VICTORIA - If the Liberals take such pride in a business-like approach, how come they haven't learned one of the most basic business lessons?
The Ipsos-Reid poll this week didn't just show the NDP ahead. It found that more than one-third of the people who voted Liberal in 2001 have quit supporting the party.
The Liberals seemed genuinely unperturbed. It's normal for support for a governing party between elections, they said — forgetting that in B.C. it's also normal for the governing party to be defeated when the election comes round. People just haven't recognized that things are better, they say. And anyway, once voters take a harder look at the New Democrats and Carole James they will come back to the Liberals. (Which suggests a campaign slogan along the lines of 'Vote Liberal - The Lesser of Two Evils.')
What's missing is any acknowledgment that the one-third of supporters who have repudiated the party may have some real concerns that need to be addressed. Maybe those 340,000 people have something important to say.
I used to run newspapers. And if one-third of our regular readers had quit buying, I'd have wanted to know why. And how to win them back.
British Columbians are both the customers and shareholders of government. But there's no acknowledgment from the Liberals that their dissatisfaction matters, that anything needs to change, or that mistakes have been made. No one apologizes for broken promises, or acknowledges that many people have not seen the promised improvements in their lives.
Premier Gordon Campbell speaks of a rising optimism, of people beginning to see real benefits.
But one-third of the people who voted Liberal disagree. And even if they're expert in nothing else, you have to concede that they likely know more about their own lives than government.
Their perception is reinforced by the recent BC Progress Board report. The board is an extremely useful Liberal creation that uses objective indicators to rate B.C.'s performance in a number of areas against other provinces.
While there are encouraging signs, progress is slow. B.C.'s economic growth in 2003 was fourth strongest in Canada, up from eighth in 2002. We moved up one place to sixth in employment. Both are positive changes, but not likely to produce the kind of sweeping optimism Mr. Campbell hopes for in the runup to next May's election.
The most critical measurement of Liberal effectiveness is likely business investment. The tax cuts and deregulation efforts were all intended to produce badly needed investment, creating jobs and a stronger, more diversified economy. Again, there are signs of progress. Per capita business investment increased 5.9 per cent last year, the third strongest growth among the provinces. But that wasn't enough to move B.C. out of its sixth place standing.
And the province slid backwards, relative to other provinces, in both productivity and research and development spending.
There are lots of legitimate explanations for the slow progress, from the many external factors buffeting B.C. to the simple reality that economies are difficult to change. And there are some hopeful signs, like the RBC Economic forecast this week that the province would have the best growth in Canada in 2005, at 3.5 per cent.
But the statistics make the Liberals' claim that people across the province are seeing significant change in their lives look delusional. The employment rate, according to the Progress Board, is pretty much the same as it has been for the past decade. That's the reality that people see, despite Liberal news releases touting monthly job growth.
The Liberals are refusing to acknowledge that, just as they are refusing to accept that the huge number of people who no longer support the government may have legitimate reasons. They are unable to admit error, apologize for mistakes, or learn from missteps.
And as a result they raise the spectre of a government defeating itself by refusing to listen to and respect the views of the electorate.
Saturday, May 22, 2004
Thursday, May 20, 2004
Liberals ignoring message in falling poll standings
VICTORIA - The Liberals seem genuinely - and bafflingly - at ease in the face of the latest poll that shows they could lose the election next May.
And their reaction helps explain why voters are deserting the party.
The Ipsos-Reid poll is the first to show that the New Democrats have taken a clear lead over the Liberals. They have the support of 44 per cent of decided voters; Liberal support has fallen to 37 per cent.
The news is even bleaker across what the Liberals used to call the Heartland. Carole James and the New Democrats are at 46 per cent outside the Lower Mainland, while the Liberals have fallen to 33 per cent. Unless those numbers change 20 to 25 Liberal MLAs outside the Lower Mainland will be gone after the election.
So what do the Liberals say?
First, they point out that governments traditionally lose popularity during their term. "Part of a normal cycle," said Economic Development John Les, a comment echoed by other ministers.
That's only partly true. A year before the last election the NDP was down to 16-per-cent support; they barely climbed to 22 per cent in the actual vote. And it ignores the reality that for B.C., that "normal cycle" ends in the defeat of the government after one term.
Second, they say that voters will return to them when the NDP has to come up with some specific policies and people remember just how bad the previous government was.
That may be. It's hard to believe that the voters could go from detesting the New Democrats to welcoming them back in just four years. (The emergence of many members of that bumbling government as potential NDP candidates is great news for the Liberals.)
But it's risky to base your election optimism on the idea that people will eventually decide they have to vote for you because they have no other choice. That kind of support can easily be lost.
And finally the Liberals say the public has got it wrong. We just haven't noticed yet how much better things are today than they were three years ago, and once we do Liberal support will surge.
That last response illustrates one reason the Liberals are doing so badly in the polls.
About 1.6 million people voted in the last election; about 930,000 of them voted Liberal, a huge show of support.
But based on the latest poll, more than one-third of those people have decided they no longer support the party.
Implicit in all the Liberal responses is that those people have got it wrong. They don't understand what the government is doing. They haven't recognized how much better their lives are.
It's a response that reinforces the impression that the government doesn't care what the public thinks, that is distant and arrogant and rigid. It adds to the perception that this is a government that is so certain that it is right that it no longer listens to people with a different view.
The fact is that some 340,000 people who supported the Liberals three years ago have decided the government has failed them.
None of the Liberals who responded to the poll suggested that it might be useful to figure out why these people have decided the government is doing a bad job. None of the MLAs or cabinet ministers suggested that maybe the government needs to listen to these people, and learn why they think the government has lost its way. None of them suggested that these people might have good reasons for withdrawing their support.
That doesn't mean government by poll; principles remain important.
I used to manage newspapers. And if one-third of the customers quit reading the newspaper, I'd want to find out why. And I would figure that we were doing something wrong, and better fix it.
The Liberals should want to know why the people they serve are giving them failing grades.
Footnote: The Green Party is down to 11 per cent support, from a high of 20 per cent. That's good news for the NDP. The Unity Party stood at five per cent provincially and eight per cent ourside the Lower Mainland. That in turn is bad news for the Liberals, who could lose support to Unity.
And their reaction helps explain why voters are deserting the party.
The Ipsos-Reid poll is the first to show that the New Democrats have taken a clear lead over the Liberals. They have the support of 44 per cent of decided voters; Liberal support has fallen to 37 per cent.
The news is even bleaker across what the Liberals used to call the Heartland. Carole James and the New Democrats are at 46 per cent outside the Lower Mainland, while the Liberals have fallen to 33 per cent. Unless those numbers change 20 to 25 Liberal MLAs outside the Lower Mainland will be gone after the election.
So what do the Liberals say?
First, they point out that governments traditionally lose popularity during their term. "Part of a normal cycle," said Economic Development John Les, a comment echoed by other ministers.
That's only partly true. A year before the last election the NDP was down to 16-per-cent support; they barely climbed to 22 per cent in the actual vote. And it ignores the reality that for B.C., that "normal cycle" ends in the defeat of the government after one term.
Second, they say that voters will return to them when the NDP has to come up with some specific policies and people remember just how bad the previous government was.
That may be. It's hard to believe that the voters could go from detesting the New Democrats to welcoming them back in just four years. (The emergence of many members of that bumbling government as potential NDP candidates is great news for the Liberals.)
But it's risky to base your election optimism on the idea that people will eventually decide they have to vote for you because they have no other choice. That kind of support can easily be lost.
And finally the Liberals say the public has got it wrong. We just haven't noticed yet how much better things are today than they were three years ago, and once we do Liberal support will surge.
That last response illustrates one reason the Liberals are doing so badly in the polls.
About 1.6 million people voted in the last election; about 930,000 of them voted Liberal, a huge show of support.
But based on the latest poll, more than one-third of those people have decided they no longer support the party.
Implicit in all the Liberal responses is that those people have got it wrong. They don't understand what the government is doing. They haven't recognized how much better their lives are.
It's a response that reinforces the impression that the government doesn't care what the public thinks, that is distant and arrogant and rigid. It adds to the perception that this is a government that is so certain that it is right that it no longer listens to people with a different view.
The fact is that some 340,000 people who supported the Liberals three years ago have decided the government has failed them.
None of the Liberals who responded to the poll suggested that it might be useful to figure out why these people have decided the government is doing a bad job. None of the MLAs or cabinet ministers suggested that maybe the government needs to listen to these people, and learn why they think the government has lost its way. None of them suggested that these people might have good reasons for withdrawing their support.
