I favour moderate economic policies to the tune of "If it ain't broke, don't fix it". Unfortunately, the Liberals one-privatization-fits-all approach hasn't been the answer. I don't know how other CUPE members feel, but I welcome Robertson's candidacy. I got tired of the right's "The NDP is in the back pocket of big labour" tirade a long time ago, given that the labour movement only contributes about 5% of the party's overall budget. Adding Social Democrat Entrepeneurs to Trade Unionists, Environmentalists, and Social Activists only helps to diversify and strengthen the party. The next election will be interesting, particular if the NDP puts on a moderate face and the Liberals continue to go negative: Big Labour, Fast Ferries, Bingogate, Blah, Blah, Blah. A party with 77 of 79 seats needs to be seen to be above the fray, not picking fights at every opportunity.

A great article.

This was a smart nomination and, if the NDP can root up 20 more Robertsons the Liberals have to be getting worried.

The point of this sort of nomination is to broaden the NDP's appeal. It is tough for the Liberals to match Robertson's new world entreprenurial skills and, hey, he makes a great product.

Now if only the NDP can make candidates like this one the norm rather than the exception they might just actually make a viable choice for the majority of British Columbians. But from personal experience I know the special interest groups within the NDP are far too entrenched to ever let that happen. Remember Mike Harcourt, he was just the moderate puppet to the true believers who then wreaked such havoc after Harcourt was dumped and replaced with the real face of the NDP: Glen CLark.

Correction: Gary Collins was not elected MLA in Vancouver-Fairview (then called Vancouver-Little Mountain) in 1991. In '91 he was MLA in Fort Langley-Aldergrove, It was not until 1996 that he moved to Vancouver-Fairview.

It is to Robertson's benefit that he doesn't have a legacy of terrible party leadership behind him as Collins does. Mayhap, now that the Liberals think they can make up for the 3 years of brutality by banning junk food from schools - some Happy Planet Juice will drive home the message that the product is as good as its ingredients - and the Liberals are way past their shelf life. I really see the NDP as the government of and by the people - and they have shown the flexibility to change with the times and are staying in touch with what society needs and how they can provide for that need. Their diversity of superior people who understand progress with a vision on sustainability outshines the "next piece to the highest bidder" mentality the Liberals have demonstrated over their short-stint in power. Hopefully their damage is not irreversible - with our privacy and health care compromised, to selling off and development of our natural resources inclusive of wildlife habitat, to burdening an incredible debt load on our post-secondary students making higher education once again inaccessible to those who desire it the most - I can't wait for the next election.

I approach this one with my CUPE/Green hat on - this should send a clear message to Barry O Niell and other CUPE BC higher ups, if the NDP don't want someone like Darcy then who does ? With my GP hat on I have to wince at Vanessa Violini endorsing the NDP, maybe she is supporting the candidate more than the party. My guess is that this is one of the few stars on the NDP roster. The nominees for Vancouver Hastings NDP are traditional NDP'ers all the way as an example.

Nothing new here. The NDP has, in fact, "socialist" illusions and protestations considered, and the hysterical ravings of the Brownshirsts, long been a "pale washed" centre-left "capitalist" party. Which the Greens as well aspire to-, though more right-centre. It's mostly just that they and the NDP are about to get more blatant about it, hopefully, finally shattering any other "illusions" the left may still have about them both. It's all a part of the "rightist" social, political and economic forces and influences underway, which as their effect on the economy and lives of ordinary people becomes inescapably clearer, is going to force a reshaping of their thinking and political attitudes. Being my read and extrapolation of the evidence anyway. Time and real life always being the actual laboratory of testing however.

I mean, let's get real, even the trade union movement and most of the "working class" still identify with capitalism. Like Karl himself said, the ruling ideas of any age are the ideas of its ruling class. Which holds true until something happens to seriously undermine that central truth, like war and/or economic collapse. I know that, as do most "serious" radicals of the left.

Yawwwn! I won't even waste my time discussing this one anymore than that. (I would only refer you to groovypippin et al above, longstanding neocon lib defenders here, who suddenly think the NDP is on the right course.)

Though it is amusing, in a twisted kind of way.

for the referral coyote. I must take issue with this new spin that the NDP only receive 5% of their direct funding from unions. Yes, directly. However, the NDP and the BC FED figured out after the last election that the public sector unions can spend millions of dollars opposing government without giving a penny of it to the NDP. And thats exactly what they have done. Do they have a right to do so? Of course, but lets be big boys and girls and admit that this is "soft money" for the NDP, just like the ads currently being run by the BC Business Council are "soft money" ads for the Liberals. Some of us here might be zealots (wink, wink), but lets at least have the self-respect to recognize the obvious. OK, with that little bit of hypocrisy put to bed, lets carry on.

Thanks... um... what is your point? You want soft money to buy hard water?

Self-respect to recognize the obvious? As a teacher, I am overjoyed that my union has put aside $5 million to engage the public in what the BC Liberals have done to education in this province. If a union wants to spend money fighting for what they believe in ... they should. The NDP might ask where the teachers were in the last election. I for one have never voted for the provincial NDP. But, telling the truth about raising class sizes and closing libraries is "soft" money for the NDP? If campaigning against the Liberals is campaigning for the NDP ... then I guess we only have two parties in this province. I hope that the NDP gets more candidates like the one above. They'll get my vote if they do. Anything but the disrespectful, cocky, spit-in-your face Liberals.

I am amazed that Chris H lets us know that he is a teacher, and that he has never voted for the BC NDP before. I've been teaching in BC for the past 20 years. I would not have a clue who to vote for if not the NDP.

Hey Chris H and Paul in East Van some of us in East Van do beleive in an alternative to the NDP try http://amputee-online.com/iangregson or http://amputee-online.com/greenparty

I'm beginning to thing that rockerbiff is adrienne herself - judging by the onslaught of green slime spewed hither tither - consider us slimed once again. We see your true colours shining through....

"...he is a teacher, and that he has never voted for the BC NDP before." wrote Paul in East Van.

And you are likely/hopefully going to see more of his kind of story.

As I said earlier, the "new" times, actually a resurrection of very old times, "...is going to force a reshaping of their thinking and political attitudes." Of which Chris H. is a manifestation. :-) Let's hope.

I have never understood why small business would vote for a party financed by big business. Big business is no friend to small business. Great nomination for the NDP.

Hey Chis H and Paul in east Van, I'm sure you know not to listen to false prophets and con artists like Rockerbiff and his/her Groin Party. As a former GP member, I gladly moved to the NDP when I got wise to the CCF/NDP legacy and realizing the critical historic importance of the labour movements (unions) in democratizing our society and, at least to a limited degree, our economy (which is the ultimate basis of socialist economics and a key step in building a sustainable ecologically sound economy)--both in Canada and elsewhere. In the last few years, I have seen the Groin Party abandon what little understanding it had of these values to suck up to high income cliques and anti-union flakes (like the idiots and liars who try to pin this "special interest" crap on unions) in order to get funding and raise its profile. The fact Vanessa Violini is now with the NDP only shows that she has smartened up at least a little bit. As for whether Gregor robertson's victory in the nomination supposedly moving to the center or right, I will remind folks here that sharing the wealth and giving employees a real say in running a business are KEY socialistic economic principles, and very much in line with the traditional values of the labour movement. Whatever happens, stick with the NDP. It's the only sane place to be these days.

We hear, "We have to find our way forward into an unimagined future with previously unthought ideas" and we hear "We need to return to first principles" and we hear "We've heard all this before".

The climate in this benighted province is so poisoned that the possibility of enlightened political leadership approaches zero.

Oh vote for the green party! Oh please vote for the green party. Did you know the green party blah blah blah. The green party.....my website....blah blah blah. We are above all political parties....blah blah blah....the green party....blah blah blah.

Adrianne Carr....blah blah blah....the green party...blah blah blah.

An exact quotation from Rockerbiff's last post.

Could some one explain, how will (one) Gregor surrounded by nothing but Do-Do's and an albatrsses,(BCGEU) hanging over him can possibly have any influence in this party, or could it possibly be, that this is just the birth of another Cadillac Socialist

I don't know, Henry - maybe Robertson is hoping to be judged by the company he keeps. He seems to be a pretty astute fellow - and more of a forward-thinking 2005 gas/electric Prius with Hybrid Synergy Drive which offers amazing fuel economy, an Advanced Technology Partial Zero Emission type of socialist vehicle. Cadillac is more of a cumbersome Gordo-type albatross - wouldn't you say?

Actually, Gregor mostly rides his bike. Seriously. And in a suit sometimes.

Well, Gregorian, that is good to hear - it appears both he (gregor) and I have similar tastes in transportation. But I had been allegorically speaking in my previous hybrid post. That Cadillac thing just ran over me the wrong way - kind of like Henry's "car-ma" running over my Dogma crash scene scenario.

I don't understand the surprise over Robertson. I'm a very left-wing small business guy. So? I would bet most NDP supporters aren't in a union.

Good to see Summerville on board. Its the finance and board-of-trade types who are usually right-wing. I wouldn't say the same for small-business, people just think anyone that has anything to do with business or finance must all be in the same party. Not true.

Carole James is doing a good job. Some more light on the real situation in BC (as opposed to the Sun, Province and CKNW cheerleading) would be good too. But that's where only the Tyee has carried the ball so far.

I'd like to see a comparison of federal dollars coming to BC under the NDP back when Martin was tightening the Canadian belt and under the BC Libs when transfers increased.

geek - Oh, be nice. I don't like Carr and her band of organic libertarians either, but I think the Green Party has done a great thing for the NDP: forced the party to take a good look at ourselves, fine tune our environmental policy, and make the realisation we're not the only game in town. This is why we're getting candidates like Robertson, and why people like Violini are coming along in tow.

"I'm a very left-wing small business guy. So? I would bet most NDP supporters aren't in a union." says Frank. Whose views I always respect here. And he is right on this matter as well. Now, I don't really know Mr. Robertson, but on the face of it, "Small business" occupies a somewhat unique position within capitalism. A very few of them, and all may dream but few come true, may evolve into major corporate conglomerates, and their owners cross that "qualitative" threshold, where they become part of a separate and higher social class above the rest of us mere peasants and prols-, and as a result, come to look at the world differently, and have different interests than we mere mortals.

Most small business folks, which I have also done in my long life as well, though I have mostly been a proud trade unionist prol and farmer, are just hardworking folks, struggling to survive and make a decent living like the rest of us. And if they really think about it, and don't get sucked into the Chamber of Commerce set of illusions about where their class interests lie, they come to see that their livelihoods and strategic interests themselves, depend much on the success of their working class customers. When they can't prosper and spend essential and discretionary income in their shops and stores, then small businesses suffer no less and as quickly as well. Which in my small town, and, for example, with the small business owner mate of one of my daughters, is much in evidence in these new neo-conservative, make the working class suffer and pay times, that Campbell has set on us like a plague.

P> The overarching political and economic reality that exists out there in current neocon capitalist society is,that there is a natural alliance of people that exists and is struggling to emerge. And that "natural" alliance includes working folks and their families, union and non-union, struggling farmers and people on the land, and the small businesses and owners who depend primarily on all these folks for their own livelihoods. To suggest as groovypippin and the other Brownshirts here do, that "merely" because the NDP includes small business folks, that this somehow equates with the Neocon Liberal Party of major "Corporatist" wealth and power, is to take a thin bare thread of reality and extend it out to the limits of utter and complete absurdity. It just doesn't compute. These apologists and foot soldiers for corporatist ideology are merely trying to fuck with your minds, in the convoluted and twisted way and value prism manner which they look at the world and society.

They are ideological and class buffoons. And even the corporate boardroom set laugh at them behind their backs, and are embarassed that they need them. Though they do need them out there, like the media, to run interference for them and hoodwink the gullible. The presumption being, there is one born every minute.

bear604 - I don't think it is the environmental record of the NDP that attracts people like Gregor Robertson and Vanessa Violini, I DO think it is the promise of a better environmental record that attract these soft Greens. No doubt it is also the ability to fill Eric Hamber with 500 patriots, something the Greens have yet to achieve. My feeling is the NDP will not live up to the expectations of Robertson and Violini, they will get bogged down in the endless war between those who believe a job is more imporatant than the environment and those who beleive the environment is more important than having a job. There is no doubt the NDP can attract the soft Greens, the question is can the NDP keep them ?

We are just attempting to continue a misconception fed often by media that the NDP is somehow a bastion of anti business rhetoric. In fact the NDP has been a host of small business people for decades. While there is truth of course that unions have wielded far to much clout in the party it is equally true that the majority of its members and supporters cross many spheres in society and many small business people have supported and in fact been succesful cadidates as well.....The hope should be that the party will manage to keep a good cross section of people in its inner sanctoms and manage to fend off the Media-Liberal attempts to paint it otherwise

This nomination is great for the NDP and great for my riding Vancouver Fairview. I look forward to casting my vote for Gregor next May, hopefully others in my riding will feel the same and we can send Collins back to giving flying lessons. The NDP definitely needs more candidates like Gregor.

I recall that under pressure to keep up a high bond rating , Mr.Harcourt was compelled to change the province's bankruptcy laws to make the first in the queue ,not the employees with their pay needs, but the creditors such as finanical institutions or lose a class rate that allows a lower cost bond.Seems like the first foray in the shift to make B.C. homogenous with all other north american jurisdictions.At least that was the presses take on the event. Such power to change laws to suit a particular business need may have been the pendulum swing to the result of Mr. Campbell's ascent to his present office.

KWL, from what I am hearing way out here in the boonies there are a good number of professionals who will be seeking nominations for the NDP in this area. I do know that in Kamloops a very interesting person will be running who will bring some new perspective on one of the major economic/social/political issues we face in B.C. Sorry, I'm not giving out names here, but I suspect G. Robertson will be among a number of new non-traditional (to those who need to categorize people), NDP candidates running in May. I do anticipate a Green challenge in Kamloops, but like in past efforts it will only serve to help the elected Liberal MLA.

rockerbiff - There are no jobs on a dead planet, however, the planet might not mean much if your job (or lack thereof) makes you wish you were dead. I don't think that's just an endless war for a political party, I think that's an endless war for everyone. While it remains to be seen if Violini sticks with the NDP, it also remains to be seen who's going to stick with the Green Party.

Trew, I think you'll find nothing of the sort. That kind of rule is ubiquitous - creditors always rate higher than employees, everywhere. And it's obvious why.

