Campbell harboured such a desire to mock the NDP that he sold those Fast Cats for less than scrap metal prices! The MSM joined in the mockery for their (campaign donation friend). Funny thing is that the ferries need not have been sold, engineering work had been completed to show exactly how the Fast Cats could have been inexpensively modofied to provide good service. Campbell Inc. wanted nothing to do with fixing them, The BC Libs and the MSM had the NDP down and they couldn't resist giving a couple of head stomps and rib kicks. It didn't matter what made the most economic sense, it was all about image.

(continued)

@ BC Boy

You seem to forget that, in the 90's, the NDP were elected because the BC Liberals (nee Social Credit) were ruining the province. Added to that was the Asian meltdown which hurt the BC economy as well as many other parts of Canada. It was in this decade that Alberta was giving its welfare recipients one way bus tickets to BC. As for fudgit budgets. Look at the last one the BC Liberals brought in. Already it is way off due to miscalculations by the gov't of BC. Wait and see how far out it is when the audit comes down this fall. And we have an even bigger fudget budget.
As for unions get big raises in the 90's, this is not true. Since the province was having a tough time unions did not request large increases.
The Fast Ferries were an attempt by Clarke to develop some manufacturing in this province. I believe with a bit more work they could have been made useful but they were auctioned off on the day that Campbell's sentence was announced. The press was given a distraction from Campbell's conviction.

Kim Pollock April22, 2010 from
http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2010/04/21/FailedTaxCuts/

"The Liberal record in these departments actually trails that of the previous government. While the New Democrats were in office between 1991 and 2001, manufacturing output grew by 88 per cent. Excluding the forest sector, growth was 106 per cent during that decade. Since then, manufacturing growth fell to just one per cent, while non-forest sector manufacturing saw growth of just 30 per cent."

The NDP left the BC Liberals with a massive budget surplus. The BC Liberals then ran 3 deficits in a row . So who is better to run the province? Campbell's moves with the IPP's will cost the residents of this province billions of dollars in increased hydro fees.

Too much to read here

Too long commentary.

As far as the Fast Cats goes, it was the NDP that tried to sell them off first
via Price Waterhouse and that failed.

The NDP themselves admitted they were not
a good thing for BC. Dan Miler said so,
Gordon Wilson said so, and Joy McPhail
said so.

But we've been around those waters before.

The Tilt-A-Whirl ride continues.

Hold in your lunch.

BC Boy (continued)

I recognize that this thread is about national politics, but if you readers will bear with me - BC Boy made an erroneous post, and I just have to rectify his statement).

Back to the secure structure:

Under the NDP, people in the government were working hard, but they felt heard when they said that improvements could be made - and improvements were made. Under the NDP initiatives were taken to integrate service delivery between the various ministries so that duplication and waste were eliminated. It was recognized that things were never going to be perfect by the workers in various ministries, but they saw continual improvement (often bottom-up/expert driven).

The Liberals were able to jump aboard the good ship BC and begin dismantling her as she was headed to blue skies and calm waters. With the Liberals at the helm of a newly refurbished BC, they were able to start dismantling the ship and forego maintenance while she was chugging along.

The first thing the Liberals did was start firing workers removing passenger seats from the ship. Before we knew it we had the highest child poverty, the lowest minimum wage, the highest cost of housing, and the greatest number of homeless people. Today, we have EI benefits that are 43% higher than our minimum wage (($457-$320)/$320). We have private extended-care facillities and fast food joints importing people from the Phillipines to work at minimum wage while charging these employees rent where they live eight to a house. The imported help put up with it so they can send money home to their families - rather than return home in disgrace. And, what kind of fool wants to get a minimum wage job when he or she can collect EI that was paid into for the purpose of guaranteeing an income that is surviveable. At least someone can stay home and watch the kids while he or she is collecting EI. $8 minimum wage is not a surviveable wage for families with children.

Harris Decima

29% + 27% + 20% = 76%

Looks like the new 3rd party has 24%.

These guys are a joke.

BC Boy (part 3)

Not only had the Liberals fired well-seasoned staff, cut transfer payments to local communities, stop maintaining the good ship BC, they sold parts of her off to corporate entities (often foreign). Now we have a ship that is worse than rudderless, it has a drunken, plundering, back-stabbing, pirate as captain who would just as soon gut his own deckhands as share the bounty that he and the pirate captains have been amassing. Our pirate captain and his officers allowed their corporate buddies to farm out jobs to places like China, Brazil, the USA and Mexico while they employ fewer workers at home. Hell, now they even import workers from poverty-stricken other places to perform labour in BC at less than EI benefits!