That doesn't mean government by poll; principles remain important.
I used to manage newspapers. And if one-third of the customers quit reading the newspaper, I'd want to find out why. And I would figure that we were doing something wrong, and better fix it.
The Liberals should want to know why the people they serve are giving them failing grades.
Footnote: The Green Party is down to 11 per cent support, from a high of 20 per cent. That's good news for the NDP. The Unity Party stood at five per cent provincially and eight per cent ourside the Lower Mainland. That in turn is bad news for the Liberals, who could lose support to Unity.
Wednesday, May 19, 2004
Anderson's offshore opposition plaguing Campbell
VICTORIA - The BC Liberals may officially be neutral in the coming federal election, but many of them will be rooting for Environment Minister David Anderson to lose his Victoria seat.
Anderson is waging a one-man campaign against offshore oil and gas development in B.C., at least according to Premier Gordon Campbell.
Anderson claims to be open-minded. We just don't know enough to consider lifting the 30-year-old ban on development, he says.
But the provincial Liberals - and a lot of people from all parts of the political spectrum in coastal B.C. - are convinced that Anderson's position is a scam. They believe, with considerable justification, that the career politician is dug in on the issue, and no matter how much information is brought forward he's going to call for more.
Anderson dove into the offshore waters again this week. He sent a memo to all the nominated Liberal candidates advising them that until the "knowledge gaps on the risks involved, the resources at stake, and the economic and social factors that might have a bearing" are filled the ban stays put.
The BC Liberals have been getting increasingly frustrated with Anderson's position. They want the moratorium lifted now, to allow work by 2010.
Partly, they just think he's wrong. The provincial Liberals point to a recent Royal Society of Canada report as the latest in a string of studies that have concluded that with proper controls the moratorium could be safely lifted. And the Liberals note that around the world - from the deep waters off Newfoundland to the shallow banks around Scandinavia - development has gone ahead successfully.
The Liberals are also convinced that no amount of information would change Anderson's mind or remove his obstructionism.
It's a reasonable conclusion, based on his statements and actions. If Anderson is concerned about the "knowledge gaps," it is well within his ability to address them. Instead of sniping at the province, he could commission the studies he believes are needed to determine if offshore development is possible.
The comments from BC Liberals like Energy Minister Richard Neufeld are getting increasingly cranky about Anderson.
Campbell says he's getting much more positive comments from other federal Liberals, including Prime Minister Paul Martin.
But there's no sign of their briefing notes to Liberal candidates offering an alternative to Anderson's negative comments on the possibility of offshore oil and gas development any time soon. They haven't rebuffed Anderson's attempts to downplay the significance of the federal panel now holding hearings on the issue. He's the one speaking for the federal government, and he's saying no.
Offshore oil and gas development is going to be an emotional, controversial issue. And federally and provincially, it involves lots of political risks.
But the evidence, based on independent studies on the B.C. issues and the industry's global track record, increasingly indicates that safe development, under appropriate regulations, is possible.
The potential is enormous. The reserves are estimated at 9.8 billion barrels of oil, a resource worth some $110 billion. That's 10 times the size of the Hibernia field that has brought an offshore boom to the East Coast.
Coastal communities need the help. The coastal forest industry continues to struggle, the fishery has been through a decade of decline and even tourism has failed to recover. Offshore oil is seen as one of the last best hopes for a number of desperate communities.
Campbell is going to get that message again next week, when he heads to the northwest for a joint cabinet meeting with Alberta Premier Ralph Klein in Prince Rupert. The premier's agenda will include some fundraisers and other activities in the region. He's going to hear a lot about the region's economic crisis.
Offshore energy isn't the only answer. And even with federal co-operation, the 2010 timeline is probably unrealistic.
But it does offer huge potential benefits. And as long as Anderson is speaking for Ottawa, any chance of progress seems remote.
Footnote: Opposing any offshore development makes sense politically for the federal Liberals. They have no realistic chance of winning seats in B.C.'s regions, but hope for success in Vancouver and Victoria. But the economic problems - and sense of alienation - in the rest of B.C. will be worsened if they have to live with policies shaped to please people who live in the big cities.
Anderson is waging a one-man campaign against offshore oil and gas development in B.C., at least according to Premier Gordon Campbell.
Anderson claims to be open-minded. We just don't know enough to consider lifting the 30-year-old ban on development, he says.
But the provincial Liberals - and a lot of people from all parts of the political spectrum in coastal B.C. - are convinced that Anderson's position is a scam. They believe, with considerable justification, that the career politician is dug in on the issue, and no matter how much information is brought forward he's going to call for more.
Anderson dove into the offshore waters again this week. He sent a memo to all the nominated Liberal candidates advising them that until the "knowledge gaps on the risks involved, the resources at stake, and the economic and social factors that might have a bearing" are filled the ban stays put.
The BC Liberals have been getting increasingly frustrated with Anderson's position. They want the moratorium lifted now, to allow work by 2010.
Partly, they just think he's wrong. The provincial Liberals point to a recent Royal Society of Canada report as the latest in a string of studies that have concluded that with proper controls the moratorium could be safely lifted. And the Liberals note that around the world - from the deep waters off Newfoundland to the shallow banks around Scandinavia - development has gone ahead successfully.
The Liberals are also convinced that no amount of information would change Anderson's mind or remove his obstructionism.
It's a reasonable conclusion, based on his statements and actions. If Anderson is concerned about the "knowledge gaps," it is well within his ability to address them. Instead of sniping at the province, he could commission the studies he believes are needed to determine if offshore development is possible.
The comments from BC Liberals like Energy Minister Richard Neufeld are getting increasingly cranky about Anderson.
Campbell says he's getting much more positive comments from other federal Liberals, including Prime Minister Paul Martin.
But there's no sign of their briefing notes to Liberal candidates offering an alternative to Anderson's negative comments on the possibility of offshore oil and gas development any time soon. They haven't rebuffed Anderson's attempts to downplay the significance of the federal panel now holding hearings on the issue. He's the one speaking for the federal government, and he's saying no.
Offshore oil and gas development is going to be an emotional, controversial issue. And federally and provincially, it involves lots of political risks.
But the evidence, based on independent studies on the B.C. issues and the industry's global track record, increasingly indicates that safe development, under appropriate regulations, is possible.
The potential is enormous. The reserves are estimated at 9.8 billion barrels of oil, a resource worth some $110 billion. That's 10 times the size of the Hibernia field that has brought an offshore boom to the East Coast.
Coastal communities need the help. The coastal forest industry continues to struggle, the fishery has been through a decade of decline and even tourism has failed to recover. Offshore oil is seen as one of the last best hopes for a number of desperate communities.
Campbell is going to get that message again next week, when he heads to the northwest for a joint cabinet meeting with Alberta Premier Ralph Klein in Prince Rupert. The premier's agenda will include some fundraisers and other activities in the region. He's going to hear a lot about the region's economic crisis.
Offshore energy isn't the only answer. And even with federal co-operation, the 2010 timeline is probably unrealistic.
But it does offer huge potential benefits. And as long as Anderson is speaking for Ottawa, any chance of progress seems remote.
Footnote: Opposing any offshore development makes sense politically for the federal Liberals. They have no realistic chance of winning seats in B.C.'s regions, but hope for success in Vancouver and Victoria. But the economic problems - and sense of alienation - in the rest of B.C. will be worsened if they have to live with policies shaped to please people who live in the big cities.
Tuesday, May 18, 2004
Liberals have bungled the children and families ministry
VICTORIA - The Walls' audit got the headlines, not surprisingly.
It was a bleak recap of government mismanagement. The audit confirmed that failed Prince George car dealer Doug Walls - a long-time advocate for the disabled - pushed his Liberal connections in advancing his personal interests, his vision for the children and families ministry and the career of his pal and ally Chris Haynes.
It worked pretty well. Walls was handed more than $500,000 worth of government contracts, often in violation of the rules. The government improperly wrote off more than $500,000 worth of debts owed by a company with tight ties to Walls. (The total loss to taxpayers when it went broke was more than $2 million.) Haynes got the deputy minister's job. And the ministry committed to the kind of services for the mentally disabled that Walls was pushing.
The audit didn't find any wrongdoing by politicians, although it all still looked bad. Walls is a relative by marriage of Premier Gordon Campbell, a confidante of Advanced Education Minister Shirley Bond and was a wheel in the Liberal party. He traded on all those things, lobbying Campbell and top strategist Martyn Brown on Haynes behalf (a move he said drew a rebuke from Campbell), name-dropping shamelessly and confirming Bond's appointment ot cabinet before it was public.