Just curious how a party (NDP) that so heavily favours the unions is good for small business. If our small business was unionized alot of people would be looking for work right now. Sure they don't get ridiculous wages and benfits, but they are working. Also how does one person change the face of a party. Because the NDP attracts one business man all of a sudden they're a pro business party with a social worker as a leader.(no offense to socail workers but there is no profession that is against all business more than social workers or for that fact all public sector unions) I'm not sure about this bragging about one balanced budget out of ten years of rule. Good for you NDP you did a not bad job 1 year out of 10 you must be really proud. Its great that you can balance a budget at the climax of a major North American economic boom. Try doing it when the North American economy is weak.

bear604 - in a completely theoretical scenario we are both correct. However, the reality is to many people the job is only thing that is important at the expense of the environment. This explains how we humans can mow down vast swathes of land relatively guilt free, in order to keep our jobs. There are people in the NDP who care not for the environment one iota. Likewise there are people within the environmental movement and GP who never seem to have jobs but spend a lot of time living up trees to protect them. This dichotomy will play out far more in the NDP than in the GP, it certainly played out between the IWA and the environmentalists in 90's. How many clear cuts will occur or raw logs be exported if a new NDP gov't is elected, before the Violini's and Robertson's bolt back to the fields of Green ? Easy come easy go I reckon.

Ya Frank transfers did increase between the Feds and us during the end of the NDP rule and the start of the Liberal rule. It's called equalization payments. It happens when one party drives a provinces economy so far into the ground that the province goes from a have to a have not province. It looks like I have stumbled upon a NDP love fest. Arguably the NDP is good for the environment (not sure how), the unwilling to work, unions and special interests, but to say the NDP looks out for business of any sort is a bit of a joke. Under this logic higher taxes increases investment. But then again as a small business owner what do I know.

"Sure they don't get ridiculous wages and benfits, but they are working. " says bongo. How suitable a name could a Brownshirt get, eh.

What he really means, where he says "ridiculous wages" is "good" or "worth living and working wages", or "just get by wages". Stop the mindshagging, bingo bango bongo.

Your Brownshirt, goodball logic is, "Hey, man! Romes slaves mayn't have been gittin, ridiculous good wages, but eh, at least dey was fuckin' workin' man, and gettin' a crust o' mouldy bread now and again."

<

Yeah, we know. Peasants, prols and slaves should just be grateful for whatever they get and, "Do da fuck as dey's told! Da rulin' class knows best."

Eh, man. Groovypippin! Ah, err, Groovypimpin.

It is sheer folly to project the candidacy of a "handsome ethical businessman" as the mask of the new NDP. You have simply taken the bait. Both the Liberals and the NDP support unsustainable economic policies that are depleting our resources and fouling our environment. You only have to look at their respective records while in government to see the real face. It is election time and we now hear about the "new" NDP, how very green they are (I never would have guessed, eh) and the "new" Liberals, how much they will protect our social programs. These parties are just two sides of the same coin; an economic system that needs to grow and needs you to consume. Until a party begins to speak about limits to growth and conservaton, their words are simply empty calories cast to hungry peasants. More junk food.

Bongo, fact is, the federal Liberals were cutting transfers in the mid-90's to tame the deficit. Other provinces, not just BC, had to make a choice as to whether or not to run deficits or cut programs. I'm happy with the course the BC NDP took. Seems they do a better job than the BC Libs of protecting social programs. You can argue that those programs aren't worth protecting, that's your right, but I think they are and I'm happy to support a government that does.

The NDP balanced 2 budgets did they not? You said 1. And they did it facing more adversity than the BC Libs who have had a very compliant federal government throwing money their way.

Small business should be a friend of the NDP because the NDP puts money into the local economy. Maybe you're happy sending a portion of your profits to Germany or the US in the form of taxes but I'm not. Ever take economics? Then you would know about the multiplier effect. Money spent here creates more jobs than sending money out of the province. When you send it out, it never comes back. I know many wish it weren't true. They like to think that if you save 5% by going outside the province that somehow you're helping the economy because you spent less. Unfortunately that argument doesn't hold water. Money invested locally creates jobs and increases the tax base. Money sent out of the country helps only that other country. On that score then, for me, the NDP win out over the BC Libs again.

Another reason why I prefer the NDP? People need money to purchase product. The NDP understands this and in government they do things like increase the minimum wage, increase social transfers to individuals, spend money locally and create a work climate that supports good jobs. If the BC Libs philosophy of low taxes, low wages, buying offshore and minimal social supports worked then the best place to run a small business would be in the 3rd world where all those things can be found in abundance. Yet somehow the Argentina's and Nigeria's etc don't become the economic powerhouses that the BC Libs say should happen. Somehow its the western governments that invest in their own people that stay on top. Somehow countries where workers enjoy a lot more vacation time and greater benefits consistently outperform them. Its not from a lack of investment. Worker paradises in the third world still seem to me very little like a paradise even though BC Liberal policies of low taxes, no unions and very corporate-friendly governments have been in place for a long time. Over and over again, its the countries dabbling with socialism that outperform these countries. Even countries that had to rebuild from WW2 have built economies where citizens are unionized, well paid and enjoy excellent benefits. Yet somehow governments that follow the IMF and World Bank fail over and over to generate any kind of economy that encourages people to stay.

For me, I don't sell much to the 3rd world. I have yet to see orders from Bolivia even though they've followed right-wing prescriptions like privatize water. In fact, I seem to get more orders from Germany than I do from the rest of the 3rd world put together. Why would that be Bongo when Germany was crushed 60 years ago and rebuilt with a pretty socialistic economy?

Ideology can be fun to argue over but when the rubber hits the road I would rather run a business in a country that doesn't let ideology get in the way of providing a worker-friendly climate for its citizens. That's the best support for a business there is.

What a wonderful article. I was begining to think that credible moderate candidates for the NDP were a lost cause. Thank goodness. It gives me hope. I was despairing that we were doomed to another four years of incompetent Liberal idealogues. Please, please, please let us vote in a moderate government which represents the majority of British Columbians. A government that has: the will to make the environment THE priority, a strong social conscience, a commitment to fiscal responsibility and the willingness to engage the community in dialogue about how we want to live together. As for voting Green? A green variaton on the Liberals. The Greens are so Libertarian in their social and economic policies. "The market is a good servant, a poor partner and a terrible master".

I don't really know if I can vote for a guy who discontinued the Happy Planet 1L carrot juice saying there wasn't enough demand only to let an American brand take its place overnight. I wonder if the CEO of Bolthouse Farms Juice Co. in California will move up here post-Bush so I can vote for him!

Kim Anderson - I'm not sure what Green Party you are referring to, you might be getting mixed up with the marajuana party who very strong liberterians. There are no liberterians in the Green Party of BC that I know of. Marc Emery's name ring a bell ?

Employees are creditors (if wages are owed)- but if unsecured we rank after 1) Revenue Canada 2) financial institutions 3) the trustees handling the bankruptcy case(who I'm sure earn their $15,000 fee) - and the director of the business is able to, apparently, liquidate RRSP's to buy a condo but not to pay the employees monies owed.

"Ideology can be fun to argue over but when the rubber hits the road I would rather run a business in a country that doesn't let ideology get in the way of providing a worker-friendly climate for its citizens. That's the best support for a business there is." says Frank.

Which is the pivot point around which effective left-wing politics, in its broadest applications at the "current" time, have to operate if , at least, the Neocon Libs are going to be defeated, and other developmental opportunities opened up.

None would prefer a more focussed attack on corporate power than I, and a challenging of its dominant "ruling class" place in the economy, and its virtual vetoe power over democracy, but that just isn't on, in this political climate and with this NDP, I don't think. And sometimes you have to go for what is immediately and realistically realizable, over what you really want, and deal with that shortcoming later. Especially if to get it, requires a whole different set of social, political and economic circumstances, that are simply not yet prevailing.

Real life itself ain't politically pretty or, as Frank suggests, ideological, it's just real. Which isn't to say that "ideology", or one's understanding of reality isn't important. 'Cause it sure as hell is. It just better be grounded there, in reality, or you lose again, Honey.

So Frank How many employees do you have? Obviously not many. I'm sorry I employ people. Maybe I should fire half my staff so I can give people "living wages". After all no job and sitting on your ass at home is a lot better than starting low and working your way up the wage scale on merit rather than on seniority. All unions do is protect the lowest common denominator, if you are a hard worker and do a good job you could make more money on a market based system if not then thats an "artificially inflated wage". High Union wages creates unemployment, economics 101, so you make the decision do you want more people working for a lower wage or a few people working for a high wage. Business is out to make money otherwise its a charity.Most companies take their profits and reinvest it back into the company in order to grow their company and in turn employ more people. All you people are dealing from ideology, not practical application. I challenge any one of you to run a small to medium sized business, giving what is equivalent to $30.00 an hour to the most under qualified unskilled labour. If its so easy tell me how its done. The only way that works is if you(that’s you the customer) are willing to pay 50% more for everything you buy. I'm sure you guys are the first ones to shop in the states or buy imported goods (Ikea) because they're cheaper. All high wages do is drive jobs from our country to other countries or provinces. If I’m a business man and I can pay someone $30 an hour in BC, $10 in Alberta or .25 in China I’m obviously going to leave this province and that’s exactly what happened when the NDP was in power. Try focusing your arguments on the real world not the NDP bubble world. We work on a global economy were competition is fierce and artificially inflated wages create an over priced product that will not sell, but then again you guys also hate globalization and free trade. And buy the way the largest economy in the world is the US, which we have ready access to so im not sure why you would sell to third world countries anyway or Germany for that matter. I do apologize to all you for being successful though, I guess I worked too many hours and didn't take enough vacation. Maybe you can lobby the NDP so I can pay a 75% tax rate, that really gives people incentive for working hard and being successful. I forgot though you want a world were everybody is equal. I believe there is another word for that, Communism, and we know how successful that is. "Money invested locally creates jobs and increases the tax base." that is a good line Frank, in support of my argument. Investment in BC is rising dramatically, and I'm sorry but higher taxes and higher business costs don't create outside investment that’s needed to expand our economy. Reinvesting our tax dollars in money losing ventures will not grow our economy, we need more outside funds to expand our economy. This way social issues can then be funded in a responsible way, not running up deficits.

This site is so well done - I guess I don't need to comment. By the time I read all the posts before I ink some thoughts - I fall asleep as the same people NDP vs Green argue about nothing. Vote as you please but please don't vote for Campbell. Can we get back to the issue and the issue is not Carr. The issue is the NDP winning more seats than last time. We need an opposition. If Carr is elected in one riding, Powell River so be it. I don't care.

The Harcourt NDP government had to pay off a large deficit left behind by the Social Credit government. The NDP eliminated the Socred deficit. The biggest deficits have always been created by the right wing.

I prefer Gregor Robertson's profit sharing to Bongo's sweat shop mentality.

Bongo, you're drum's sounding a bit tinny after four years of Liberal ideology, but I am glad you did note the NDP's better environmental record. Perhaps you could pass that info on to the Greens who have conveniently forgotten that it was NDP policy that led to the greatest effort to protect and expand parks in the province's history. It was the NDP that brought in the Agricultural Land Reserve, a system that is praised world wide and continues after almost 40 years to save farmland despite ongoing efforts by the development industry to pave it over, or alternately, green it up as a golfcourse before ringing it with oversized energy and space-consuming housing units. Perhaps that is one of the reasons you don't like NDP. Yes, I know you say it's all about the NDP's links to organized labour that has you fearful because you are a small businessman who might wake up some morning to learn that some big, bad union has twisted your workers' arms and forced them to sign union cards. But Bongo, your acknowledgement that your employees aren't paid "ridiculous wages or benefits" sounds just a tad overstated. A good employer (yes I was an employer once) understands there is more to a job than simply having one. Benefits, whether "ridiculous" or minimal, are a measure of the value the employer is willing to invest in his or her employees. Want to keep the big, bad union out? Well then take some advice from someone who has helped to get unions in. Start sharing the profits and begin to invest in your employees. Although you may not realize it, being so busy looking after number one, your employees know the difference between being part of a team and being used. Now, you also appear to have a hangup on social workers, although for the life of me, I can't fanthom how a private-sector employer would have a problem with social workers, other than, as you implied, all those public sector union types hate you. WHY? Because most of them get "ridiculous wages and benefits?" Bongo, I think your problem is your logic, the logic you employ to show your grasp of economics, such as your cheesy "higher taxes increases investment" scenario you toss up. Perhaps you can enlighten some of us who didn't get a tax break the day after Gordon Campbell took office in 2001 as to the investment that poured into our economy thanks to that gift to our wealthiest. A tip for you and your chamber of comics bretheran. Want to spur the economy? Invest in your workers because they reinvest in BC immediately and continually.

If you need workers to run your business, and you can't pay them a wage they can actually live on, raise families to replace themselves, educate their kids, and have some quality of life beyond just being your mindless grunts, that include holidays and health, for example, what the Hell real good are you to anybody, bongo?

All you are, and your "business", is then somebody who merely prolongs the agony of living for everyone who works for you. Shut your doors if all you can do is pay coolie wages, or go to China for chris'sake. You're certainly not then a real or desirable part of this economy in any case. (And if you need the subsidizing or startup stimulus of substandard wages and conditions, you know ,the kind that feed on and only create added poverty, then there better/needs to be prospects and a "deal understanding" in place, that out there in time somewhere, there's a payback in equity and power to the employees who have carried your sorry ass.)

Though I still think, in this new globalized "corporatist" world, with the deliberately structured and enforced race to the bottom it is seeking to impose on everyone who mere "labours" everywhere for a living, that we have to get back to a place that allows us to protect ourselves and our own home enonomies from the destructive rapaciousness of the likes as yourself, and that "fuck eveyone else" mentality so manifest in the Brownshirt mob.

It's your type bongo, who in fact feed into "communist" ideas like mine. You make me possible-, and bring me like thinking people, possibly even amongst your own workers. :-)

So the two suggestions to my last piece are, Raise my wages so I go out of business, or shut my business down. Good call people thats how you build an economy. Then I can go on welfare and mooch the system just like you. By the way I do profit share but there is no profit under your way of thinking.

Sweat Shop mentality, Nice rhetoric, again living in a dream world called Communism. Go move to Cuba if its so damn good there. Give me handouts I deserve it i'm Canadain. What a joke

Allan - the NDP's record on the environment is not good. Creating lines on a map and calling it park is one thing, easy to do and looks good. However, assigning park rangers and staff to enforce the rules within those same lines on the map is where it is at - lines on a map are just lines on a map without enforcement. The NDP also increased raw log exports and it was Glen Clark who called environmentalists the "enemies of progress". Little did the NDP do to protect ancient growth forests it was left to the real environmentalists to do this. All Clark did was get people arrested and support the goals of the multi-national logging corporations vis-a-vis the IWA. There can only be one real enviornmentally based party in this province and it is not the NDP, but they do a damned fine job of looking the part, their past record says otherwise.