On top of that, the other control freak pirate, Harper, is in bed with the BC Libs to steal HST from us when Harper also knows we don't want this to happen. Harper and Campbell have been willing to impose this regressive tax so that their buddy pirate corporations (some of which have moved their head offices out of BC) and owners of corporate stock can make bigger profits while BC's working and middle class have less. Under Campbell, like no other time, the rich have gotten richer - while the working people have continually had less.

A few BC Liberal boondoggles:
Convention center: half a billion over budget.
The subway from the airport to downtown instead of light rail to the East.
BC Rail : sold for a pittance: not the $Billion we were told it went for - and the railway has been a money maker for us and now CN.
ICBC: Libs order rates to go up, 2 years later they steal the $0.7 billion surplus and put it in general revenue,
Sell IPP ROR hydro-electric generation to private, for profit, power (often US-funded) and guarantee them a profit for energy generated when we already have surplus.
Sell off transmission of gas to for profit firms.
Sell off accounting and book-keeping to US firms.
Make BC Ferries appear to be private so that we can't look at their books.
Increase pay by incredible amounts to MLAs and their DMs, ADMs, and other top bureaucrats while laying off workers.
Make the PAB the largest media outlet in the country.

There is no comparison. The NDP, by far, provided the best service per dollar to the average BC resident.

Matt T

Tou for get that the Parti Quebecois has a good number of votes. A fourth party already exists. And, there is also the Green party siphoning some of the votes from all three parties, but especially the NDP.

WTF?

"The NDP, by far, provided the best service per dollar to the average BC resident."

You should go work for the LIEberal PAB. They would love your smoke and mirrors. A pox on both their deceitful houses.

BC Boy

BC Boy said regarding the above:
"Too long commentary."

The commentary is too long, you are right. The sad thing is, there are also many more negative things that have needed to be reported upon. Corporate MSM has been remiss in its duty to inform you and the rest of the public. When it comes at you all at once, it must feel overwhelming. You have hitched your wagon to a black star, BC Boy - a black hole, the BC Liberals. This black hole has been draining our province of the incredible wealth. Though you have sided with the pirates, BC Boy, I am willing to forgive you if you will just learn to look at every issue and look at them with an honest eye. Look at them like you have no stake in the BC Liberal Party or the corporate world. Look at the issues like you are just an average person, say a delivery truck driver working out of Kamloops, trying to put food on his family's table.

www.kamworksearch.com/docs/8F37817083773163.pdf

 Truck Drivers (excluding light Truck Delivery Drivers) make on average $41,300 for full-time, full-year work. In many cases, truck drivers are paid by the mile or on a percentage basis rather than by the hour.
 Bus Drivers average annual salary in 2000 was $40,600 for workers who worked full time, year round.
 Delivery Drivers might have lower earnings with better terms available for owner-operators. Their average annual earnings for full-time year round work was $31,600.
 Taxi Drivers salaries average $24,500 for year round, full-time work. They usually work for a percentage of total fares.

Too detailed.

"The commentary is too long, you are right. The sad thing is, there are also many more negative things that have needed to be reported upon. "

Too detailed.Time to move on.

Keep on truckin' till ya reach the stop.

Have no stake in the BC Liberals. Don't work for them and don't volunteer for that party.

Have a nice day.

BC Boy can't read long posts

So I'll make this short.

You're lying or ignorant. BC was not a have-not province in 1995.

Federal poll

Great to see, the NDP is almost competitive nationally with the two old parties.

Herman's Hermit

Upset because the Greens still haven't won a seat anywhere eh

Frank's right

It took a couple of years but eventually they managed to do it.

"BY MOST MEASURES BRITISH COLUMBIAS ECONOMY IS AILING. PROVINCIAL PER capita GDP growth between 1992 and 2000 was the lowest in Canada. This was also true for the growth in average real disposable income, in the ratio of employment to population, in total exports per capita and in fixed business investment. For the last five years, the population growth rate has been declining, net interprovincial migration has turned negative and the number of head offices based in Vancouver has steadily gone down. And, symbolically worst of all, in 1999 the land of the lotus blossom moved from a "have" to a "have not" province: it started to receive federal equalization payments. "

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa4014/is_200201/ai_n9028727/

1991 - 1996 Mike Harcourt Premier, BC NDP.
1996 - 1999 Glen Clark Premier, BC NDP.