But it's all no one's fault, according to the Liberals.
Haynes, fired over the affair, leaves with more than $500,000 in severance and deferred vacation pay, despite the auditors' report. Former children's minister Gordon Hogg says he feels vindicated. No one is fired or disciplined. (The severance issue will be a problem for the Liberals. Anyone in private business who was found to have improperly written off a $500,000 debt to a friend would not be collecting a big cash payout.)
But the Walls' audit, ugly as it was, wasn't even the worst news released by the ministry.
Rather cynically, the government chose the same day to release an assessment of their efforts to restructure the ministry.
The "readiness report" revealed that after more than two years and tens of millions of dollars, remarkably little progess has been made.
The ministry unveiled its big plans in January 2002. The government would slash spending on children and families, and save money by moving to 11 new semi-independent authorities. Ten regional authorities - five aboriginal, and five non-aboriginal - would take over children's services. A Community Living Authority with a $600-million budget would provide services to mentally disabled British Columbians and their families.
The transition work was always going great, according to Hogg, ahead of schedule even. A year ago he said the Community Living Authority and the first two regional child protection authorities would be up and running by last fall.
He was wrong. The regional authorities won't be ready until 2006. After the bleak readiness report on the Community Living Authority new minister Christy Clark said the target start date for it is now late 2005, two years later than Hogg promised.
The report reveals that the most basic questions haven't been answered. The ministry doesn't know how services will be delivered. It hasn't developed the organization, systems or management team to make the authority work. It doesn't know how it will cope with transition costs, or even rising demand given its current reduced budget. It hasn't figured out what's going to happen to staff.
It's shocking that so much time and money could have spent so ineffectually without anyone in government noticing - not MLAs, government caucus committees, the premier, cabinet, the top bureaucrats. It's a grimly incompetent performance.
It's also a betrayal. The Liberal promised an end to endless bureaucratic restructuring in the ministry during the campaign. Campbell spoke passionately of the need for more money.
But what they have actually been delivered is arbitrary budget cuts and a botched and mismanaged re-organization.
Footnote: The failure is hardly a surprise. The Liberals were warned repeatedly that the idea of simultaneously restructuring the ministry while cutting the budget by more than 10 per cent was reckless. They chose to ignore the warnings, and apparently also chose to ignore the fumbling in the ministry's restructuring plans. Now the spending cuts are going ahead while the changes that were supposed to make them possible without hurting children and familes are stalled.
It was a bleak recap of government mismanagement. The audit confirmed that failed Prince George car dealer Doug Walls - a long-time advocate for the disabled - pushed his Liberal connections in advancing his personal interests, his vision for the children and families ministry and the career of his pal and ally Chris Haynes.
It worked pretty well. Walls was handed more than $500,000 worth of government contracts, often in violation of the rules. The government improperly wrote off more than $500,000 worth of debts owed by a company with tight ties to Walls. (The total loss to taxpayers when it went broke was more than $2 million.) Haynes got the deputy minister's job. And the ministry committed to the kind of services for the mentally disabled that Walls was pushing.
The audit didn't find any wrongdoing by politicians, although it all still looked bad. Walls is a relative by marriage of Premier Gordon Campbell, a confidante of Advanced Education Minister Shirley Bond and was a wheel in the Liberal party. He traded on all those things, lobbying Campbell and top strategist Martyn Brown on Haynes behalf (a move he said drew a rebuke from Campbell), name-dropping shamelessly and confirming Bond's appointment ot cabinet before it was public.
But it's all no one's fault, according to the Liberals.
Haynes, fired over the affair, leaves with more than $500,000 in severance and deferred vacation pay, despite the auditors' report. Former children's minister Gordon Hogg says he feels vindicated. No one is fired or disciplined. (The severance issue will be a problem for the Liberals. Anyone in private business who was found to have improperly written off a $500,000 debt to a friend would not be collecting a big cash payout.)
But the Walls' audit, ugly as it was, wasn't even the worst news released by the ministry.
Rather cynically, the government chose the same day to release an assessment of their efforts to restructure the ministry.
The "readiness report" revealed that after more than two years and tens of millions of dollars, remarkably little progess has been made.
The ministry unveiled its big plans in January 2002. The government would slash spending on children and families, and save money by moving to 11 new semi-independent authorities. Ten regional authorities - five aboriginal, and five non-aboriginal - would take over children's services. A Community Living Authority with a $600-million budget would provide services to mentally disabled British Columbians and their families.
The transition work was always going great, according to Hogg, ahead of schedule even. A year ago he said the Community Living Authority and the first two regional child protection authorities would be up and running by last fall.
He was wrong. The regional authorities won't be ready until 2006. After the bleak readiness report on the Community Living Authority new minister Christy Clark said the target start date for it is now late 2005, two years later than Hogg promised.
The report reveals that the most basic questions haven't been answered. The ministry doesn't know how services will be delivered. It hasn't developed the organization, systems or management team to make the authority work. It doesn't know how it will cope with transition costs, or even rising demand given its current reduced budget. It hasn't figured out what's going to happen to staff.
It's shocking that so much time and money could have spent so ineffectually without anyone in government noticing - not MLAs, government caucus committees, the premier, cabinet, the top bureaucrats. It's a grimly incompetent performance.
It's also a betrayal. The Liberal promised an end to endless bureaucratic restructuring in the ministry during the campaign. Campbell spoke passionately of the need for more money.
But what they have actually been delivered is arbitrary budget cuts and a botched and mismanaged re-organization.
Footnote: The failure is hardly a surprise. The Liberals were warned repeatedly that the idea of simultaneously restructuring the ministry while cutting the budget by more than 10 per cent was reckless. They chose to ignore the warnings, and apparently also chose to ignore the fumbling in the ministry's restructuring plans. Now the spending cuts are going ahead while the changes that were supposed to make them possible without hurting children and familes are stalled.
Saturday, May 15, 2004
Incompetence leads to children and families flop
VICTORIA - The Liberals have made a remarkable mess of their plans for the ministry of children and families.
The Walls' audit got the headlines this week. But at the same time the government released an assessment of their efforts to restructure the ministry. And it is much more damning.
After two years and tens of millions of dollars, stunningly little has been accomplished. The changes that were supposed to make a 12-per-cent cut in ministry spending possible are mired in confusion. The spending cuts are still being made.
It is baffling that so much time and money could have spent without anyone in government noticing that the entire process was like one of those phoney Hollywood stage sets. Former minister Gordon Hogg kept insisting cheerfully that things were great, even ahead of schedule. In reality, as the report released this week confirms, things were a mess.
The government unveiled its big plans for the ministry back in January 2002. Those included deep spending and staff cuts, justified by a shift to 11 new semi-independent authorities that would deliver services. Ten would be regional authorities - five aboriginal, and five non-aboriginal - to take over children's services. A province-wide Community Living Authority would provide services to mentally disabled British Columbians and their families, with a $600-million budget.
The plan was flawed from the start. The government was warned of the risks in launching a massive restructuring while simultaneously slashing the ministry budget.
But Mr. Hogg was always confident. There was a great show of public consultation. Doug Walls was, we now know, pushing his agenda tirelessly. Advisory committees were named. Why, Mr. Hogg said a year ago, things were going so well that the Community Living Authority would be up and running by the fall of 2003, along with the first two regional child protection authorities.
We now know Mr. Hogg was hopelessly wrong. The regional authorities won't be ready until 2006.
And the this week's "readiness report" on the Community Living Authority paints such a bleak picture of the lack of progress that it too will be delayed. Children and Families Christy Clark says the target is now late 2005.
The report reveals that after two years of work, the most basic questions haven't been answered.
The government's fundamentally flawed approach has "resulted in a lack of co-ordination between the planning and operational components, with the result that there has been no opportunity to develop the organization and systems required."
The ministry hasn't figured out how it's going to cope with the significant transition costs. It doesn't have a plan to meet increasing demand within its current budget. It doesn't have a management team to lead the change. It hasn't figured out how to deal with the labour relations issues, which were complicated by last fall's job protection deal with the BCGEU.
And it still hasn't sorted out the basic question of how services will be delivered.
Remember, this is after more than two years and repeated assurances that everything was moving along ahead of schedule.
Mr. Hogg's chances of returning to cabinet should be non-existent.