It is the communists who pay sweat shop wages. You are no better than them. Go to China if you want to pay 25 cents an hour.

Artificially wages create an overpriced product that will not sell? Then why are so many of the third world products ie. clothing not refective of the low wages that created them. We will not be able to compete with 25 cent an hour jobs , and live in Canada, period. Anyhow the thread is supposed to be about Mr. Robertson. I think he is a good choice, and indicative of how the New Democratic Party is changing. Change is good.

If you were really interested in the environment, Rockerbiff, you would not have made such a blatantly self-interested statement as: "There can only be one real environmentally based party in this province..." Why is that? You'd think you would want every party to be environmentally based, no matter what the party politics IF you really cared about the environment. And you would give credit where it is due. Really it's time the Greens moved past their self-congratulatory egos.

My grandparents, collected rain water in barrels, grew their own vegetables, ate natural foods, and travelled softly all over this fair earth. I even remember the ceiling border mural that my grandfather oil painted around their living room of the stately green firs and the shimmering coastal islands that trim our shore ...and the Sanskrit words of welcome he had etched into their walkway. My point is not to wax sentimental but to remind you that many others gently walked this earth, hundreds , indeed thousands of years before us with much less bally-hoo, and much less self-applause than those self-proclaimed saviors of us all - the Greens.

Bongo, I guess Europe and much of the west never read Economics 101 because they do pay high union wages and their economies are doing fine thank you very much. How do you square that circle in your head? You know that economies with high rates of unionization outperform those that the IMF "advises". You must wonder why don't you? Or do you wake up every morning hoping advanced economies with minimum wages and social programs collapse?

I'm afraid its you that is wrapping yourself in ideology and not looking at the world as it is, rather than how you'd like it to be. For example you said "All high wages do is drive jobs from our country to other countries or provinces." If you let people move to the 3rd world but enjoy the benefits of selling to the high-wage market then yes. That's why the argument over free-trade. But only with free-trade does this happen. Without that benefit those companies would stay where the high wages are, the low wage countries are only desirable to them if they can still sell to the high wage ones. The long-term consequences of this is clear. High wage jobs will be lost and economic problems such as unemployment will hit the high wage economies. The left has been saying that for 30 years, why has it taken you guys on the right so long to agree with us? If you want to be successful you have to sell to somebody. Those people have to have the money to purchase your product. Its that simple. Corporate paradises that follow the BC Lib economic plan fail to provide this.

And no I don't shop in the US, I support the local economy.

You call union wages artificially inflated? Actually aren't they set using the same logic we use to set prices? Whatever the market will bear? I don't consider my prices to be "artificially inflated". The 4 people I pay, work with me as part of a team. All of us are unable to make anything unless we all do a good job. I happen to be the one that doles out the cash but I know that if they're not fairly paid they'll move on and I'll be looking for work myself because I need them.

Cuba? Best you could do?

Face it, your economic ideology doesn't work, has never worked. If you don't like living in a mixed economy with things like minimum wages why don't you follow your own advice and move your business to the corporate-friendly shores of Honduras? According to the CIA Factbook more than half the population is below the already low Honduran poverty line. You could employ people for less than you pay now and have lower taxes. Strange that Honduras isn't an economic powerhouse using your twisted logic isn't it? Just think of the money you could make there. Please tell me what's holding you back, I sincerely want to know.

You said "Reinvesting our tax dollars in money losing ventures will not grow our economy, we need more outside funds to expand our economy. This way social issues can then be funded in a responsible way, not running up deficits"

I agree that investing in money losing ventures is not efficient but it is more efficient than using those same dollars to purchase foreign products. Do you not agree that sending money out of the country is a waste? You say yourself that you want other countries to invest in us so that we can afford better social programs? I assume then you like social programs? You also admit then that other countries sending us money is a benefit to us? So why is the other way around not a bad idea? Why do you think we should support the German union-based economy with our tax dollars?

A New Democrat MPP recently proclaimed that "excess wealth" should not be allowed to exist and that wealth should be redistributed through a "more equitable" tax system. That such an obvious (and evil) contradiction in terms went so easily unchallenged is truly remarkable. When a private citizen attempts to "redistribute the wealth" of others, we call the act by its true name: theft. When a politician does exactly the same thing, he calls it by an entirely different name: equity! Thus, by some mysterious alchemy, stealing is transmuted from the base metal of criminal activity to the pure gold of high and noble purpose. Author George Gilder, in his book Wealth and Poverty, describes the inevitable outcome of this political deception this way: "One of the little-probed mysteries of social history is society's hostility to its greatest benefactors, the producers of wealth. On every continent and in every epoch, the people who have excelled in creating wealth have been the victims of some of society's greatest brutalities." Pointing to the fate of the Jews in Hitler's Germany, the Pogroms against the Russian Kulaks, the slaughter of the Ibo tribesmen in Nigeria, the killing of almost one million Chinese in Indonesia, etc., Gilder continues:"Everywhere the horrors and bodies pile up, in the world's perennial struggle to rid itself of the menace of riches --- of the shopkeeper, the bankers, the merchants, the traders, the entrepreneurs --- at the same time that the toll also mounts in victims of unnecessary famine and poverty." Invariably, those who conscript wealth (politicians) rail against those who create wealth (capitalists), revealing the bitter envy of those who are able to make their way productively in the marketplace. The rich in our society must feel like the character in the Kafka play who was found guilty of being innocent, especially if their wealth resulted from business activity. While most are willing to allow an entertainer or an athlete to "make a bundle", they begrudge the businessman the same opportunity. You only have 4 employees Frank. There is a big difference between employing 50 and 4 people. You may not be able to grasp the fact that some people are smarter, some work harder and some can do more. You cannot pay someone who works 40 hrs a week doing brainless work the same as someone putting in 60 hours a week changing the direction of the company. I know you would pay them the same, but its not reality. So lets get this clear Frank, you Don't Support free trade, well then out the window goes our resource economy. So where is our GDP at now. And since we won't be able to import anything without high tariffs, we are now limited to products produced in Canada. Back to communism we go. I'm not saying a mixed economy doesn't work but the fact is in a mixed econmy there will always be unemployment. The higher you move up the minumum wage the more unemployment goes up. I have one question for you about the multiplier effect. What is the difference between alot of people working for a lower wage or a few people working at higher wage. How does the muliplier work then. I assume if there is less people working there is less people contributing to the economy, but then again I'm always wrong. Please explain.

I'll just duck under all the wisdom and profanity being flung back and forth by you other opinionated folks up above to say -- YYEEEESSSSS! I have six months to look forward to replacing Mr. Collins, our disastrous MLA, by voting for a real entrepreneur who has a social conscience to boot! Can we clone him and create a whole team? (Not that I want a government run by handsome entrepreneurs with heart any more than I want one run by the unions or the Board of Trade!) I hope the NDP (or any party, for that matter) will finally get it that we need a big tent where everyone can be at the table and that it's all important--economy, environment, education (thank you teachers -- don't let them shut you up!), social programs... Business people, the union folks, kids, seniors, First Nations, immigrants, the homeless, etc. all deserve equal respect and we're all tired of being yanked around from one extreme approach to the next.

Freedom (Bongo), your understanding of history is as incomplete as your understanding of economics.

And you keep avoiding the question, why is Europe successful and IMF-advised countries in the toilet. Why do you not set up your business in Honduras? You keep trying to expand the argument so as to avoid answering anything. I'd be happy to talk history but these posts are getting long enough already.

As for the end of free trade meaning the end of our economy. Do you know that in Canada prior to 1989 we actually exported a lot of "stuff"? You can actually go look it up. I'm not making this up. We really did have foreign trade prior to 1989. We even sold... (wait for it)... commodities! Isn't that incredible? And we still had quality social programs without free trade too. I know I know, its hard to believe but if you crack open a history book it will tell you this is true.

As for the "back to communism" comment. You should have known Canada has never been communist.

You said "The higher you move up the minumum wage the more unemployment goes up". Strangely the same effect seems to be true going the other way. Places paying 25 cents an hour actually have high unemployment. Again, I know reality doesn't mesh with your ideology so you ignore it but its true. Why? Because the aggregate demand of people paid 25 cents an hour is economically useless.

How does the multiplier effect work? I'll quote from my old text (Blomqvst) : "The answer is that as businesses build more factories and order more equipment, people are put to work producing the factories and equipment. They earn more wages. As their incomes rise, they increase their consumption expenditures. Thus the nation produces not only more capital goods but also more consumer goods; national product rises by more than investment."

The entire explanation goes on for many pages. I'm sure you can understand why I wouldn't want to type in the whole chapter.

You said : "I'm not saying a mixed economy doesn't work but the fact is in a mixed econmy there will always be unemployment" and "I assume if there is less people working there is less people contributing to the economy". Yes of course less people working means less demand. Full employment at lower wages produces the same problem however as IMF-advised countries continually prove to their detriment. A mixed economy is not perfect, nothing is. But given the current choices out there its the direction I prefer. A functioning free market on top of a quality social safety net makes capitalism palatable. A "human-face" if you will. Remove the net, or let it deteriorate and you will get much larger problems which will eventually lead to the end of your free market. As Coyote says, capitalism creates communists.

Lynn: The Greens have as much right to claim themselves as the only real authentic environmental party no more or no less than the NDP claim themselves to be the only true "progressive" party.[which they do endlessly] The NDP's claim to be the only party that can do X is as offensive to me as my claim regarding the Greens is to you. Ok I'll give, there can be more than one truly environmental party, it still isnt the NDP, it is the federal Greens :-) Seriously, though why is it ok for the NDP to be an environmental friendly party and not ok for the Green Party to be friends of labour, small business or first nations ? The Greens have policies that are friendly to all these issues. Lets face it the NDP are no friends of the Greens, all the negative things I have learned about election have come from my no holds barred political training via the CLC, so I expect negative comments from the NDP in regard to the Greens, likewise the NDP should not be surprised to hear some real NDP truths coming from the Greens.

Lets just say we agree to disagree. I believe that you should have to work for what you get, you think you are entitled to whatever you want because your born. My understanding of Communism is trying to make everybody equal regardless of what they do or how hard they work. Is that not what income redistribution is? i worked my ass off to get where i'm at and to have some smug lazy person demand that i give them my money while they sit on there ass does not fly with me. Im fine with increasing wages if the market accepts the increased costs, but it won't, trust me it won't. And you won't pay the extra costs you'll buy your stuff somewhere else. Business is competitive in nature and if my prices are too high you'll go to my competitor. If all our prices were high you would be screaming collusion. As far as your Honduras argument give me a break. Why would I set up my business in Horduras? good question. All your examples are at the very extreme end of the spectrum. I'm not saying all regulations are bad, i'm saying it has been taken too far. I don't see why I should throw 20 years of hard work and sacrifice away because because some unskilled labours want more money(I can replace them in a heartbeat, it's not brain surgery placing a piece of wood into a machine). I take the risks, its my house thats collateral with the bank not theirs. I assume all risk and responsibilty yet they deserve to paid as well as me. I'm not some elite businessman I'm someone who has worked hard all my life and you(and your socialist friends) come along in all your smugness and say that I don't deserve what I've built for myself and should share it with everybody. Lets just have a %100 Income tax then we can divide our countries entire revenue among our entire population evenly and we can live happily ever after.

rockerbiff: I don't agree with the claim the NDP is the only "progressive" party as much as I don't agree with the claim you made that the Greens are the only real authentic environmental party. Both are equally stupid statements - the statement itself not the commenter.

Good luck also to Gregor, the "good" businessman, who, rather than grind workers down which is the mean fashion of late, willingly recognizes and rewards their valuable contribution in the grand, very apolitical tradition of "do unto others..."

Bongo, I haven't even mentioned entitlements, or argued for communism, nor am I smug and lazy. You're throwing out a straw-man.

Honduras is not extreme (certainly no more so than Cuba), I could have picked a much poorer country. My point was only that using Honduras as an example for you to respond to would allow us to find some middle ground. Originally I only challenged you on your assertion that one business guy in the NDP was some sort of strange event. You've said you're in favour of some regulation, decent, but not obscene wages, and a social safety net. What I'm saying is that we're only disagreeing on the degree, not the mixed economy itself. The people in the NDP really aren't that extreme.

You said : "I believe that you should have to work for what you get, you think you are entitled to whatever you want because your born".

I say that people do not enjoy the benefits of their work. Most of the wealth in this country is in the hands of a few. The few do not work to a large degree anywhere near the capacity required to have gained that wealth. Do you think that inheritances, stocks and bonds etc are worth more than working? Because the wealth disparity between the working poor and the top 10% in Canada is incredible. Nobody who claims that those who work enjoy the benefits of their toil has looked at the stats. They don't. Investing in an existing clothing company and making more money than the combined salaries of all the offshore workers is obscene. No system will stand up for any appreciable length of time under those rules.

In fact I would go so far as to suggest that those who feel "entitled" are not on the left, they are among the top few percent of wealth owners in this country. You may not like unions but at least the people in them work. Unlike someone such as Belinda Stronach or George Bush who really are "entitled" to a life of luxury without working.

One thing I do agree with you on is the inheritance part of it. The richest few people will pass their money on for generations keeping the bottom down to some degree. But we do live in a country where ANYONE can be sucessful if they put there mind to it. Many of the wealthiest people I know made there money through hard work, not inheritance. I do not however agree with unions due to the fact that they keep people from maximizing there potential by bringing them back to the lowest common denominator.(which is where my communism reference comes in) I do not have a problem with high wages if deserved. An example would be the HEU. There are very high trained workers (technicians) and low skilled (janitors) Why are they lumped together? Thats the nature of a union, bringing the best back to the worst. Unions are bad for employers, and good employees but great for unskilled, uneducated, lazy workers (the worst employees). After all a Union is a business that doesn't care about its customers (businesses, taxpayer), so why should we care about unions? One thing is for certain though, being a pro-union business person is an oxymoron

Bongo. Really? Did your daddy sit you down as a child and explain all this socialism to you? "A union is a business that doesn't care about its customers (businesses,taxpayers), so why should we care about unions?" To begin with a union is not a business, unless the Salvation Army or the United Way or even the Lions Club are businesses too. Profit isn't the motive, but service is. Bongo, pay real close attention here because you seem to be confused. A union's customers are not the employer, the business or the taxpayer, but rather the members who pay dues to ensure their union will have the financial and political clout to go to the wall with jerks who think their excess wealth and profits are an entitlement that comes before paying a good day's wages for a good day's work. A good union has respect for the employer, but will insist on respect flowing from the employer to the workers in return. Unfortunately, you appear to have grown up in one of those households were making a buck is more important than anything and paying taxes was seen as a communist conspiracy to get the family estate. I do hope you take a more enlightened approach on other business costs and actually pay for things like Workers Compensation and holiday pay or are your employees normally encouraged to leave before the $6-an-hour training period expires?