Sharing

It is quite touching that you are prepared to forgive BC Boy if, only if, "you will just learn to look at every issue and look at them with an honest eye."

Judging from the factual article I mentioned above, how does your narrative square, me hearty?

"The province was never managed better than it was under the NDP. ... BC was on top of Canada,..."

On top in what, exactly? Out migration? Population decline? Net loss of Head Offices? GDP per capita loss? Ownership of rose-coloured glasses?

realisticman

Its Campbell that benefitted from the actual cheques from the Feds, not the NDP.

He's also the one that received all that federal health care money that was supposed to fix health care for a generation.

Ask him where the money went.

Realisticman

The answers to your questions have been given time and again , here, at the Tyee.

Go to BC Stats and you will see that BC had a net increase of population through every year of the 90s. This, even though Asians have stoped migrating from Hong Kong and Japan.

In this current decade, we have had a greater increase of population due to bay boomers retiring to the Okanagan, the Lower Mainland and Vancouver Island.

The NDP were handed a province that was in recession that was made worse for BC because the Asian Tigers house of cards had imploded. During the BC Liberal regime, we have had a huge transfer of wealth from the working and middle income workewrs to the wealthy. The NDP had handed the BC Liberals a proven $surplus and a province that had improvements in services and infrastucture in virtually every area of government. They had been downsizing government through attrition, and they had been making things more efficient for average citizens.

The growth in GDP during the Liberal reign has come largely through real estate speculation and the wholesale selloff of BC resources with no value-added labour. BC has the least affordable housing of any province in the country. Increased expenditure of capital to secure a family's housing does not constitute real growth - though it raises GDP. Increased costs for average users of every service and implementing an HST while giving tax breaks to corporations and while the provincial debt balloons shows a government that knows how to manage the resources of the people.

Sharing

I read the sermon before. One question. You say; "BC has the least affordable housing of any province in the country.".

Why?

Frank....

Any ideas of who will be chosen for cabinet posts in the upcoming NDP federal government?

Wilf

Any idea when the current Liberal government will be able to find a competent minister from among their ranks?

I can see why you'd want to look ahead, things are pretty bad in the here and now eh?

Realisticman's question answered

Stats Can shows the stats on housing costs related to income.

table 16
http://www12.statcan.ca/census-recensement/2006/as-sa/97-554/table/t16-eng.cfm

During the peak of the greatest demand for BC resources in history, you will note that in 2006, 29.1% of BC citizens were paying out more than 30% of their income for housing. This more than any other province; it is 17.8% greater than the average for all of Canada. The average percent for Canada 24.7%.

Now that it is 2010 and real estate values have continued to bubble upward, those costs can only have increased for the middle income and below. I would suspect that it is pushing 30% at this time.

SharingIsGood

realisticman doesn't accept StatsCan numbers because they and the CBC are all part of the massive left-wing conspiracy.

He instead gets all his talking points from Charles Adler and other talk radio.

If they don't say it he doesn't believe it.

Perhaps, Frank

Frank, I was speaking of the Federal government.

As for the situation with the provincial government, they are elected to govern. There is an election in 2013 and voters can express their electoral choices then.

But I would say that it 100% absolutely for sure that Carole is the next premier.

Well, maybe 99.9% sure.

Wilf

I have a newsflash for you, the Conservatives are in power federally.

I'll use your words to explain it to you : "they are elected to govern. There is an election in 2013 (or whenever) and voters can express their electoral choices then."

Frank

Right wing federal governments in power since Mulroney and the CBC and StatsCan are still controlled by the left? I didn't realize we are so powerful!

My goodness, are you saying his thoughts have been addled by Adler?

Political earthquake

The NDP are not only in the lead among federal parties in BC, the Liberals are only a whisker ahead of the Green Party.

The Liberals should hold a convention and select a new leader.

Sorry Sharing

I missed your post.

In a nutshell, yes.

Don't you know Rahim Jaffer is a "good guy" that's just being railroaded by a left-wing media?

Its all true in r'man's world where stats are something to be belittled and spin is king.