But how is it that no one in government noticed the mismanagement - not the premier and cabinet, or the senior deputy ministers, or the government caucus committee that's supposed to be a watchdog. Alarms were raised regularly by people outside government, but they were either ignored or mocked by the Liberals.
It's a hugely incompetent performance. Leave aside the merits of the proposed shift to new authorities, which is widely - though not universally - supported.
The issue here is the government's ability to develop a plan and execute it. And it failed spectacularly.
It is also a huge betrayal. In opposition, Gordon Campbell said the ministry needed more money to do its work. The Liberals' New Era campaign promised a halt to endless to bureaucratic restructuring.
What they've delivered is $185 million in spending cuts and an endless, grossly mismanaged restructuring effort.
B.C.'s most vulnerable children and adults deserve better.
The Walls' audit got the headlines this week. But at the same time the government released an assessment of their efforts to restructure the ministry. And it is much more damning.
After two years and tens of millions of dollars, stunningly little has been accomplished. The changes that were supposed to make a 12-per-cent cut in ministry spending possible are mired in confusion. The spending cuts are still being made.
It is baffling that so much time and money could have spent without anyone in government noticing that the entire process was like one of those phoney Hollywood stage sets. Former minister Gordon Hogg kept insisting cheerfully that things were great, even ahead of schedule. In reality, as the report released this week confirms, things were a mess.
The government unveiled its big plans for the ministry back in January 2002. Those included deep spending and staff cuts, justified by a shift to 11 new semi-independent authorities that would deliver services. Ten would be regional authorities - five aboriginal, and five non-aboriginal - to take over children's services. A province-wide Community Living Authority would provide services to mentally disabled British Columbians and their families, with a $600-million budget.
The plan was flawed from the start. The government was warned of the risks in launching a massive restructuring while simultaneously slashing the ministry budget.
But Mr. Hogg was always confident. There was a great show of public consultation. Doug Walls was, we now know, pushing his agenda tirelessly. Advisory committees were named. Why, Mr. Hogg said a year ago, things were going so well that the Community Living Authority would be up and running by the fall of 2003, along with the first two regional child protection authorities.
We now know Mr. Hogg was hopelessly wrong. The regional authorities won't be ready until 2006.
And the this week's "readiness report" on the Community Living Authority paints such a bleak picture of the lack of progress that it too will be delayed. Children and Families Christy Clark says the target is now late 2005.
The report reveals that after two years of work, the most basic questions haven't been answered.
The government's fundamentally flawed approach has "resulted in a lack of co-ordination between the planning and operational components, with the result that there has been no opportunity to develop the organization and systems required."
The ministry hasn't figured out how it's going to cope with the significant transition costs. It doesn't have a plan to meet increasing demand within its current budget. It doesn't have a management team to lead the change. It hasn't figured out how to deal with the labour relations issues, which were complicated by last fall's job protection deal with the BCGEU.
And it still hasn't sorted out the basic question of how services will be delivered.
Remember, this is after more than two years and repeated assurances that everything was moving along ahead of schedule.
Mr. Hogg's chances of returning to cabinet should be non-existent.
But how is it that no one in government noticed the mismanagement - not the premier and cabinet, or the senior deputy ministers, or the government caucus committee that's supposed to be a watchdog. Alarms were raised regularly by people outside government, but they were either ignored or mocked by the Liberals.
It's a hugely incompetent performance. Leave aside the merits of the proposed shift to new authorities, which is widely - though not universally - supported.
The issue here is the government's ability to develop a plan and execute it. And it failed spectacularly.
It is also a huge betrayal. In opposition, Gordon Campbell said the ministry needed more money to do its work. The Liberals' New Era campaign promised a halt to endless to bureaucratic restructuring.
What they've delivered is $185 million in spending cuts and an endless, grossly mismanaged restructuring effort.
B.C.'s most vulnerable children and adults deserve better.
Comments feature added
Like what you read? Think it's remarkably wrong? Or just have your own comments?
I've added a comment feature to the website. Just clink on 'Comments' at the end of any entry to share what you think with other readers.
Three rules. Be polite. Don't comment on the motives of other people, just their actions. (You can't possibly know what their motives are, and they don't matter anyway.) And keep entries fairly brief.
I've added a comment feature to the website. Just clink on 'Comments' at the end of any entry to share what you think with other readers.
Three rules. Be polite. Don't comment on the motives of other people, just their actions. (You can't possibly know what their motives are, and they don't matter anyway.) And keep entries fairly brief.
Friday, May 14, 2004
One year to election, and LIberals face a real challenge
VICTORIA - Start counting down - one year from today (Monday) you'll be heading off to elect the next provincial government.
Three years ago most people would have expected it to be an easy Liberal re-election victory. Not so lopsided as 2001, certainly, but still another big majority.
No more. Based on the latest polls the Liberals will face a tough battle and some 30 of the party's 75 MLAs will be out of a job. An NDP victory is no longer out of the question, a stunning turnaround given the party's dismal performance in government and overwhelming rejection three years ago.
The Liberals aren't panicked. They're confident that as the election comes closer voters will look more closely at the NDP and their record.
That's the first big factor to watch as the next year unfolds. NDP leader Carole James has been relatively untested in terms of what her party would do in government.
The former NDP government was widely and accurately seen as incompetent and wasteful, and a particularly poor manager of public sector wage costs. James has to prove that she - and the leading NDP candidates - would do better.
It will mean walking a political tightrope. James has said repeatedly that she "can't turn back the clock" and undo LIberal decisions. But she will have to provide specifics to win trust and votes. Would an NDP government restore the 15-per-cent wage rollback for Hospital Employees' Union members, for example? And if it did, where would the extra $250 million a year come from? One answer will anger public sector union members; the other will anger many other voters.
The Liberals face their own challenges.
With only a year to go, Premier Gordon Campbell points to a long list of New Era campaign promises that have been delivered.
But voters - as the polls indicate - have major doubts, linked to failures in key areas.
Health care is not better under the Liberals than it was under the NDP. The economy has not improved in the way the Liberals promised. Universities and colleges are harder to get into, and cost more. The promised improvements in the children and families ministry have been botched. The tax cut did not deliver the promised returns to government, and this year taxes actually increased for lower and middle-income British Columbians, while going down for the more affluent.
Partly, the Liberals need luck, especially on the economy. (And that should worry them, given that the only luck they have had so far has been bad - think of SARS, softwood, 911, fires, floods.)
Analysts have been upgrading their economic growth estimates for this year, a change that would mean more jobs and better pay.
More importantly, a stronger economy would allow the Liberals to bring in a credible pre-election budget next February that included spending increases for health and education. They could then claim that the sacrifices were begininning to py off.
The Liberals also need to find a way through difficult negotiations with teachers, nurses and doctors in coming months, especially critical after their mishandling of the HEU strike.
And they have to find a way to deal with the Campbell problem. B.C. premiers always trail their party in popularity. But Campbell's approval rating is dismal, with only 29 per cent of British Columbians approving of his performance. (Glen Clark, in his worst days, fell to 19-per-cent approval.)
There are lots of theories about why people believe Campbell is doing a bad job. He's seen as untrustworthy by people who believe he broke critical promises on issues like BC Rail and respecting contracts. And he's blamed for a wide perception that the Liberal government doesn't care about the effects of its policies on ordinary British Columbians.
The Liberal pitch will be based on asking for four more years to complete the job and capture the benefits of the Olympics.
The race is on. And the mere fact that it is a race, and not an easy Liberal walk, is an indication of how many more surprises may lie ahead.
Footnote: For the NDP, a critical issue will be who emerge as candidates. Newcomers may not inspire confidence; veterans of the Clark government will be a reminder of its bleak performance. For the Liberals, a critical issue will be whether the Unity Party is able to capture right-wing votes in close races that would have gone Liberal.
Three years ago most people would have expected it to be an easy Liberal re-election victory. Not so lopsided as 2001, certainly, but still another big majority.
No more. Based on the latest polls the Liberals will face a tough battle and some 30 of the party's 75 MLAs will be out of a job. An NDP victory is no longer out of the question, a stunning turnaround given the party's dismal performance in government and overwhelming rejection three years ago.
The Liberals aren't panicked. They're confident that as the election comes closer voters will look more closely at the NDP and their record.
That's the first big factor to watch as the next year unfolds. NDP leader Carole James has been relatively untested in terms of what her party would do in government.