Well theoretically anyone can be successful but the odds are definitely not even.

I happen to like unions but I understand your point. We'll have to agree to disagree here. However, if places like Honduras had strong unions, wages would rise and domestic demand would increase and a better society would eventually come to be. Also, many companies are ran by a management that never worked on the floor. In such cases, why shouldn't a union exist to defend the workers from some new guy's pet ideas on how to run a corporation he may have joined only a few weeks earlier.

I'm sure you would agree also that its not just wages and benefits that unions are good for. In places without unions its who does a better job of sucking up or who is a friend or relative of who that counts. All very discouraging if you're not in the inner circle. Experience should count and unions, through seniority lists, enforce that. That can mean more to many people than minor increases in pay.

Strangely enough, many union members tend to be supporters of other political parties than the NDP. Its certainly not the case that the NDP wins consistently in riding with high levels of private-sector union members.

the best post goes to Frank,Bongo is so far up the right wing ass of Gordo.he must have brown ankles,keep it up Frank you make sense that Bongo could not possibly digest,cheers to you. Ed .

With all of the lively Bongo interaction that we have been doing, I for one would like to state that I do not shop at Walmart or Superstore, FutureShop or any other mega-monopoly operation. I would really prefer dealing with small or moderate sized BC businesses. I really don't care if I am paying a bit more. Sadly I feel that Bongo may be right that price-sensitive shoppers may not buy his goods at a highter price. I can understand that he is the one taking the risk in his business.

Now commenting on another post: Why do right wingers use terms like "Freedom For Canadians" when they really mean "Give Tax Money Back to the Rich and Screw the Social Programs" I believe that Canadian should certainly be allowed to persue wealth, but why are neo-cons like the BC Liberals trying to destroy what makes Canada different?

Also, why do right wingers use the term "non partisan" when they are extremely partisan? This is not a rhetorical question. It is dishonest to call yourself non partisan just to get yourself elected.

There are so many cases of misuse of words like democracy,and liberty.

Bongo says "I forgot though, you want a world where everyone is equal". We're not all equal? We are Bongo; you are not better than someone who earns less than you- I'm not better than the citizens of an entire country because what I pay for a latte is more than what they earn in a week. All this bs talk of "success" and "pursuing wealth" is so sad. Our world is so sad. The happiest I've ever ever been in my life (well, other than right now with my dog lounging beside me next to the fireplace and a hot cup of tea on hand :) is when I trekked in Nepal. Hey, I was unemployed at the time- not much in my pack, not a lot of money in my pocket, but I was successful, Bongo- because the word means to thrive and achieve what you set out to do. It's not all about money. It IS about people earning a fair and decent wage so that at the end of the day they can make a hot cup of tea and have a roof over their head.

My vote for the best post above also goes to Frank. Good stuff. I wonder which group could buy the most of bongo`s products? The decent living wage or the low-wage ?

Why were unions created Bongo? It was the greed and abuse of powers by unscupulous owners/operators. It was their abuses that pushed the workers to organize. Bad bosses created unions...irony eh? Without wishing to spend too much time in the past, the reality is that today's globalization schemes being led by G-8 nations, WTO and GATT are a continuation of the bad ol'days of robber barons. It's not the small business owners promoting this, it's the multinationals who have gained more power than the people by right-wing appointed judges in the late 1800's. Answer this Bongo: Do corporate CEO's "deserve" a wage 500% above the lowest paid labourer? The squeeze is on as resources diminish and the myth of "infinite resources = infinite wealth" crashes head-on with "free-market" ideologies that, like pirates of old, roam the earth like locusts and plunder ( i.e. lowest wages). How low can you go? I'm not a huge fan of winning a race to the bottom, are you? Unions, weakened as they are from the likes of Reagan & Thatcher and our perennial friend of BC's millionaires, Gordan Campbell, are trying to stem the bleeding from communities just like yours Bongo, or the middle-class is toast in BC. Have you seen the documentary "Corporation"? If not, it is a must see...if only to hear a few enlightened CEO's admit that unfettered capitalism is a plague on the planet and big business behaves in a psychopathic fashion. This new NDP candidate seems like the right person to bridge the "old NDP" to the "new NDP".

The reality is - Much of what Bongo says is the truth. As consumers we look for the best deals, best value, a sale, clear out - whatever - It is done each and every day. There is a reason why places like Wal-Mart are thriving in B.C. The only way places like Wal-Mart work is by keeping costs, including labor, down. Do all those who advocate for paying higher wages boycott Wal-Mart ? Absolutely not. Are people willing to accept these jobs each and every day ? They do. Of course the NDP and Unions come along and offer false hope offering higher wages for a "decent" living. Who will pay these wages ? Not the consumer, we continue to look for the best deals. And not the employer either - Much as if you raise the rent in an apartment building, people move on to something they can afford. Hence why so many people left B.C. during the 90's - they went to where there was a more affordable climate for investment - Alberta is one example. So this ultimately leaves the tax-payer footing the bills and the debt gets racked up to almost 17 Billion over two terms of NDP - The end result is the entire Province votes them out of office and you end up with a loopsided Gov. that the NDP now complains about constantly, and yet cannot admit it was them who created this situation by doing such a terrible job when they were in goverment in the first place. Why is this concept so difficult to understand ?

The concept that you present is hard to understand because it is BS. The Auditor General of BC stated that the NDP left a surplus of 1.5billion,and, was operating in a sustainable manner, ie more coming in than going out. The current mess is that a large tax break was given to those that didn`t need it, crippling the province`s finances. If you didn`t like the 17Billion you refer to, how do you like the debt know? Why comment on the NDP debt without commenting on the current debt? It is true that people look for bargains without concern for the conditions in the stores that sell them. It is also true that it is getting harder and harder to buy Canadian/USA products in some stores. Why even Levi Strauss no longer makes jeans in North America. But will the price of the third world Levis be less? Not a chance.

With all do respect, I think you miss my point. Had the former NDP Government not done such a poor job in the 90's they would not have been so badly trounched from office. I cannot comment on the claim that the NDP left a balanced budget as there was an Indep. fiscal review panel that stated clearly the NDP balanced budget was unsustainable to the tune of 4.1 billion. Much like the fudget budget, it was yet another false promise when spending commitments were factored in. Kind of like going to the Brick tomorrow and buying 10,000 dollars worth of furniture on the don't pay for 90 day plan - your budget might be balanced today, and for the next few months, but once the 90 days is up and the payments kick in, suddenly your so called balanced budget is not so balanced anymore.

I have to agree with Bongo on the note that we wouldn't have to deal with Wal-Mart if Canadians wouldn't shop there. Bongo is right that too many Canadians will save a dollar by buying a product where everything behind that product is simply wrong. Whether its low-wage labour or foreign repatriation of profits. Too many people don't at least make an attempt to support the local economy. Buying foreign goods from a US company when a similar Canadian product (union made or not) is available (not always true I know) is the same as the government buying German ferries. Of course, this is preaching to the converted :)

Frustrated, Alberta is not a good comparison with BC. The oil revenues that Alberta brings in yearly make any comparison invalid. Of course people will move there. Alberta can afford to have zero sales tax and maybe even zero income tax while at the same time paying high enough salaries to attract the people required such as doctors from the rest of Canada.

Personally, I think all Canadians should share in the wealth of Canada, not just those in the province those resources lie under. I doubt Saudi Arabia only has low gas prices for those near the wells. Doesn't seem like any benefit at all when Alberta is willing to sell Canadian gas to fellow Canadians at the same price as they charge everyone else.

As for the NDP and the debt. The NDP had to either make cuts or run deficits. The federal government dollars flowing into the BC liberal coffers weren't there in the mid-90's when the feds were reducing their debt on the backs of the provinces. Other jurisdictions in Canada faced the same problems. Its not fair to single out the NDP when even the PCs in Ontario ran up huge deficits (which they hid) at a time when their manufacturing economy (mainly the auto-sector) was firing on all cylinders.

I supported the increased debt to maintain the social programs over the short-term until provincial transfers were increased, as they have been.

I would like to introduce a slight change of topic, which is nontheless highly relevant to this thread as the bc liberals attempt to reposition themselves as kinder, gentler, CENTRIST backstabbing liars.

I learned yesterday that the bc liberals, while crowing continually about the $70 "increase" to payments to Persons With Disabilities, or PWD, (which does not come even CLOSE to replacing diet allowances, home visits and other benefits gutted by them a few years ago) have been secretly behind the scenes been attacking another group of the disabled, those in the PPMB classification. People on PPMB recieve just $610 a month, but include many people with SEVERE disabilities, including those with aids, hepatitus, people with canes, walkers and wheel chairs, and those with mental disabilities and addictions. In general this group is made up of those who can not find a doctor to do the new 23 page disability form, which replaced the old seven page form. The 23 page form constitutes HOURS AND HOURS of a doctor's time at extremely low compensation and many doctors do not even want to look at it. Changed in secret, and completely unnannounced in canwest media (except in "sound-off threads, where I'm announcing it in every undeleted comment beginning today) the liberals now require a statement from all those on PPMB, from their doctor that it is physically impossible forn them to look for work -essentially the same as the end result of a successfull 23 page application.

Please listen carefully, this means that even IF someone on PPMB has everyone of the disabilities listed above, and is in continual pain and faces INSURMOUNTABLE BARRIERS, including those of age and the job market, that even if they have been vigorously looking for work, that they will lose their PPMB status. To sum up, what the liberals have done is to prevent HIGHLY DISABLED PEOPLE FROM ACHIEVING PWD STATUS, and then are turning around and attacking them in secret. Nor are PPMB persons who need to reapply for PPMB status EVEN BEING INFORMED OF THE CHANGES IN THE ACT IN THE LETTER THEY RECIEVE WHEN THEIR TWO YEARS IS UP AND THEY MUST RENEW THEIR STATUS. Remember, there is now a gag order on all bc social workers about speaking about about negative consequences of bc liberal policy. The liberals are simply hoping that those on PPMB will only find out AFTER IT'S TOO LATE. Welcome to the new "CENTRIST" BC LIBERALS.

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This is no more than assaulting an entire category of the disabled by stealth. The liberals have essentially rewritten the PPMB act so that the category barely even exists. A HUGE numbver of severely disablesd people are going to be tossed into the street, especially if the liberals get reelected. I have contacted the BC Coalition of Persons with Disabilities and they are just learning of the behind-the-scenes GUTTING of this program -court challenges are highly possible. I am also going to contact shreck and others in hopes of an article regarding this HEINOUS BETRAYAL OF THE DISABLED BY THE BC LIBETRALS. I respectfully request that the Tyee commission an article about this horrendous behind the scenes abuse of the disabled by the bc liberals. The new changes to the act are posted at the bc government website: www.mhr.govbc.ca/factsheets/2004/ppmb.htm. I know I can be a pain sometimes, but please, please, help me speak up about this. It could save a lot of innocent lives.

To be honest Frank, while I concur that Alberta and B.C. have many differences, I don't think it is entirely fair to blame all of the Provincial NDP Government's debt woes onto the Feds. There were also many poor financial decisions made (fast ferries for one) and that cost taxpayers a ton of money, and added on to our debt. My only point (and as the stats show) people left BC and went to places of opportunity like Aberta. Also, other Provinces did not have their credit rating knocked down as badly as we did, and thankfully it is on the rise back up. Sadly there are people who do not appreciate that this is good news for all of us, regardless of where we put our "X" on voting day. Why is that ?

I'm listening, Lewis. My friend (who has bi-polar and is on PWD) told me a few days ago about the $70 increase crap, which essentially they have due to the money they recently cut ($50 for volunteer work and emergency allowance?) The cuts of course weren't reported and now they're trying to look good for the upcoming election. I'll check out that site.

Only an N.D.P.er would complain about a raise.No one is forcing you to take it. Send it back.

Mr.Swift, For starters I found that the link you posted did not work. I took the time to visit the Ministry of Human resources website firsthand from the Government homepage at www.gov.bc.ca I did not find any of your claims there, in fact, I found "All BC Employment and Assistance clients are also eligible for the Medical Services Plan, no deductible Pharmacare, optical and emergency dental coverage. " I also found that the recent increase to persons with a disability is the largest increase in the history of B.C. Government, and far from the token gesture that you implied I took things a step further and called a neighbor who works for the Ministry, she also stated that your claims were completely spun out of control. She indicated the only change to persons with PPMP is that new applicants are assessed at the regional level and not local, as was the case in the past. She also indicated that this was consistent untrue rumor that her staff had also dealt with at length. Why you desire to generate fear and false information for people that are truly less fortunate is for political gain is reproachful. Give your head a shake.

Frustrated, Let's look at what we can agree on. BC ran up a debt of 17 billion under the NDP. Social programs and health care and education either received increases or small cuts. Federal transfers were cut. Fast ferries ended up a failure but at least the money was spent here and contributed to the economy (just as the building boom in Kelowna due to the fires contributed to the Liberals' economy).

Under the Libs, federal transfers increased, commodity prices skyrocketed, interest rates fell, yet deficits were run, social programs were cut and non-income taxes and fees such as MSP were increased. And poverty, as reported by increased food bank usage, has increased.

Can we agree on those things?

If so, then can we also agree that many social problems can't wait for the vagaries of the economic cycle? In other words, if your kids are sick, you don't wait till you have a better paying job, you borrow the money. Because some things are too important to be left till you have the money.

I've never said the NDP could walk on water and that they never made mistakes. Would be rather Bush-like if I had. I'm simply saying that looking at it objectively the NDP did not do a bad job. And in areas that are harder to quantify on a balance sheet such as funding social programs I'm happy with the course they followed.