The former NDP government was widely and accurately seen as incompetent and wasteful, and a particularly poor manager of public sector wage costs. James has to prove that she - and the leading NDP candidates - would do better.
It will mean walking a political tightrope. James has said repeatedly that she "can't turn back the clock" and undo LIberal decisions. But she will have to provide specifics to win trust and votes. Would an NDP government restore the 15-per-cent wage rollback for Hospital Employees' Union members, for example? And if it did, where would the extra $250 million a year come from? One answer will anger public sector union members; the other will anger many other voters.
The Liberals face their own challenges.
With only a year to go, Premier Gordon Campbell points to a long list of New Era campaign promises that have been delivered.
But voters - as the polls indicate - have major doubts, linked to failures in key areas.
Health care is not better under the Liberals than it was under the NDP. The economy has not improved in the way the Liberals promised. Universities and colleges are harder to get into, and cost more. The promised improvements in the children and families ministry have been botched. The tax cut did not deliver the promised returns to government, and this year taxes actually increased for lower and middle-income British Columbians, while going down for the more affluent.
Partly, the Liberals need luck, especially on the economy. (And that should worry them, given that the only luck they have had so far has been bad - think of SARS, softwood, 911, fires, floods.)
Analysts have been upgrading their economic growth estimates for this year, a change that would mean more jobs and better pay.
More importantly, a stronger economy would allow the Liberals to bring in a credible pre-election budget next February that included spending increases for health and education. They could then claim that the sacrifices were begininning to py off.
The Liberals also need to find a way through difficult negotiations with teachers, nurses and doctors in coming months, especially critical after their mishandling of the HEU strike.
And they have to find a way to deal with the Campbell problem. B.C. premiers always trail their party in popularity. But Campbell's approval rating is dismal, with only 29 per cent of British Columbians approving of his performance. (Glen Clark, in his worst days, fell to 19-per-cent approval.)
There are lots of theories about why people believe Campbell is doing a bad job. He's seen as untrustworthy by people who believe he broke critical promises on issues like BC Rail and respecting contracts. And he's blamed for a wide perception that the Liberal government doesn't care about the effects of its policies on ordinary British Columbians.
The Liberal pitch will be based on asking for four more years to complete the job and capture the benefits of the Olympics.
The race is on. And the mere fact that it is a race, and not an easy Liberal walk, is an indication of how many more surprises may lie ahead.
Footnote: For the NDP, a critical issue will be who emerge as candidates. Newcomers may not inspire confidence; veterans of the Clark government will be a reminder of its bleak performance. For the Liberals, a critical issue will be whether the Unity Party is able to capture right-wing votes in close races that would have gone Liberal.
Wednesday, May 12, 2004
Tougher laws against street people not the answer
VICTORIA - I learned to to look carefully out the bus windows in Mexico City whenever we hit an intersection. A red light might mean a human pyramid - a man on the bottom, a kid about 10 who clambered up to stand on his shoulders and then a five-year-old, often in some ragtag costume, who scrambled up to stand on the very top, madly blowing a whistle. A silent ta-daa, everybody leaps down to the hot pavement and then dashes to collect money from drivers before the light changes.
It was weirder outside the main business district. There it was often just sickly looking men who took big swigs from plastic bottles and then breathed fire across the street, hoping drivers would toss them a few coins. (They were sickly looking because they used a mix of diesel and water to make the flames.)
Which leads, in a circular way, to MLA Lorne Mayencourt's bills that aim to put an end to squeegee people and aggressive panhandlers, and make it easier for property owners to bar people they don't like.
Mayencourt probably reflects the views of many people in his downtown Vancouver community. Many of them find panhandlers not just a nuisance, but threatening. Others wish they would all just go away.
And I can see that.
But it also gets a little uglier. Mayencourt did a reasonable job of explaining why he had introduced the bills in a scrum outside the chamber. But then he went a little father: "We're telling them that the streets belong to the people who pay for them."
So you low-income single mom, these aren't your streets. A citizen's rights are linked to the amount of taxes he pays.
You can make a good case for setting limits on peoples' actions, at least ones that affect others. If confrontational panhandlers make people feel unsafe, then there's a case for stopping them.
It's tricky ground. It's unrealistic to say people should simply ignore the approaches of panhandlers. If someone feels menaced, if their ability to make use of the streets is reduced, then something should be done.
But it's a short step from that argument to sweeping away anyone who makes people feel uncomfortable. And that 's wrong and dangerous. All people have a right to use the streets and public places.
The other problems with Mayencourt's bill are purely practical. It's hard to see how they are going to make any real difference.
Mayencourt cited the example of a woman whose car window was smashed by a squeegee person as an example of the need for a new law. But assault, smashing windows, threatening people, even jaywalking are all already offences. If law enforcement is the answer, the tools are already there.
It's not. Police have better things to do than arrest panhandlers, or issue tickets that they can't pay because they have no money.
There are no simple answers. One response is to look at why people are on the streets. If cuts to support programs for at-risk youth or a lack of treatment options for the addicted or mentally ill are a factor - and they likely are - then that needs to be part of the solution. If people are camped out in storefronts because there are no other safe places, then why not provide them?
At the risk of being simplistic, part of the answer lies within us. If we see these people as threatening aliens and respond in that way, we set the stage for deeper division. If we nod and say hello - even without giving money - we bring our community together. (And if we make personal contributions to the many effective agencies working with them, we do even more.)
We tend to like simple solutions: more law and order, or more social spending.
But ultimately this is about people and how they get along. And that is never simple.
Footnote: Mayencourt's bill isn't going anywhere. The big guys in government aren't keen, and only one private member's bill has passed in more than 20 years. That was MLA Steve Orcherton's bill extending patient's right to alternative health care. The Liberal repealed it shortly after the election. But it's still healthy to see a backbencher at least getting an idea on the agenda.
It was weirder outside the main business district. There it was often just sickly looking men who took big swigs from plastic bottles and then breathed fire across the street, hoping drivers would toss them a few coins. (They were sickly looking because they used a mix of diesel and water to make the flames.)
Which leads, in a circular way, to MLA Lorne Mayencourt's bills that aim to put an end to squeegee people and aggressive panhandlers, and make it easier for property owners to bar people they don't like.
Mayencourt probably reflects the views of many people in his downtown Vancouver community. Many of them find panhandlers not just a nuisance, but threatening. Others wish they would all just go away.
And I can see that.
But it also gets a little uglier. Mayencourt did a reasonable job of explaining why he had introduced the bills in a scrum outside the chamber. But then he went a little father: "We're telling them that the streets belong to the people who pay for them."
So you low-income single mom, these aren't your streets. A citizen's rights are linked to the amount of taxes he pays.
You can make a good case for setting limits on peoples' actions, at least ones that affect others. If confrontational panhandlers make people feel unsafe, then there's a case for stopping them.
It's tricky ground. It's unrealistic to say people should simply ignore the approaches of panhandlers. If someone feels menaced, if their ability to make use of the streets is reduced, then something should be done.
But it's a short step from that argument to sweeping away anyone who makes people feel uncomfortable. And that 's wrong and dangerous. All people have a right to use the streets and public places.
The other problems with Mayencourt's bill are purely practical. It's hard to see how they are going to make any real difference.
Mayencourt cited the example of a woman whose car window was smashed by a squeegee person as an example of the need for a new law. But assault, smashing windows, threatening people, even jaywalking are all already offences. If law enforcement is the answer, the tools are already there.
It's not. Police have better things to do than arrest panhandlers, or issue tickets that they can't pay because they have no money.
There are no simple answers. One response is to look at why people are on the streets. If cuts to support programs for at-risk youth or a lack of treatment options for the addicted or mentally ill are a factor - and they likely are - then that needs to be part of the solution. If people are camped out in storefronts because there are no other safe places, then why not provide them?
At the risk of being simplistic, part of the answer lies within us. If we see these people as threatening aliens and respond in that way, we set the stage for deeper division. If we nod and say hello - even without giving money - we bring our community together. (And if we make personal contributions to the many effective agencies working with them, we do even more.)
We tend to like simple solutions: more law and order, or more social spending.
But ultimately this is about people and how they get along. And that is never simple.
Footnote: Mayencourt's bill isn't going anywhere. The big guys in government aren't keen, and only one private member's bill has passed in more than 20 years. That was MLA Steve Orcherton's bill extending patient's right to alternative health care. The Liberal repealed it shortly after the election. But it's still healthy to see a backbencher at least getting an idea on the agenda.
Monday, May 10, 2004
Penner shows health care better if you can pay
VICTORIA - Queue-jumping MLA Barry Penner deserves our thanks.
The Abbotsford Liberal pushed the issue of two-tier health care out in the open, by taking the dramatic step of paying for surgery at a private clinic to avoid health care wait lists.
Let me be clear. If was in Penner's situation, I would do the same thing. He's had a bad back for a couple of years, and injured it while exercising in mid-April. His doctor put him on a wait list for surgery to repair a damaged disc. It was elective, but it was pressing enough that the operation was scheduled within a couple of weeks.
Then the Hospital Employees' Union strike began, and the procedure wasn't urgent enough to be done under essential services.
Penner says his doctor disagreed. He was in pain, and worried - even scared, I'd say - about long-term damage. So he went to a private clinic and paid for the surgery.
I'd do the same, even knowing that the surgery was probably illegal. (And I, like Penner, would express regret about it.)
But that's not the way health care is supposed to work in Canada. The Canada Health Act requires equal access to care. Canadians have taken it as a principle that income shouldn't determine who gets needed treatment and who has to wait.
Governments have been working hard to ignore the reality that private treatment has already created a two-tier system.
Which is fine if you have money.
But what if you can't come up with the cash? (Penner won't say how much his operation cost, because the clinic swears clients to secrecy, a nice surreptitious touch.)
Then you wait. You risk the permanent damage Penner was worried about. If you don't have the same benefits as MLAs, you lose income. You suffer.
That is today's reality - a world in which there is one standard of health care for people with money, and another for those without. So far government's have decided to pretend it's not happening. Health Minister Colin Hansen introduced a bill last year that would have targeted the abuses. The Liberals passed it. But then Premier Gordon Campbell, under pressure from private clinics, said the law wouldn't go into effect.
The government is still trying to avoid the issue. Hansen struggled to explain why Penner's surgery - and thousands more like it - aren't a violation of the Canada Health Act's ban on paying to jump the queue for medically necessary procedures.
Penner didn't jump the queue, Hansen said, he just stepped out of it.
Anyway there's no clear definition of medically necessary, Hansen added, although surely Penner's surgery would qualify under anyone's definition.
And he noted correctly that Penner would have got his surgery in the public system if not for the strike.
But this isn't about the strike. Waiting lists have climbed steadily since the election, and private operations for people who don't want to wait are done every day.
At its base the issue isn't complex. Waiting lists are climbing because governments won't pay for the treatments people need. There are enough operating rooms, nurses and in most cases doctors. Governments don't believe treating people in a timely way is a spending priority. (Every year since 1997 about 2,600 British Columbians have been told they need hip replacements and put on a waiting list. But in every year but one 2,300 replacements have been performed. So waiting lists grow until it now takes an average four months to get an operation. A one-time $25-million investment would clear the backlog.)
Penner deserves our thanks. He has provided a high-profile demonstration that two-tier care exists.
Now all Canadians need to decide if we are ready to accept a health care system which lets people with money get speedy treatment, while others wait, and often, suffer.
Footnote: Hansen also noted that queue-jumping has already been sanctioned by the federal government in some cases. The WCB can pay for private treatment for claimants, and RCMP members and federal prisoners also are allowed to go private. When injuries and illness cost governments money, they find ways around the queue. In opposition, the Liberals opposed the practise; they have now changed their minds.
The Abbotsford Liberal pushed the issue of two-tier health care out in the open, by taking the dramatic step of paying for surgery at a private clinic to avoid health care wait lists.
Let me be clear. If was in Penner's situation, I would do the same thing. He's had a bad back for a couple of years, and injured it while exercising in mid-April. His doctor put him on a wait list for surgery to repair a damaged disc. It was elective, but it was pressing enough that the operation was scheduled within a couple of weeks.
Then the Hospital Employees' Union strike began, and the procedure wasn't urgent enough to be done under essential services.
Penner says his doctor disagreed. He was in pain, and worried - even scared, I'd say - about long-term damage. So he went to a private clinic and paid for the surgery.
I'd do the same, even knowing that the surgery was probably illegal. (And I, like Penner, would express regret about it.)
But that's not the way health care is supposed to work in Canada. The Canada Health Act requires equal access to care. Canadians have taken it as a principle that income shouldn't determine who gets needed treatment and who has to wait.
Governments have been working hard to ignore the reality that private treatment has already created a two-tier system.
Which is fine if you have money.
But what if you can't come up with the cash? (Penner won't say how much his operation cost, because the clinic swears clients to secrecy, a nice surreptitious touch.)
Then you wait. You risk the permanent damage Penner was worried about. If you don't have the same benefits as MLAs, you lose income. You suffer.
That is today's reality - a world in which there is one standard of health care for people with money, and another for those without. So far government's have decided to pretend it's not happening. Health Minister Colin Hansen introduced a bill last year that would have targeted the abuses. The Liberals passed it. But then Premier Gordon Campbell, under pressure from private clinics, said the law wouldn't go into effect.
The government is still trying to avoid the issue. Hansen struggled to explain why Penner's surgery - and thousands more like it - aren't a violation of the Canada Health Act's ban on paying to jump the queue for medically necessary procedures.
Penner didn't jump the queue, Hansen said, he just stepped out of it.
Anyway there's no clear definition of medically necessary, Hansen added, although surely Penner's surgery would qualify under anyone's definition.
And he noted correctly that Penner would have got his surgery in the public system if not for the strike.
But this isn't about the strike. Waiting lists have climbed steadily since the election, and private operations for people who don't want to wait are done every day.
At its base the issue isn't complex. Waiting lists are climbing because governments won't pay for the treatments people need. There are enough operating rooms, nurses and in most cases doctors. Governments don't believe treating people in a timely way is a spending priority. (Every year since 1997 about 2,600 British Columbians have been told they need hip replacements and put on a waiting list. But in every year but one 2,300 replacements have been performed. So waiting lists grow until it now takes an average four months to get an operation. A one-time $25-million investment would clear the backlog.)
Penner deserves our thanks. He has provided a high-profile demonstration that two-tier care exists.
Now all Canadians need to decide if we are ready to accept a health care system which lets people with money get speedy treatment, while others wait, and often, suffer.
Footnote: Hansen also noted that queue-jumping has already been sanctioned by the federal government in some cases. The WCB can pay for private treatment for claimants, and RCMP members and federal prisoners also are allowed to go private. When injuries and illness cost governments money, they find ways around the queue. In opposition, the Liberals opposed the practise; they have now changed their minds.
IWA the Liberals' partner in health sector wage cuts
VICTORIA - Back in 1994 it would have been hard to predict that Dave Haggard and the IWA would become the Liberals' allies in privatizing health sector jobs and cutting employees' wages.
The Liberals could have shifted the work to private companies without the IWA's help. But it would have been a heck of a lot harder and slower without the union.
What a difference a decade makes. Back in 1994 Haggard and the IWA were waging war on MacMillan Bloedel over work done by construction companies using members of "rat unions." The unions were employer-controlled and negotiated inferior contracts, said Haggard. The IWA threatened boycotts and the dispute led to violent clashes in Port Alberni.
Flash forward. The Liberals want health authorities to be able fire Hospital Employees Union members and contract with private companies to do the work. The goal is to save money, largely by hiring new employees at much lower wages and with fewer benefits.
The Liberals could clear the way for the changes. They used legislation to remove job protection in health care workers ' contracts and eliminate successor rights.
But that still left a risk. The private companies bidding on the contracts knew they could probably fill the jobs with new workers who would work for much lower wages.
But they couldn't be guaranteed that those wages would stay low. The HEU would almost certainly try and organize the workplaces. The employees might decide to form their own association, or hook up with some other large union. Even if they didn't, the threat would always be there, creating uncertainty for the companies.
And that's where Haggard and the IWA came in. Before a single employee was hired, the IWA sat down with the three companies bidding for most of the work and signed a contract that provided low wages and few benefits.
When hiring started, job applicants were told they had to sign an IWA membership card before they would be interviewed. The companies and the IWA co-operated to force them into the union, and subject them to a contract they never had a chance to see, let alone vote on.
It was a good deal for the companies, which got an insurance policy against employees deciding to form a union and advance their own issues.
The government got lower bids for the work, since the companies didn't have to worry about their labour costs going up.
The IWA picked up a lot of dues revenue, without having to go through the hassle of convincing the workers that they actually wanted to hand part of their wages.