Frank, Thank you for your reply, I can actually agree with many of your points; The Fed’s did decrease transfer payments, 17 billion was added to our debt, fast ferries did not work, interest rates have fallen, commodity prices are up, as are MSP Premiums, as are federal transfer payments, and deficit’s have been run. I disagree strongly with your philosophy on social programs. Social programs are very important, however what is even more important is having the ability to fund those programs. I will grant that the NDP tried to place an emphasis on social programs, however in the end they nearly bankrupt the province in the process. This government takes a different approach – Let’s get the economy going first, and once we have money to spend, let’s spend it to help those most in need. Not unlike life – every community has it major philanthropists, however to reach that level of giving, first they had to have the economic means to do so, hence how they become the people that they are. You referenced Kelowna – Some lumber baron recently donated something like 14 million to UBC Okanagan – Why, because he had the economic wherewithal to do so. – I submit that is what we are looking at in B.C. today. This government finally has the economy going to make a difference and they are. Let’s face it, we all would like to have the ability to give money away to those who are less fortunate, and generally it is those who have way more that do. Just look at Carnegie as an example. However we must first be able to afford to do so, and I feel like for the first time in this Province, we really do have the economic means to move forward AND fund the social programs that we really need. My .02

"Response," you are mistaken. The link I posted was given me By an ADVOCACY WORKER, those official, sanctioned, mostly volunteer workers, often with disabilities themselves, who are the frontline defense all diasabled persons in bc, along with the BC Coalition of Persons with Disabiliities. Nearly all disabled people seek an advocate's advice and support before such things as undergoing the new 23 page (UP from seven pages under the bc liberals) application form.

My advocate, who helps disabled people every week, informed in unequivocal words that the bc liberals, UNNANNOUNCED IN CANWEST, BEHIND THE SCENES HAD CHANGED ONE KEY WORD IN THE ACT, THAT EFFECTIVELY RENDERS THE ACT INTO A MECHANISM FOR THROWING DISABLED PEOPLE OFF PPMB AND THAT ALSO CONTRAVENES THE ENTIRE SPIRIT UNDER WHICH THE BC LIBERALS AND THE DISABLED AND THEIR ADVOCATES CAME TO AN AGREEMENT OF PPMB REPLACING THE OLD DISABILITY ONE. The bc liberals tried to get away with no replacement for at ALL, a wish I believe they are now implementing.

The key word change is changing the word "IMPEDES," to "PRECLUDES," in the phrasing that PPMB benefits are meant for those ONLY whose medical condition PRECLUDES, ie, PREVENTS ABSOLUTELY (and what's the test of that??) them from getting employment. Not only that, she told me,without qualification that the decision as to whether you qualify is no longer made by your worker, but is instead, mailed to an office where the decision is made without input from the disabled person in question, by a very few APPOINTED individuals. As to the websight, that is the correct site, although I haven't visited it as yet. Check it again, "RESPONSE," or I will. But advocates are always the FIRST to learn of such changes, and they certainly don't tell people of threats that are not absolutely real, so maybe you and your social worker friend should be shaking your own heads, for the bc liberals after reassuring the disabled otherwise seem to HAVE COMPLETELY ALTERED THE SPIRIT OF PPMB LEGILATION FROM HELPING THE DISABLED TO THROWING THEM OUT IN THE STREET, WHILE CROWING ABOUT A HALF REPAID PAYBACK TO SEVERELY DISABLED PEOPLE, AFTER INNTRODUCING A NEW AND EXCEPTIONALLY DIFFICULT TO PASS APPLICATION FORM. I will be talking to ever disabled advocate I can find as well as the bc coalition of disabilities to ensure that what I have learned is true, and I expect my respectfull remarks to be posted. The advocate I saw said she had already told several people on disability what she told me, as we were discussing my doing some unpaid writing, advocating for the disabled....and "response." rent increases for the poor and the disabled invariably wind up in the hands of landlords, especially after the bc liberal GUTTING of the residential tenancy act.

Frustrated, thank you for your reasoned response. And I'm happy to see we don't have to be burdened arguing over things we can generally agree on. So on to the crux of the matter.

I agree that if you don't have the economy, it doesn't matter how big your heart is, you can't fund social programs. However, its in hard times when those services are needed most, not during boom times. Therefore I see deficits as sometimes being necessary.

I'm not being political when I say that I don't believe the Libs policies were responsible for low interest rates or high commodity prices and that the increased federal transfers fell in their lap. If the NDP had won the last election the same things still would have occurred. Therefore I don't believe the Liberals turned around the economy. I think it was going to turn around anyway. I also don't believe BC was on the verge of bankruptcy. If it was, America is already bankrupt. I do believe that the last 2 budgets of the NDP were balanced and therefore that the NDP's deficits were not going to continue. The economy was growing, quite well in most years. We aren't looking at 0% economic growth under the NDP or anything. In other words, having stopped the deficits and with healthy economic growth the NDP had already turned the corner. Without making big cuts.

So although I agree with much of what you say, I don't believe the BC libs put us on the right track and I do blame them for making "hard decisions" which I don't think were necessarily hard at all. The only reason for the big deficits the Libs ran and increased non-income taxes and social service cuts that I can see is to pay for the income tax cut. To me that's ideology, not sound economics.

Postscript: RIGHT -AT THE REGIONAL LEVEL, NO LONGER BY YOUR WORKER, AND NOW BY ONLY A SINGLE ABSOLUTE CRITERIA, WHICH IS ACTUALLY THE SAME CRITERIA, SHORTENED, AS THE CRITERIA FOR THE 23 PAGE FORM.

Gee, "RESPONSE," I just found the site, and the act with remarkable ease, one hit, first time, using googol as a search engine. At the top of the easily located page it states THAT THE ACT HAS BEEN UPDATED (Gee, I wish I could get a look at what the old act said) and the word PRECLUDES, appears in exactly the way I indicated. I'll talking to the bc coalition of persons with disabilities, as well. they've been on holiday today. This is a direct quote, I don't how to post a link yet, but I've been meaning to learn: THe PPMB category recognizes (here I have left out two other stringent qualifying conditions which MUST also be met) those who are unable to achieve financial independence because of multiple barriers to employment and who have a medical condition lasting at least one year, and that is likely to continue or reoccur for at least two years and which BY ITSELF, (new language "by itself"??) PRECLUDES their ability to search for, accept, or continue employment. More on this tomorrow.

I left out the act has been updated AUGUST THIRD, 2004 _EXACTLY THE TIME FRAME THE ADVOCATE GAVE ME...still upset.

And, remember, "RESPONSE," "-no using the disabled for political gain."

David Schreck has a graph on interprovincial migration to BC and it shows that the latest BC adbvertisements is just another lie. www.strategicthoughts.com

Why would anyone want to move here to experience expensive rents and overpriced homes when BC jobs are paying less?

I have tried to contact the bc coalition of people with disabilities and their office is closed today. I will retturn online with this when my research and data are complete. Neevertheless all emerging information suggests that circumstances are what I have indicated.

Henry, 11/11/2004 6:02:10 PM, writes: Only an N.D.P.er would complain about a raise.No one is forcing you to take it. Send it back. The cuts that have been made are tough for anyone, even tougher though for those on disability. The government has cut funding the $50 volunteer program. This money helped get some of the PWD clients back into the larger community. The funds helped pay for extra costs required when you volunteer somewhere, like buying your lunch, or coffee, getting better clothes so you don't stand out too much. The $70 is welcome, PWD clients deserve it and what's more need it. Just don't give me all the crap about the Govt doing something great. They have already clawed most of that money back.

Sue Clark, Thank you for you the link to Mr.Schreck’s website, at first it all made sense to me, What Mr. Schreck said about 1989-1995 all made sense. However then I took the time to actually look at his Stats Can graph, posted at his website, and was in complete disbelief He mentions 1995, as that was the “peak” of that graph, and the peak of net migration in BC’s favor. After that, the graph takes a near ninety-degree nosedive, just after the NDP managed to get a second term. In fact it dives in 1996 until 2000 – the year the NDP was voted out of BC in record numbers. Once the Liberlas were comfortably in control in 2001 – the graph has risen at an alarming rate – at present almost as fast, if not faster than it did in the 80’s. In fact, that graph tells the truth – It is Mr.Schreck who only mentions 1989-1995 and somehow does not mention 1995-2001, the very years the graph nose-dived sharply. So I look a little further on his site, and my god, those years when everyone left B.C. 1996-2000, the years he does not mention on his website, were the years this fools was in the premiers office. If in doubt, look at the graph yourself www.strategicthoughts.com and look at 1995-2001 in particular, after that look at 2002-2004 and see the direction that we are currently headed (that would be up). After that look at this morons own “about me” link at www.strategicthoughts.com/aboutme.html and you will see very clearly that he WAS in the Premiers office when the Province was falling apart and people were leaving in droves. Until tonight, I never really believed that there was such blatant political misinformation out there, however Mr. Schreck has proven me wrong, thank you Sue Clark for bringing this to my attention. It is truly sad, and more so you when ypu need only study the Stats Can. Graph to learn the truth !

Sue Clark, Thank you for you the link to Mr.Schreck’s website, at first it all made sense to me, What Mr. Schreck said about 1989-1995 all made sense. However then I took the time to actually look at his Stats Can graph, posted at his website, and was in complete disbelief He mentions 1995, as that was the “peak” of that graph, and the peak of net migration in BC’s favor. After that, the graph takes a near ninety-degree nosedive, just after the NDP managed to get a second term. In fact it dives in 1996 until 2000 – the year the NDP was voted out of BC in record numbers. Once the Liberlas were comfortably in control in 2001 – the graph has risen at an alarming rate – at present almost as fast, if not faster than it did in the 80’s. In fact, that graph tells the truth – It is Mr.Schreck who only mentions 1989-1995 and somehow does not mention 1995-2001, the very years the graph nose-dived sharply. So I look a little further on his site, and my god, those years when everyone left B.C. 1996-2000, the years he does not mention on his website, were the years this fools was in the premiers office. If in doubt, look at the graph yourself www.strategicthoughts.com and look at 1995-2001 in particular, after that look at 2002-2004 and see the direction that we are currently headed (that would be up). After that look at this morons own “about me” link at www.strategicthoughts.com/aboutme.html and you will see very clearly that he WAS in the Premiers office when the Province was falling apart and people were leaving in droves. Until tonight, I never really believed that there was such blatant political misinformation out there, however Mr. Schreck has proven me wrong, thank you Sue Clark for bringing this to my attention. It is truly sad, and more so you when ypu need only study the Stats Can. Graph to learn the truth !

Good response, Frustrated. I already know who David Schreck is. Yes, he does represent the BC Liberal opposition. This province *needs* and opposition.

Try measuring the area under the curve for the NDP years and compare with the Liberal years. Sure there is a small upward trend in 2004, but 8 of the 10 years of the NDP had higher Canadian migration than the Liberal 2004 year.

Again I ask: Why would anyone move here with poor medical coverage, bad education funding, poor paying jobs and expensive housing costs? Millionaires would love this, and in BC, we have them in greater numbers than any other Canadian province. Why is Gordon Campbell robbing the middle class and the poor to hand money to the rich?

Interprovincial migration is simply another red herring put out by the gordon campbell regime to hide the fact that their economic plan has been a DISMAL failure. It's certainly not THAT viable a measure of economic growth any way, particularly in bc. Why? Because bc has the mildest climate in the country it will often attract net immigration anyway. There are also seasonable variations having to do with seasonal industries, and returning and leaving students. In general Shreck's statements and arguments are based on documented STATSCANADA STATISTICS, far more than can be said for the bc liar's doctored, cherry-picked, HIGHLY MISLEADING, tax payer funded television and newspaper ads, which bill tieleman estimates have cost over $10,000.000 already. How many drop in centers for youth and women would that have funded as the bc liars BRAG of their "surplus," which if the sale of bc rail were removed, along with the cuts to social sevices, the school closings, the tripled tuiution WOULD BE A MASSIVE DEFICIT...all accompanied by an ASSAULT on 30 years of social progress as the bc economy remains the second slowest growing in canada, with the fastest growing debt -6 billion in new debt in a mere three and one half years! How anyone can have voted for the bc liberals, and look either their children or their grandchildren in the eye, without a queasy grin of betrayal will remain forever beyond my comprehension, and thank christ for that small favor.....

I agree Sue, we do need more opposition. Why I am I frustrated? There is too much misinformation out there. And both sides do this way to much. I only look for real factual information. I was bothered by Mr.Schrecks website as it concentrated only on the stats that were positive and to his advantage, and yes I know some will argue "that's politics" However does that make it right ? He completely ignored the sharp decline, and the recent rise, and more so ignored the decline when he was in the Premiers office - to me this is false and misleading and for other people to rely on that information without looking at the full trend is simply not accurate. More importantly you ask, "Why would people move here" today? And yet even Schrecks Graph indicates that the amount of people moving back here is on the increase, regardless of how that is spun. What if we looked at % of decrease under the former government and % of increase on the current Gov.? Misinformation is rampant - just look at the last post by Lewis Swift. Mr. Swift I challenge you to prove that our debt has grown by 6 Billion under the current Government. If this were true it would need be over 40 Billion today and looking at the most recent Quarterly report on the Ministry of finance website, clearly it is not. The NDP’s own financial records indicate that the debt was roughly 17.262 Billion when they formed Government, and was just over 34 Billion when they left Government. In fact the updated first quarter report for this year has the debt at 37.229 Billion. So you do the math and show me where you come up with your claims. It is time we started doing our own research and quit letting “experts” like Mr.Schreck and Mr.Swift give us information that is either false, or presented in a manner that only tells half of the real story.

Swift reminds me of a seagull, if he's not eating, he's squawking, if he's not squawking he's shitting.

Swift reminds me of a seagull, if he's not eating, he's squawking, if he's not squawking he's shitting.

I believe some debt has been off-loaded. For example, some entities that were considered part of the Crown are now somewhat "privatized" and took their debt off the books when they went. Political move.

In-migration should climb regardless of the government from here on as the baby boomers retire. And a lot of people from the rest of Canada love to retire here. Unfortunately, our tax base won't climb with them as much as if they were workers. However, health care costs will skyrocket.

And yes it is frustrating that stats are always massaged to make a political point. But if you look at both sides, and the source of the stats themselves you should be able to find the truth. That's all I ever complained about from the local papers, they only give you one side.

In the mail, I just received the BC government brochure that asks our opinion about what to spend BC budget money on. The document is full of lies. Who needs Statistics Canada when the BC Liberals can just make things up? This is exactly the same as Bill Bennett's lies in the 1980s. Mr. Schreck is not hiding anything or giving false information. Here is another recent Schreck article on interprovincial migration http://www.strategicthoughts.com/record2004/migration.html

F rustrated, your debt numbers are wrong. You are attributing Gordon Campbells 2001 tax cut debt to the NDP. $4 billion of the 17.262 Billion was Gordon Campbell's gift to the rich. You want Lewis to prove this?