The employees didn't do quite so well. There's lots of talk about the efficiencies of private companies, and there are some benefits. But the real savings simply come from paying people less. Contracting out laundry services meant wages for an employee went from $34,000 under the HEU to $21,000 under the IWA contract, with benefits taking a similar cut.
The employees, in short, got what looks very much like the kind of contract Haggard used to rail against.
The employees could decertify, of course, but that's slow and difficult.
And in any case the government effectively took that option away, passing legislation last year to strip these employees of the successor rights enjoyed by employees at every other private business in the province. A health sector company facing a union or contract it doesn't like can fire the employees and walk away. A new operator then takes over, free to sign a more accommodating contract with a friendly union like the IWA. (This isn't theoretical; it has already happened.)
It's a sorry role for the IWA, one that has embarrassed many members and drawn sanctions from the Canadian Labour Congress.
And it's surprising that the union's members have stood by and watched as the IWA played a part in reducing not just wages, but the basic rights of workers.
Footnote: Haggard has been anointed as a federal Liberal candidate in New Westminster-Coquitlam, spared the trouble of a nomination battle thanks to Paul Martin's intervention. It's a reminder of how out of touch Martin is with B.C. To beat Conservative incumbent Paul Forseth, Haggard needs to capture votes from the NDP. Given the IWA's health role, that's not going to happen.
The Liberals could have shifted the work to private companies without the IWA's help. But it would have been a heck of a lot harder and slower without the union.
What a difference a decade makes. Back in 1994 Haggard and the IWA were waging war on MacMillan Bloedel over work done by construction companies using members of "rat unions." The unions were employer-controlled and negotiated inferior contracts, said Haggard. The IWA threatened boycotts and the dispute led to violent clashes in Port Alberni.
Flash forward. The Liberals want health authorities to be able fire Hospital Employees Union members and contract with private companies to do the work. The goal is to save money, largely by hiring new employees at much lower wages and with fewer benefits.
The Liberals could clear the way for the changes. They used legislation to remove job protection in health care workers ' contracts and eliminate successor rights.
But that still left a risk. The private companies bidding on the contracts knew they could probably fill the jobs with new workers who would work for much lower wages.
But they couldn't be guaranteed that those wages would stay low. The HEU would almost certainly try and organize the workplaces. The employees might decide to form their own association, or hook up with some other large union. Even if they didn't, the threat would always be there, creating uncertainty for the companies.
And that's where Haggard and the IWA came in. Before a single employee was hired, the IWA sat down with the three companies bidding for most of the work and signed a contract that provided low wages and few benefits.
When hiring started, job applicants were told they had to sign an IWA membership card before they would be interviewed. The companies and the IWA co-operated to force them into the union, and subject them to a contract they never had a chance to see, let alone vote on.
It was a good deal for the companies, which got an insurance policy against employees deciding to form a union and advance their own issues.
The government got lower bids for the work, since the companies didn't have to worry about their labour costs going up.
The IWA picked up a lot of dues revenue, without having to go through the hassle of convincing the workers that they actually wanted to hand part of their wages.
The employees didn't do quite so well. There's lots of talk about the efficiencies of private companies, and there are some benefits. But the real savings simply come from paying people less. Contracting out laundry services meant wages for an employee went from $34,000 under the HEU to $21,000 under the IWA contract, with benefits taking a similar cut.
The employees, in short, got what looks very much like the kind of contract Haggard used to rail against.
The employees could decertify, of course, but that's slow and difficult.
And in any case the government effectively took that option away, passing legislation last year to strip these employees of the successor rights enjoyed by employees at every other private business in the province. A health sector company facing a union or contract it doesn't like can fire the employees and walk away. A new operator then takes over, free to sign a more accommodating contract with a friendly union like the IWA. (This isn't theoretical; it has already happened.)
It's a sorry role for the IWA, one that has embarrassed many members and drawn sanctions from the Canadian Labour Congress.
And it's surprising that the union's members have stood by and watched as the IWA played a part in reducing not just wages, but the basic rights of workers.
Footnote: Haggard has been anointed as a federal Liberal candidate in New Westminster-Coquitlam, spared the trouble of a nomination battle thanks to Paul Martin's intervention. It's a reminder of how out of touch Martin is with B.C. To beat Conservative incumbent Paul Forseth, Haggard needs to capture votes from the NDP. Given the IWA's health role, that's not going to happen.
Wednesday, May 05, 2004
Public sector strikes: there's a better way
VICTORIA - It's time for a new way of resolving public sector labour disputes, especially in the health sector.
Premier Gordon Campbell doesn't seem keen on the idea, making no commitment for action. Labour Minister Graham Bruce says he's explored ideas a little with an informal "blue-ribbon panel" of advisors.
But the way we do things now doesn't work. And there are alternatives.
Most labour negotiations are resolved at the bargaining table. That's partly because union and company can usually agree pretty much on what a reasonable settlement would look like and find their way there, with some posturing along the way.
But negotiations also work because both sides are strongly motivated to avoid the worst case outcome - a strike or a lockout.
It's the labour version of the Cold War doctrine of mutually assured destruction. That theory held that as long as the U.S. and Russia each had enough atomic bombs to reduce each other to rubble, neither would be crazy enough to use them.
The strike/lockout threat is a small-scale version of the same principle. Companies know that a strike could inflict big economic damage, perhaps so great that the business would never recover and owners would lose everything. Employees know that they could be giving up wages for an indefinite period, and that if the company goes broke everything will be lost.
Asa result both sides are extremely motivated to make a deal. Both are aware of the dangers.
The balance actually works pretty well. (And to their credit the Liberals have done nothing to tilt the scale in favour of employers, despite pressure from some business groups.)
But the process breaks down in many public sector negotiations. Both sides know that the right to strike or lockout employees is an illusion. The public will get crabby; the politicians will step in and order a return to work; and a deal will be imposed or brokered in the backrooms.
Under the NDP those deals tended to favour the unions. The Hospital Employee Union's members work a 36-hour week because that's part of the deal former health minister Elizabeth Cull agreed to in 1993 to end a strike.
Under the Liberals, the deals favour the employers. The government moved the union back to a 37.5-hour week in the current dispute. (The change matters. The increase to 37.5 hours means about 1,700 fewer employees will be required; an increase to 40 hours would push the job loss to more than 4,000.)
And meanwhile the public suffers through the disruptions and pendulum swings.
It's time for a better system.
John Fryer has just chaired a federal committee looking at the same issues. Fryer has seen disputes from both sides, as a former BCGEU leader and a senior B.C. government bureaucrat.
The committee proposed an independent public interest disputes commission, with members experienced in employer and union sectors. If a dispute was looming, they would investigate and present a "framework for a settlement in the public interest." The commission would also have the chance to recommend mediation or other ways of resolving the dispute.
Nothing would be binding. But it would be tougher for both sides to cling to unreasonable positions in the face of an independent review. (Ottawa acted on the recommendation.)
There are other options. Both parties could be required to submit their final offers to an arbitrator who would pick one or the other in its entirety. Since trying for too much would mean you get nothing, a reasonable approach and moderation would be encouraged.
B.C. needs a better way of resolving these kinds of disputes. The current system serves both sides badly and makes the public tthe victim of destructive and unnecessary confrontations.
The government should start a search for a better way now, involving labour and employer representatives, and with a pledge to have some system of dispute resolution as part of next years' election platform.
Footnote: The Liberals have one big problem on this issue. Any solution relies on mutual trust that commitments will be honoured. But the Liberals have agreed to arbitration and then reneged when they didn't like the results. They have signed contracts, and then broken them when they proved inconvenient. A solution that imposes discipline on only one side in a dispute is doomed.
Premier Gordon Campbell doesn't seem keen on the idea, making no commitment for action. Labour Minister Graham Bruce says he's explored ideas a little with an informal "blue-ribbon panel" of advisors.
But the way we do things now doesn't work. And there are alternatives.
Most labour negotiations are resolved at the bargaining table. That's partly because union and company can usually agree pretty much on what a reasonable settlement would look like and find their way there, with some posturing along the way.
But negotiations also work because both sides are strongly motivated to avoid the worst case outcome - a strike or a lockout.
It's the labour version of the Cold War doctrine of mutually assured destruction. That theory held that as long as the U.S. and Russia each had enough atomic bombs to reduce each other to rubble, neither would be crazy enough to use them.
The strike/lockout threat is a small-scale version of the same principle. Companies know that a strike could inflict big economic damage, perhaps so great that the business would never recover and owners would lose everything. Employees know that they could be giving up wages for an indefinite period, and that if the company goes broke everything will be lost.