Now regarding the migration graph, you are looking at a higher immigration in ONE year (2004) and we are calling it a trend. The graph shows a single point for each year and draws a line between the points. You cannot draw any conclusions about a single point on the graph. Since 42% of the 2004 migrants to BC were over 65 years old, these are likely to be millionaire retirees. My guess is that most of the rest are the construction workers coming in to work in the housing boom, which was fueled by fears that the interest rates would be going up in the near future. There was a downward trend in the last couple of NDP years, but the point is that the BC Liberals have been and continue to be telling us a pack of lies. The 2004 migration is just *not* very high. The brochure that you will receive in the mail seems to be saying that BC had ZERO GDP growth under the NDP when it has actually much higher than under the Liberals.

As I have said before, the NDP debt was inherited from the Social Credit government. The BC Liberals and the Socreds are the same people.

Sue, Please take some time to do some research, or at least more carefully read my post before you comment. The 17.262 Billion I mentioned was the total Provincial Debt before the NDP came in power during the early 90's. In fact, it was the amount of debt that the NDP inherited from the Socreds, if you will. It had nothing at all to do with the BC Liberals, or tax cuts, or anything else. Your un-informed comments are a big part of the problem in understanding what is really occurring in BC today. As for the migration stats, anyone not capable of looking at the graph on Mr.Schrecks website and clearly seeing a decline in the late 90's and a dramatic increase in the last two years is clearly in denial. It is important to realize and understand that MORE people are moving to BC today - Why? Because Frank makes a really good point. We do have people who love to come here from the rest of Canada to retire, and as Frank has pointed out, with them, (being older retirees) comes the healthcare problems that they have, and that in turn leads to sky-rocketing health costs. This is one of the real reasons why things have gotten so demanding under health care – the demands are surpassing our ability to provide the services. Plain and simple, however if people are going to be in denial over the real causes for only partisan purposes that we are all in trouble. Let’s get do away with the misinformation on whatever side it might lie and deal with the facts. Is that possible? Or is finger pointing and misinformation more important as long as it suits a political need ?

I agree with Sue Clark; the BC Liberals & the Socreds are the same people, with a dash of The Alliance/Conservative parties thrown in the pot! The Hate NDP Campaign is nothing new! The CCF started and was labeled Communists by big business and politicians who didn't want to give up power or give their workers decent wages/working conditions. Look at Charles Dickens', Christmas Carol. "decrease the surplus population,. . . are there no prisons, are there no workhouses." Greed/power and dumbing down the masses; they are too poor, scared, hungry, uneducated, to stand up for their rights and dignity as human beings. History repeats itself. I will fight for those who can't speak for themselves, despite ridicule and insults. Human kind is everyone's business, but alas others are selfishly hoarding wealth and ignoring the suffering around them. I am a person living in poverty. I struggle, yet I still help others when ever I can. Is it so wrong to ask others who are more fortunate, to do the same?

Sue-Shana-- you feel free to declare the Liberals and Socreds as one and the same,but,with the same token though, are you going to declare the N.D.P and B.C.G.E.U as one and the same. Huh.

Sue-Shana-- you feel free to declare the Liberals and Socreds as one and the same,but,with the same token though, are you going to declare the N.D.P and B.C.G.E.U as one and the same. Huh.

Well, Libs and Socreds are both political parties, so it is apples and apples. Whereas the NDP and the BCGEU are a political party and a union, apples and oranges. If the NDP and BCGEU are considered the same then it would be fair to say the Libs/Chamber of Commerce or Socreds/Board of Trade are the same.

Frustrated: Well, that was a great over-simplification of skyrocketing health care costs on your part. Don't you think the Campbell cuts to nurses, technicians and health care workers and their agenda of privatization of health services and the resulting emphasis on a profit margin now plays a part in deteriorating health care and increasing costs? Why did all those nurses in St. Paul's resign en masse? When Global covered this story their emphasis was on how privatization was the answer to the chaos and they shrugged off the nurses' union president statement that the answer lay in finding out why so many nurses would resign en masse. The present government wants the waiting lists to increase, wants services to deteriorate, wants in effect to set the public healthcare system up as a failure so they can bring in more and more privatization. And our mainstream media does it's best to prop them up in their shameful quest.

The 6 billion dollars in new debt in a mere three years under the bc liberals is so well known and well documented, that I am not even going to bother rebuttting the supposedly impartial "frustrated." You're frustrated? THe poor and the disabled are dying unde this government of incompetent ideologues AND EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THE "NEW." LOW WAGE, NO BENEFIT JOBS THE BC LIARS SO EMPTILY BRAG OF, WOULD HAVE HAD TO HAVE GONE TO A WELFARE RECIPIENT IN ORDER FOR ALL THOSE THROWN INTO THE STREET TO HAVE FOUND WORK. CLICK THE ICON ABOUT GARY COLLINS ON THE LEFT OF SHRECK'S PAGE TO SEE VERIFICATION OF THIS. THE BC LIARS TRACKED ONLY THOSE WITH A TELEPHONE, THE VERY GROUP OF THOSE MOST LIKELY TO BE ONLY TEMPORARILY ON WELFARE AND MOST LIKELY TO FIND EMPLOYMENT AND NOT HAVE DISABILITIES. "Frusrated, " your pretense of being unbiased is so ridiculous and so transparent that you must think you are dealing with imbeciles.

I have successfully posted information regarding the gutting of the PPMB disability act by stealth on at least 3 posts on two canwest "sound-off" threads in the province newspaper.. Rightwing postetrs are continuing to get their butts kicked on the ICBC and Medical services/PAtriot Act thread in the vancouver sun. I am gratified to see more tyee posters there, incognito and otherwise. Please pay particular attention to the noxious rightwing ravings of "FREE," (STOP SOCIALISM NOW!) and "Teddyden," "jaydee" TROG, and "Michael." Don't neglect the ideas canwest least wants the public to know: the economy worse than under the ndp and propped up, by only low interest rates fueling housing starts, and high prices for natural resources, two things having NOTHING TO DO WITH THE BC LIARS.

Read the article on the online victoria times colonist (STRAIGHT FROM THE CANWEST HORSE'S ...um, MOUTH) about the new privatized healthcare services in victoria feeding cheese burgers to recent heart attack victims and white bread to diabetics. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE A SUBSCRIBER TO READ THIS ARTICLE, ALTHOUGH YOU DO VARIABLY, FOR OTHERS. Another shocking, DISGUSTING BETRAYAL BY THE BC LIARS. Another point that doesn't get mentioned nearly enough is that the mustel group, they of the questionable bc liberal popularity polls are also the recipients of LOTS of ad revenue for the latest full page taxpayer funded newspaper ads. HOW 'BOUT THAT SURREY BYELECTION!? Let's keep fighting and send the bc liars - a party which moderates like greg halsey brandt, richmond's former mayor, who at least up about the gutting of social services at the recent liberal pat yourself on the back for assaulting the innocent annual conference- to the same political limbo in 2005 as that of the limbo so populated by bc socreds -those that didn't become bc liberals, I mean. KEEP FIGHTING AND WE WILL WIN!!!

"C-gulled," you remind ME of a sneaky, little coward, who can't string more than 6 words together, but who must continually post under different names. JUST HOW MANT ALIASES DO SUCH POSTERS AS "FRUSTRATED," and "SEE -"GULLED"" USE ANYWAY???

Frustrated: You have to ask why are the demands surpassing our abilities to provide health services? Frank provided an excellent piece of the puzzle in reference to retirees coming to our province but, Frustrated, there are also demands on our system that have been artificially created by government. There has been underfunding of our health authorities, top heavy health management, and outright manipulation of the system in creating bad working conditions that have worked against the public health system and it's workers as exemplified by the nurses at St. Paul's, being left burned-out, working more and more overtime and finally leading to a sudden exodus of operating room nurses.

We need more operating room (OR) nurses and instead of encouraging the OR education of nurses the government and health authorities are asking the nurses to take a huge pay cut to take specialty nursing education. So if we want a "supply" of nurses, maybe we should help them instead of working against them. Maybe then we could move forward in meeting our increasing health "demands". But no, instead of these issues being addressed in our public health system, St. Paul's was sending patients to for-profit private clinics for surgeries that otherwise would have been done in the hospital. If we don't invest in and maintain our public system we will lose our nurses and doctors to the private clinics...which of course reveals the real madness behind the government's very calculated method of bringing in privatization to our health system.

Not so fast Lewis Swift...You show me where there is any proof the current Government has added 6 Billion to the Debt - I say BS. Fact, and call it Political Karma, the NDP firmly established that they inherited a 17,262.4 Billion dollar debt from the Socreds back when they were first elected. Fact - after the NDP was ousted from Victoria our Provincial Debt stood at 34,221 Billion- These are facts verified from the Provincial Governments own financial records when the NDP was still in power and does NOT include the 4.1 billion dollar structural deficit that was discovered by an Independent fiscal review panel. I am leaving that debate for another day. The Fact is the NDP added just under than 17 Billion in debt to the backs of our children, those very same children you claim to be able to look in the eye with untruthful information. At the present time our Provincial debt is sitting at 37,229.0 Billion as of the most recent quarterly report. A far, far cry from the 6 billion you claim - So Mr.Swift, I again challenge you to show me the source of your so-called “well documented” information – the reality is, it is misinformation. So prove me wrong Mr. Swift, show me the 6 Billion you preach of - I am waiting

For Lynn, I do concede that I used an over simplification in assessing our health care challenges; my intent was only to validate Frank’s point that we should be cognizant that we have had increases in demand, and so very few are willing to admit that point as it compromises the ability to make other partisan arguments. I will say in rebuttal that you have oversimplified the position of government with respect to waitlists. The HEU was originally presented with a superior contract that it voted down, and likewise, the HEU was also offered the opportunity to use arbitration to negate the effect on wages and factor in benefits. However the HEU instead asked for a direct cut to wages without allowing members an opportunity to vote on this. I have many friends who are in the HEU, specifically LPN’s and Tech’s and guess what? …They want out of the HEU…and the HEU is fighting to keep them in…just visit the HEU website and read the propaganda to try and sway them to stay. My friends worked hard and got extra training and are being penalized for people with no extra training and a Grade 10 education – still the requirement of many of these positions. And here is the HEU telling us all of the people are equal within the system, as if to imply an LPN can be replaced as easy as a cook. I don’t think so. Perhaps you do. Perhaps that is also part of the problem ?

Are not the debt numbers skewed by the movement of BC Ferries, among others, off-book? In other words, do the government debt figures still include the debt of what were crown corporations?

Regardless, with low interest rates, social service cuts, increased federal transfers, commodity royalties flowing into the coffers, you'd have to be incredibly incompetent to still be increasing the debt. Even the Canucks would have to admit they made money this year if they were still playing :)

The important question is, how has the government performed with all these windfalls landing in its lap. Is BC a better place to live? Is the homeless problem better? Food bank usage down? Students and the sick getting what they need?

If the answer to these is negative then what are the successes the Liberal government can point to? On what basis should we evaluate its performance? In-migration? Doesn't mean a thing to me. Olympics? I hope not. Slightly better credit rating? Sure, there's one. But there has to be more than that after 4 years to be called a success.

Thanks for the gift question, "frustrated at being out of your ethical and moral depth.." There was AN ENTIRE ARTICLE ON IN THE TYEE, LESS THAN SIX MONTHS AGO RE CANWEST IGNORING THE EXPLOSION OF A 6 BILLION DOLLAR DEBT DEBT UNDER THE BC LIARS IN A MERE THREE YEARS AS OPPOSED TO THE 10 YEARS IN WHICH THE NDP CREATED ONLY 10 billin in new debt or half the average annual neew debt under the ndp. Despit ethis, under the ndp canwest couildn't run stories about the growth of provincial debt too often, and made much lamenting and woe of the issue. If anyone can tell me how to search the tyee archives for this artickle I'd be most happy to oblige, although the research would do your limited and highly biased posts more good. Now, "frustrated," try responding to the dozens of OTHER bogus points you raised, that were so easily rebutted by myself and other posters. Inquiring minds would also like to know just how MANTY aliases you use on the tyee...I don't know you get your DOCTORED figures from but can only conclude that they must be from a rightwing thinktank, because they certainly don't exist on any data base I've ever encountered....Or are the bcliars rewriting government websites and tweaking already written and passed legislation in the middle of the night again? Perhaps you can inform readers here just how much of your children's and grandchildren's doubled rents, tripled tuition, hydro rates and gutting of access to BASIC HUMAN AND LABOR RIGHTS WILL BE REPLACED BY YOUR TINY LITTLE TAXCUT, you know, the one the size of your empathy for the less fortunate, your children's future and your own nnow limited chances ofaccess to medicare? My guess is you'll have to lie some more... just like your buddy, gordon backstabber....

Just in case my own slightly vitriolic post replying to "frustrated" is deleted the tyee itself ran an article with the same or similar figures I have given remarking on CANWEST'S REMARKABLE SILENCE ON THE EXPLOSION OF NEW DEBT UNDER THE BC NEOLIBERALS. Can anyone help me find this, if not, I will, sooner or later...

Can I supersize that order of fries, you're having with your heart operation, in good ol' wisdom of the marketplace BC???Oh, and give that diabetic over there a box of chocolates...don't worry, the multinationals are making out LIKE BANDITS....

Lewis: I think the article you are looking for is "Why Silence on BC's Groaning Debt" by Will McMartin.

Very good, lynn. Thank-you kindly, I'll see if I can find it now, which I think I can and report back...

Thanks as well Lynn...I look forward to learning where these "factual" claims really come from.

Yes, I just located the article by using the google the tyee search feature, on the tyee's home page. Mr Mcmartin reports that, as of, Monday, August 9, 2004, "EACH OF US OWES PERSONALLY, $9003, sharply up under the bc liberals." Mr Mcmartin, is a conservative, although, more in the old, joe clark sense in that he seems to eschew the abondonment of ethics and honor so beloved by all neoliberals. To continue: "The burden of government debt on every man, woman, and child in BC has grown by $682 in the THREE (caps mine) short years since gordon campbell took office." So this figure is for a mere three years. "The financial picture darkens when the debt of profitable crown corporations is excluded. (This is called "self-supported-debt" because commercial Crowns such as bc rail and bc hydro are responsible for their own debt repayments, not bc taxpayers.)

"The financial obligations for which bc taxpayers are solely liable the "taxpayer supported debt has grown by a whopping $965 PER CAPITA SINCE 2001 and now stands at $7.937. This represents an increase of 15.6%, a growth rate nearly twice as fast as that of the total debt."

"The document reveals that bc's total debt was in excess of 37.3 billion on march 31, 2004...when the provincial liberals took office in 2001 (IN MAY) the total provincial debt stood at 33.6 billion.

SO. I said 6 billion in new debt in a mere three and ONE HALF YEARS, adding 2 months for the difference between march and may and applying it to the average debt increase means that the new debt in bc is somewhere on the order of 4.5 billion in a mere three and a half years, NEARLY HALF OF THE TOTAL NEW DEBT accumulated under the NDP IN TEN YEARS OF ONLY TEN BILLION, because frankly, "frustrated," I and 90% of thre rest of bc believe no more in structual deficits than we do the easter bunny, especially when such gary collins fantasies are used as a vicious excuse to set social justice back thirty years.

But notice, a KEY THRUST of mr mcmartin's article TAXPAYER SUPPORTED DEBT GREW AT TWICE THE NORMAL RATE UNDER THE BC LIARS, BC RAIL WHICH AVERAGED A PROFIT OF 80 million a year for 19 years, out of 20 was given away along with a billion dollar pension fund for peanuts. HOW'S THAT FOR A STRUCTURAL DEFICIT? -Giving away profit and job generating assetts for half their value. Additionally, NEVER FORGET THAT THE BC LIARS ARE MASTERS OF NEOLIBERAL MATH, HAVE CHANGED THEIR ACCOUNTING PRACTICES AND ARE THE STEPEN HAWKINGS OF CREATIVE ACCOUNTING AND I NO MORE TRUST A ONE OF THEIR FIGURES, OR YOURS MR FRUSTRATION, ANY MORE THAN I WOULD GORDON CAMPBELL'S WORDS ABOUT PROTECTING THE DISABLED, AND WE ALL KNOW OF COURSE, ABOUT YTHE CREATIVE ACCOUNTING PRACTISED BY THE PREMIER'S INLAW, WALLS, WHO MILKED THE MINISTRY OF CHILDREN AND FAMILIES AS A PERSONAL CASH COW -perhaps walls has been helping frustated with his mathematics...

To sum up, I was off but not by much, mr mcmartin substantiates entirely my charges of extreme fiscal recklessness by the bc liberals, even if the disastrous, ill advised taxcut for the rich, which has used AS A CLUB TO ASSAULT THE DISADVANTAGED WAS NOT ARGUMENT ENOUGH...thank you. and goodnght....

Very astute comment from Frank: After all the series of windfalls, how has the government made BC a better place for us all, what are its real successes ? Why are more and more people turning to food banks and why are schools increasingly having to turn to fundraising for items as fundamental as textbooks, why are emergency rooms so chaotic of late...

Frustrated, I will modify my statement or as you rightly say my oversimplification of waiting lists by saying that I think the government has underfunded certain areas of our health system deliberately in order that there is "just enough failure", "just enough waiting," "just enough impatience" in the public system created to tip the scales towards a move to privatization while still keeping the public system limping along enough to show they are not violating The Canada Health Act.

Score lewis swift: 15,893. frustrated: MINUS 5...toodle ooo, best wishes to all the decent human beings out there, you already know How I feel about the other kind....

Mr.Swift...I am afraid your numbers do not add up. You stated the following “the new debt in bc is somewhere on the order of 4.5 billion in a mere three and a half years, NEARLY HALF OF THE TOTAL NEW DEBT accumulated under the NDP IN TEN YEARS OF ONLY TEN BILLION.” Let’s revisit history – Once elected in the early 90’s the NDP Government engaged an independent private accounting firm to go through the Provinces books after the Socred’s were gone…. The amount of Provincial Debt at that time was made very public at 17,262.4 Billion. You will find this number in virtually every NDP Finance Minister’s annual budget report including Joy’s. In other words Lewis, there is no spinning or disputing this number. Now, let’s for a moment assume the somehow, Mr. McMartin’s supplied numbers, that disagree with the Ministry of Finance’s, are accurate and the Ministry is wrong. Even by Mr.McMartins rather conservative to the NDP estimate (in fairness to you Lewis you did mention he was conservative) he pegs the debt inherited by the BC Liberals from the NDP at 33.6 Billion, Now initially I went with the Ministry of Finance number of 34.2, Billion but hey, what a spare .6 Billion to a taxpayer – So let’s go with Mr.McMartin’s number of 33.6 Billion Let’s do simple math…33.6 Billion – 17.262.4 Billion = Over 16 Billion Dollars of Debt from the NDP! Granted I had originally said just under 17, but let’s stick with just over 16 Billion to make Mr.McMartin happy. So we have 16 Billion dollars of debt and you are somehow claiming under 10 Billion ? Well Mr.Lewis you are off by 6 Billion dollars. Now let’s go back to Mr.McMartin’s article – He claims the BC Liberals inherited a Provincial debt of 33.6 Billion and he claimed back in March 31, 2004 the debt was at 37.3 Billion – Now here is what I originally stated “At the present time our Provincial debt is sitting at 37,229.0 Billion as of the most recent quarterly report” So suddenly, Mr.McMartin is not so conservative and rounds up to 37.3 Billion – However I know at least Frank will agree that I am in the ballpark with my Ministry of Finance number of 37.229. Back to math, and once again using Mr.McMartin’s number of 37.3 Billion – 33.6 Billion = 3.7 Billion This Mr.Lewis is much less than the 6 Billion “well known and well documented” amount that you claimed, in fact, it is 2.3 Billion dollars shy – But hey, what’s a spare 2.3 Billion to a taxpayer. Back to the math Mr. Lewis. You were inaccurate in your assessment on the NDP government’s original contribution to our Provincial debt by 6 Billion dollars, and likewise you overstated the BC Liberal contribution by 2.3 Billion. In short Mr. Lewis, your so-called “I was off but not by much” statement is in fact some 8.3 Billion dollars off the mark. Mr.Swift with thinking such as yours you have indeed illustrated the very essence of misinformation. At least now we know where it comes from.

Hogwash. ANd I have heard that 6 billion in debt too many times to doubt it. I repeat I said 6 billion in 3 and ONE HALF years, add in the extra half year and add as well the fact that the first year was really two moths short of a year , add .8 billion=4.5 billion. I REPEAT AGAIN I DO NOT BELIEVE IN STRUCTUEAL DEFICITS, SUBTRACT 4 billion; I have heard many times the 10 billion dollar figure of new debt for the 10 year ndp reign, I believe from bill tieleman and I don't believe YOU have quoted hardly any of the sources for your figures, But yyou know what's really telling about you, and every other mindless, heartless supporter of the bc liars YOY THINK THE ENTIRE TOPIC OF USING AN ARTIFICIAL MANUFACTURED CRISIS, THE TAXCUT FOR THE RICH THE DAY AFTER AS AN EXCUSE TO ATTACK THE DISABLED IS LESS IMPORTANT THAN COLD FACTS AND FIGURES- defending a backstabbing sociopath like gordon campbell for ANY reason, is really akin to making the argument that hey, mussolini wasn't really so bad after all, he made the trains run on time, I don't really care if gordon campnell paved the streets with gold, he deserves criminal sanction for gross betrayal of the public trust, here's another lil' bone for you to chew on, for the balance of gordon campbell's turn bc has had the second slowest growing provincial economy with the fastest growing debt, and as mcmartin showed, campbell has also multiplied taxpayer responsibility for debt especially when you add in the olympics, and something is happening here, but YOU don't know what it is, DO you, mr frusration, I'll bet you get frustrated a lot, especially in an ethics class...AND START GIVING YOUR SOURCES NOT VAGUE REFERENCES TO ACCOUNTANTS, but then that might tellus more about who you are, and aren't... try and think of society and your responsibility to it as more than just a set of facts and figures, facts and figures don't by themsrelves generate much warmth or have much to do with human decency, but that's obviously eluded you, try and emulate the old kind of conservative, one with at least some concscience, because frankly, mr frustato, there's something a little creepy about you, you carry with you the stench of a moral void and it's not a pretty smell...

Didn't BC Ferries have to pay off a $427,701,000 debt it owed to the province? That would certainly have increased the debt upwards but it would no longer show on the books.

So Mr.Lewis, Your rational is that if you heard something “many times” it must be true? Even using those “conservative” numbers provided by Mr.McMartin – they still do not add up anywhere near the 6 Billion you claim, furthermore look at your own math “6 billion in 3 and ONE HALF years, add in the extra half year and add as well the fact that the first year was really two moths short of a year , add .8 billion=4.5 billion” That does not add up at all. The fact is Mr.Lewis, all of the financial numbers I have used are from the Finance Ministers Reports from the 90’s to the present day (I did mention this several times). They are the public record, and available to the public, so hopefully people can have an accurate understanding of the facts, rather than simply make them up as you do. Furthermore, why you elect to cast someone as a supporter of our current Government simply because they elect to correct inaccurate misinformation that is untrue and misleading is very short sighted. You ask about responsibility to society – Do you not think an accurate understanding of our real financial picture is important? How responsible is it for you to be over 8 billion dollars in error in your understanding and claim to be correct when indeed you are very much mistaken. Make no mistake Mr.Lewis, over 16 Billion dollars of debt WAS added onto the backs of our children by the former NDP Government – almost doubling it !. And thus far, as even Mr.McMartin numbers illustrate, the current Government added 3.7 Billion and NOT 6 Billion as you claim. As I somehow doubt you will bother to do any research yourself, here is how our Provincial Debt was reported by the NDP Government during the 90’s – I will leave out 2000 and beyond to save further debate – However as these numbers all came from the various NDP Finance Ministers annual Budget Reports you can indeed see that even well before 2000, the NDP Government had added well over 10 Billion worth debt onto our kids backs. No matter how many times you were told “only 10 Billion” Mr.Lewis, you were given false information. 1991 newly elected NDP Government inherited a debt of 17,262.4 Billion 1992 NDP Government increased the debt to

My point is that the numbers don't tell the whole story. We know where the money went under the NDP and why. The province tried to make up for federal cuts and follow its own social agenda. I have no problem with either of those things. After Bennett and the Zalm I appreciated the social investments. The billions the NDP added onto the debt was mirrored across the country, even in Mike Harris Ontario which slashed social programs mercilessly even though the auto sector was booming. So it wasn't "just" the BC NDP that had to make "hard decisions". Just that many provinces decided to download the federal cuts instead of running bigger deficits. Probably why health care across the country hit the skids and things like R and D investment fell to embarrassing levels.

Why did the Liberals have to run a debt at all? The fiscal picture of low interest rates, federal government money, rising commodity prices etc, literally fell from the sky. They didn't have a hand in creating any of those things. Its like they won a lottery so why did they have to run up 3.7 billion in debt at all? Where did that money go? How many nurses do we have now compared to when the NDP left office? How many doctors, teachers, MRI machines? Why are the kids in Langley getting several weeks of no school this year? Where's the money savings from the HEU fight gone? How much social housing has been built? On it goes. I just don't see the Liberals making any positive contributions to the province in spite of the financial ability to do so. Instead we get taxpayer-funded ads about the Spirit of 2010.

If an "independend" panel looked at the Libs would they find a "structural deficit"? Obviously they would. The high dollar will hurt our exports causing a fall in that income plus a loss of employment. Interest on the debt will rise. Commodity prices will fluctuate as other parts of the world are attracted to the market by the high prices. The continuing increases in funding from the Feds probably won't survive the next majority government. Structurally, there will be a deficit.

So what are the Liberals plans to deal with the long term economy? I don't believe they have one. We can't keep selling off BC Rails, we just don't have enough of them. That was a one-time infusion of cash. They've removed BC Ferries from the books, fine, but how much of our debt can they do that with? Meanwhile, is there any growth in this economy anywhere outside of construction in the lower mainland and oil and gas in the north-east? The tax-cuts were introduced with a lot of fanfare and a lot of promises. They failed to fulfill those promises. A billion in other taxes, at least, were added to make up for that revenue shortfall. Taxes that were aimed at the lower middle class and poor. So we've transferred some of the burden from the middle and upper classes to those below. What has that got us? We've essentially lowered the spending power of some to raise that of others for no positive benefit to the economy.

Over and over again when you look at the Liberals record you see nothing but ideology masked as good management.

You are not impartial , you are a rabid bc liberal supporter. I Do not trust your figures whatsoever. Give us a website with the figures you haVE given us on it. My bet is you can't or won't/ Therefore YOU must be relying on hearsay. We have given YOU three sources: shreck, mcmartin and Statscanada statistics. You have made numerous vague references to provincial budgets from years ago. Nor have you responded to a single criticism made by myself or others about campbell's social policies, or your taxcut soaked in the blood of the disadvantaged. Similarly you have preferred not ONE defebse of the amazingly tainted structural deficit , used as an excuse to attack the disadvantaged when THE BC LIARS WERE LEFT a ONE AND A HALF BILLION SURPLUS, which somehow became transformrd to the so-called sructural deficit. Moreover, my mcmartin post proves that debt both accellerated rapidly under campbell and that the BC LIARS HAVE SHIFTED A HUGE AMOUNT OF DEBT FROM CROWN CORPORATIONS DIRECTLY TO THE TAXPAYER, ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU ADD IN THE OLYMPICS FOR WHICH EVERY BC TAXPAYER IS ON THE HOOK, which I believe is not even included in the growing debt by mr mcmartin, THE DEFICIT AND DEBT FROM WHICH RIGHT WING SHILLS SUCH AS YOURSELF WILL BE USING FOR GENERATIONS AS AN EXCUSE TO TAKE MONEY FROM HEALTHCARE AND SOCIAL SERVICES. And your professions of being nonpartisan ARE AS BIG A JOKE AS YOUR SOCIAL CONSCIENCE AND YOUR HUMANITY. Post us a government, nonpartisan website address with the details you claim. I REPEAT THE BC LIARS ARE THE STEPHEN HAWKINGS OF CREATIVE ACCOUNTING, AND THEIR STATEMENTS HAVE BEEN SHOWN TIME AND TIME AGAIN TO BE BIASED, MUISLEADING AND SPUN TO FIT THEIR TEN TIMES OVER TAINTED AGENDA. yOU'RE FULL OF IT, FRUSTRATED.

Mr. Swift, My original rebuttal to your comments were as follows “Mr. Swift I challenge you to prove that our debt has grown by 6 Billion under the current Government.” It was not my intent to enter in a debate on social policy, nor political agenda, rather to draw attention to the fact that your claim of our debt growing by 6 Billion was entirely mis-information, untrue, and unfounded. In response, you eventually produced an article attributed to a Mr.McMaster that made the following statements: "The document reveals that bc's total debt was in excess of 37.3 billion on march 31, 2004...when the provincial liberals took office in 2001 (IN MAY) the total provincial debt stood at 33.6 billion.” Once again even the most basic arithmetic illustrates the complete error in your misleading and false statement. 3.7 Billion is a far cry from the 6 billion you claimed was “well documented” and truthful. My only intention, regardless of how you try to spin this into a greater partisan debate, is that your numbers were sadly mistaken, and even by your own provided information, this fact is well established. This is only the tip of the iceberg of the obvious misinformation campaign going out there, and clearly people such as yourself, even when facing your own facts, still refuse to acknowledge the truth. How Sad

It really depends on how you were able to arrive at the 3.7 billion doesn't it, which I tried to say above but said badly. Since it is the taxpayers of BC who own Crown corporations, who invested and built them up over the years, if we have a government that is willing to steal them from our hands and then give them away for a song, even if some debt was freed up, how is that good business? A very small pay-off for a big time loss to the citizens of this province. Also under the very convenient protection of the privacy act, we have few details of what exactly the deals were or how great our losses might actually be so there has been a lot of subterfuge used by the government in arriving at these final figures... what future losses and debts will be incurred by the province because of the BCliberals reckless business decisions that have literally sold off our province. There is a lot that is hidden from public view, some for a thousand years apparently.

Often advocating for the disabled, lewis swift is as mad as hell at the present government and I think since the BCliberals have done nothing but make life worse for the disabled, among many others, I think he has every right to be.

know what, I don't think between the three of you lewis, frank, lynn, that you could find your asses with both hands, let alone try to explain the intricacies of gov't financing, your all out of your league.

So Lynn, are you advocating that simply because Lewis Swift is "Mad" at the Government it is OK to circulate considerably inaccurate financial figures to an attempt to entice others to form a similar "mad" at the government mentality as well ? Doesn’t the real cost of these programs and the resulting debts if the economy cannot fund them have some merit? Evidently not. Perhaps Mr.Swift should stick to what he knows - disability issues, only now he has no credibility as he sold himself out relaying false financial misinformation to serve only his own partisan cause. Herein lies the problems with misinformation; it does no good to anyone, much less address a real issue.

C-gull, At least I can spell you're. Your is possessive, you're is a contraction of you are. Its english, use it.

Now why don't you enlighten us on gov't financing. I'm sure it'll be illuminating.

Frustrated, let's say we use your numbers. Let's assume your numbers are the most accurate. My questions above still stand. So? What does that mean? What's the point of the discussion? Where do you want to go based on those numbers?

Frustrated: What was the real cost of those tax cuts to the rich and the resulting debt they caused and the effect that debt had on social programs in BC? Can our economy afford to fund those kind of tax cuts to the rich? What is the real cost of selling our Crown corporations at garage sale prices and the resulting deteoriating effect that the loss of those assets will have on our province's future financial picture?

I don't intend to speak for lewis swift, he does a fine job himself. However, I think the continual "misinformation" that the present government has put out there has caused a lot of people to not believe a word they say or trust the figures they present. So much is shrouded in secrecy, so many "deals" protected by the Privacy Act, so many questions refused to be answered. Really, the transparency of this government is as foggy as the inlet I live in. The point is we can't determine the financial information anymore, we can't get to it anymore. Freedom of information means nothing in this province, it's just words mouthed. And then there's the tricks of the new accounting practices. So, the bottom line is I don't know if lewis is right on the figures just as I don't know if you are because this government is all about the public "not knowing" anything. No one is sure of the "real" figures anymore.

What I do know is that the Campbell liberals, rather than having a sound economic policy of reducing debt, have instead chosen to sell off our public assets, assets that do not belong to the BCliberals, which is tantamount in many BC taxpayer's eyes to thievery. And that by selling them so cheaply for such short term gain reveals once again the poor business sense that is inherent in the policies of the BC liberals.

Frank old boy,with all your(you're) knowledge you must realize that C-gulls know nothing of money (financing), as they only deal with garbage, which the ndp leaves lots of to clean up.

All I know C-gull is people respond in the way they're spoken to.

Frank correct you are , now go tell that to your buddy Lewis.

Well, Lewis has never attacked me. I don't want to be involved in discussions that trade personal attacks, I only responded to you because you addressed me.

Ladies and gentlemen; please get a grip on yourselves. Part of the problem with the culture of spin that we have built up around politics is that true facts become impossible to extract from the statistical bafflegab. Nobody knows, probably ever will know what the precise numbers are, or were. They're too well hidden.

A more important way of arriving at the true nature of a party is to watch the processes by which it operates in the world. The Liberals emptied the treasury into the pockets of it's supporters on their first day, then spent years disregarding the clear wishes of generations of British Columbians by selling off the assets they had carefully and at great expense kept in their own hands. This was very disrespectful to say the least of the will of the people they swore to serve.

Who made the decisions? Who benefitted? How did the money and power interact? Who got the feast and who got the bill?

Ask similar questions about anybody who wishes to put his hand directly into your pocket.

When the spin can't be trusted, there is no official opposition, and the Auditor has been moved into the broom cupboard under the west stairs, this kind of analysis of dynamic process is the best way left to judge.

Bailey, I think Frank and Lynn's comments were saying exactly that.

Frank, Keep in mind “my numbers” are those directly from the Ministry of Finance’s own annual budget reports, so in fact they are “our numbers”. I think accurate numbers are important, more so when looking at social programs. I think we can all agree that there is a growing disparity from those who have wealth, and those who have not. While we might debate the solution to this problem, I think we can all agree that whatever the solution will be, it will require additional funding to resolve, hence why I place an emphasis on accurate numbers. It is also important to understand that we cannot give what we do not have, and conversely appreciate that spending in excess of 1.8 Billion a year over revenue (on average) as was done by the former NDP, is not sustainable – you either end up going bankrupt, or thrown out of office, as was the case here. I am one of those who believe history tends to repeat itself, and as such, think that we need to pay more attention to overall costs in finding solutions to our challenges. In short, we need to find solutions that we can afford, however I do realize that many tend to disagree with that point of view and therein lies the great debate that splits our Province, and why I am continually frustrated.

Frustrated, what I find is that so often the divide is there because we disagree not only on solutions but also on what the problems are and where our priorities should be. Its not just a case of having the money. Because when the money is there, things I see as problems are still not addressed. That is what I find frustrating. The Liberals are a failure in my mind not because they have different solutions (2010?) but because they don't have any solutions to what I see as problems.

As for the numbers, they don't mean much if the circumstances of the time are ignored. Different governments have their own agendas and have different issues on their plate. Ignoring problems because you don't have the money can be a prescription for disaster in my opinion. For example we wouldn't shut down all of BC's hospitals or schools till we had more money would we?

As for the NDP, I maintain they weren't perfect but they did a good job under the circumstances. I would go so far as to say that having ended their term with two balanced budgets, that had they won BC would not have had the tax shifting that happened under the Liberals and the province would owe $3.7 billion less than it does now and closed schools and hospital beds would still be open.

Agendas are important differences. Some problems will never be fixed and will only get worse under a government that doesn't see them as priorities at all.

Frank, We can all have our differing views of the performance of the NDP during the 90's, that said, and in terms of specifics, what are the problem areas that you see today ? Keep in mind by no means am I intending to imply that there are not problems, I am more asking what you see from your perspective.

Off the top of my head, homelessness, child poverty, replacement of family-supporting jobs with near-minimum wage jobs, loss of wildlife habitat and threatened species, shifting of the tax burden from the haves to the have-nots, moving of assets from the public to private hands, increased travel times for school kids, unused operating room capacity in public hospitals when the demand is there, the meagre income provided to the disabled and others requiring assistance, the fact that high levels of the population are only able to cope with the increased stress of this society with drugs, the constant use of circuses to mask societal problems, the takeover of Canadian business by foreign interests and the resulting loss of that income and the monopolization of the media by corporate interests serving those same interests.

I'll probably think of a lot more as soon as I hit submit.

And what do you think the costs would be to fix just some of that, and where it will come from ?

Some of it would cost nothing at all such as shifting the tax burden back to the haves, stopping the sale of public assets, circuses, takeover of Canadian companies and a monopoly in media law.

Some of it would cost less than the Olympics such as building low-cost housing or increasing the shelter allowance of welfare. Same with closing of schools when the next school is an hour bus ride away.

Protection of wildlife habitat such as shutting down salmon farms would also cost the government very little, just the loss of a tax base that provides very few actual jobs anyway.

The costs of using operating rooms to capacity means more nurses. Its a cost that is probably (since I don't have the actual cost numbers) covered by the increased federal health transfer.

Addressing child poverty would be the biggest investment. But that is what it is, an investment, not a simple cost, as the benefits over the long term would go some way to reducing other costs. What would have to be set is a "floor" and the government would have to use a combination of increased benefits as well as minimum wage and daycare provisions.

However, if we take the view that our economy does not work for us and instead we work for it then no steps, not even small ones, will be taken. Instead we'll shrug off child poverty, homelessness and increased stress as a necessary condition. The result will be a growing percentage of the population that will want this current economy replaced by something that will actually deal with these very real issues. This is what causes a divide.

Frank - you mention some excellent things that we should be paying attention to over the next 181 days. My question is the NDP barely scratched the surface of these issues in the years they were in power, what makes people think they will tackle them again ? Take the provincial childcare strategy, a great idea, much needed, much appreciated, but brought in 12 months prior to the election; as a result parents and kids lost out significantly. Will the NDP bring this back - it would be a signifcant step toward removing child poverty - $4 per day for childcare.

rockerbiff, agreed, the NDP barely scratched the surface as you say. But that's why I voted for them, they were the only party that at least scratched the surface instead of rhetoric like "the best cure for homelessness is a job" and then nothing ever gets done. I take whatever little bit I can get :)

Responding to Frustrated on 11/13/2004 11:36:03 AM.

I have done plenty of research, sir. It is my job. You are totally wrong. The Social Credit left behind a deficit of more than 3 Billion dollars as a gift to the incoming Mike Harcourt government. This is deficit spending and Vander Zalm's government did not leave the books in good shape at all. You post the annual debt numbers, and blame it all on the NDP, but that deficit was created by the Socreds and was gradually eliminated by the NDP *without* doing a drastic neo-liberal purge of government services.

And it is true that the Liberals and the Socreds are the same people. Gordon Campbell's people got rid of all of the moderate Liberals long before the 2001 election.

Once again to the frustrato castrato, I Said 6 billion in 3 AND ONE HALF YEARS , NOT three, the period from 2001 to 2003 is nearly 2 MONTHS SHORT OF 3 YEARS, factoring in the EXTRA 8 months we ARRIVE at 4.5 BILLION, a debt growth far AHEAD OF THE NDP'S, even without adding in the doubling of debt formerly supported by the taxpayer from the offloading of debt formerly supported by crown corporations, OF COURSE THAT MAKES THEM EASIER TO SELL OFF TO THE AMERICANS FOR PENNIES ON THE DOLLAR -AND A DEBATE ABOUT BC'S DEBT THAT DOES NOT FACTOR IN THE MANUFACTURED CRISIS THAT WAS USED AS AN EXCUSE BOTH TO ASSAULT THE POOR AND THE DISABLED AS WELL AS SET SOCIAL JUSTICE BACK 30 YEARS, AND FOR ALL FOR A TAXCUT THAT'S DONE ZIP FOR THE ECONOMY does not deserve to be debated!!

You know, mr frustrato, the only thing that will make me happy if the bc liars are reelected is that people such as yourself, (and I use the term "people " loosely) is that NEXT time the great PONZI OR PYRAMID SCHEME KNOWN AS THE NEOLIBERAL AGENDA IS GOING TO PISS ON HEARTLESS BACKSTABBERS SUCH AS YOURSELF FROM A GREAT HEIGHT, AS YOUR SOCIAL PROGRAMS LIKE ICBC GET GIVEN AWAY AND YOUR CAR INSURANCE COSTS 5 GRAND A YEAR AS IT DOES UNDER THE MIRACLE OF THE PRIVATE SECTOR IN NEW BRUNSWICK, AS YOUR CHILDREN'S AND GRAND CHILDREN'S COLLEGE TUITION HITS TEN GRAND A YEAR JUST LIKE THE GOOD OL' USA YOU'RE SO EAGER TO SELL YOUR KIDS TO FOR NICKLES AND DIMES AS you drop off the chain letter mailing list of lies AND BROKEN PROMISES...AM I BITTER? AM I ANGRY? YOU'RE GODDAMNED RIGHT I AM. I GOT NEWS FOR YOU FOLKS, THE POOR AND THE DISABLED DON'T HAVE TO BEG YOUR PERMISSION TO GET ANGRY, AND ANYONE WHO DEFENDS THIS TAINTED PACK OF BACKSTABBING LIARS THAT MASQUERADES AS A GOVERNMENT, OR CAN'T BE BOTHERED TO GET UP OFF THEIR COLLECTIVE ASSES AND FIGHT BACK, BECAUSE GEE, THEY MAY BE STILL OK, DESERVES EVERY BIT OF CONTEMPT AND DISRESPECT THEY GARNER...THIS HAS BEEN THE LEWIS SWIFT MANIFESTO, AN UNPAID POLITICAL ANNOUNCEMENT....

Thank you bailey, frank and lynn for your measured and even, but compassionate responses, I try not to draw those I respect into my brawls with the right...I do believe vey much however that the anger the campbell government has created is the very thing that will in the end contribute most to its demise as their agenda with its thinly veiled contempt for the electorate feeds one of their key weaknesses: their delusions of both grandeur, and of, competence....I continue to sense nothing but a thinly veiled underlying contempt from posters such as frustrato, and SEE-"GULLED" whose actual interest in revealing the truth is about as spurious as gordon liar's compassion...

Thanks to sue clark as well, who should be mentioned above, along with frank, bailey, and lynn.

Very excellent piece of work. Very true. Who supports the NDP?? Any buisnesses? Or very important people? I dislike social class.

Well one juice king does not make up for all the ex-Marxists (Boyd Pyper and Rb Fleming)union hacks (too many to list) and Glen Clark apparatchnik (Adrian Dix) that Carole James has surrounded herself with.

I love how these NDP hacks talk about how progressive they are and then go off on how "Cuba has it right when it comes to health care."
And they claim that they had a decent budget their last year in office!? The only reason the economy picked up was because the whole world knew that the NDP didn't have any hope of being re-elected. It's like stock markets, they go up 6 months before a recession is officially over!