Asa result both sides are extremely motivated to make a deal. Both are aware of the dangers.
The balance actually works pretty well. (And to their credit the Liberals have done nothing to tilt the scale in favour of employers, despite pressure from some business groups.)
But the process breaks down in many public sector negotiations. Both sides know that the right to strike or lockout employees is an illusion. The public will get crabby; the politicians will step in and order a return to work; and a deal will be imposed or brokered in the backrooms.
Under the NDP those deals tended to favour the unions. The Hospital Employee Union's members work a 36-hour week because that's part of the deal former health minister Elizabeth Cull agreed to in 1993 to end a strike.
Under the Liberals, the deals favour the employers. The government moved the union back to a 37.5-hour week in the current dispute. (The change matters. The increase to 37.5 hours means about 1,700 fewer employees will be required; an increase to 40 hours would push the job loss to more than 4,000.)
And meanwhile the public suffers through the disruptions and pendulum swings.
It's time for a better system.
John Fryer has just chaired a federal committee looking at the same issues. Fryer has seen disputes from both sides, as a former BCGEU leader and a senior B.C. government bureaucrat.
The committee proposed an independent public interest disputes commission, with members experienced in employer and union sectors. If a dispute was looming, they would investigate and present a "framework for a settlement in the public interest." The commission would also have the chance to recommend mediation or other ways of resolving the dispute.
Nothing would be binding. But it would be tougher for both sides to cling to unreasonable positions in the face of an independent review. (Ottawa acted on the recommendation.)
There are other options. Both parties could be required to submit their final offers to an arbitrator who would pick one or the other in its entirety. Since trying for too much would mean you get nothing, a reasonable approach and moderation would be encouraged.
B.C. needs a better way of resolving these kinds of disputes. The current system serves both sides badly and makes the public tthe victim of destructive and unnecessary confrontations.
The government should start a search for a better way now, involving labour and employer representatives, and with a pledge to have some system of dispute resolution as part of next years' election platform.
Footnote: The Liberals have one big problem on this issue. Any solution relies on mutual trust that commitments will be honoured. But the Liberals have agreed to arbitration and then reneged when they didn't like the results. They have signed contracts, and then broken them when they proved inconvenient. A solution that imposes discipline on only one side in a dispute is doomed.
Monday, May 03, 2004
Liberals bungled back-to-work bill badly
VICTORIA - The Liberals did an astonishingly bad job of handling the
health care strike.
They bumbled and bullied and made what was inevitably going to be a bad
situation much, much worse.
The government has a good case for wage and benefit cuts, particularly
after overly generous contract awards under the NDP. (A single mom
working two jobs shouldn't pay more in taxes so health union members
only have to work a 36-hour week.).
And since the Hospital Employees' Union could be expected to fight any
concessions, it's tough to imagine any resolution without some
brinksmanship and disruption.
But the Liberals made a complete mess of this.
It's reasonable to seek cost reductions. It's reasonable to use
legislation to end the strike, deciding the health care system is too
fragile to sustain any more cuts.
But the Liberals had weeks to prepare back-to-work legislation that
would be pragmatic and effective.
They also had an obvious model. The government and the HEU leadership
reached an agreement last year that would have seen wage and benefit
cuts in return for a limit on job loss to privatization. The leadership
recommended it, but the deal was voted down by 57 per cent of the members.
That's a narrow defeat. And the LIberals also knew that just under half
the membership voted. That means only 13,000 of some 43,000 members felt
strongly enough opposed to the deal to cast a no vote.
That tells me that a fair back-to-work bill based on the agreement
reached last year would have worked. Employees and unions would grumble,
but they would return to work. And remember, the government had decided
last year that the deal made sense and was affordable.
That's not what the Liberals did. They opted for legislation that was a
one-sided attack on the union.
The legislation ending the strike imposed - as the base - an unpaid
1.5-hour increase in the work week and an 11-per-cent wage cut. The wage
cut was retroactive to April 1, so employees would be paying back money
from pay cheques they had already cashed. How would most of us feel if
the boss said he wanted to roll back our wages, starting last month, and
could we give him $300? (Even though unions always expect employers to
come up with retroactive pay increases.)
There was no privatization job protection, or any other small win for
the union.
The Liberals touted an option that would have let the HEU agree to have
a government-appointed arbitrator come up with combined pay and benefit
cuts that produced similar savings. (All the Liberal MLAs present voted
against an amendment that would have called for an arbitrator acceptable
to both parties.)
Gordon Campbell has been the peek-a-boo premier through all this. He
didn't speak during the 12-hour debate. He skipped the legislature the
next day. His only comments came in a couple of brief, puzzling
appearances on BCTV.
He urged the unions to accept the arbitration option, claiming the
arbitrator could deal with job protection - even though the bill doesn't
mention that option, and Health Minister Colin Hansen said that was
because he doesn't want any cap on contracting out.
And Campbell suggested that if employees would give up a week of
vacation and move to a 40-hour week with no wage increase, then they
would lose only a little in wage rates.
Sounds simple. But those two changes would translate into another 5,100
HEU members losing their jobs. That's hardly a strong selling point.
Now, after huge disruptions and a serious blow to the economy, the
Liberals are doing what they should have done in the first place.
The retroactivity requirement - which was either mean-spirited or dumb -
is gone. Additional job losses to privatization are capped at 600.
The same deal should have formed the basis for the back-to-work
legislation in the first place. And if the government had done that,
this damaging confrontation could have been avoided.
Footnote: How did this happen? One answer is that Liberal MLAs seemed to
have turned off their minds during debate on the back-to-work bill. In
hours of detailed examination, there was exactly one question from a
Liberal backbencher. Not one Liberal asked about retroactivity or any
other element of the deal.
health care strike.
They bumbled and bullied and made what was inevitably going to be a bad
situation much, much worse.
The government has a good case for wage and benefit cuts, particularly
after overly generous contract awards under the NDP. (A single mom
working two jobs shouldn't pay more in taxes so health union members
only have to work a 36-hour week.).
And since the Hospital Employees' Union could be expected to fight any
concessions, it's tough to imagine any resolution without some
brinksmanship and disruption.
But the Liberals made a complete mess of this.
It's reasonable to seek cost reductions. It's reasonable to use
legislation to end the strike, deciding the health care system is too
fragile to sustain any more cuts.
But the Liberals had weeks to prepare back-to-work legislation that
would be pragmatic and effective.
They also had an obvious model. The government and the HEU leadership
reached an agreement last year that would have seen wage and benefit
cuts in return for a limit on job loss to privatization. The leadership
recommended it, but the deal was voted down by 57 per cent of the members.
That's a narrow defeat. And the LIberals also knew that just under half
the membership voted. That means only 13,000 of some 43,000 members felt
strongly enough opposed to the deal to cast a no vote.
That tells me that a fair back-to-work bill based on the agreement
reached last year would have worked. Employees and unions would grumble,
but they would return to work. And remember, the government had decided
last year that the deal made sense and was affordable.
That's not what the Liberals did. They opted for legislation that was a
one-sided attack on the union.
The legislation ending the strike imposed - as the base - an unpaid
1.5-hour increase in the work week and an 11-per-cent wage cut. The wage
cut was retroactive to April 1, so employees would be paying back money
from pay cheques they had already cashed. How would most of us feel if
the boss said he wanted to roll back our wages, starting last month, and
could we give him $300? (Even though unions always expect employers to
come up with retroactive pay increases.)
There was no privatization job protection, or any other small win for
the union.
The Liberals touted an option that would have let the HEU agree to have
a government-appointed arbitrator come up with combined pay and benefit
cuts that produced similar savings. (All the Liberal MLAs present voted
against an amendment that would have called for an arbitrator acceptable
to both parties.)
Gordon Campbell has been the peek-a-boo premier through all this. He
didn't speak during the 12-hour debate. He skipped the legislature the
next day. His only comments came in a couple of brief, puzzling
appearances on BCTV.
He urged the unions to accept the arbitration option, claiming the
arbitrator could deal with job protection - even though the bill doesn't
mention that option, and Health Minister Colin Hansen said that was
because he doesn't want any cap on contracting out.
And Campbell suggested that if employees would give up a week of
vacation and move to a 40-hour week with no wage increase, then they
would lose only a little in wage rates.
Sounds simple. But those two changes would translate into another 5,100
HEU members losing their jobs. That's hardly a strong selling point.
Now, after huge disruptions and a serious blow to the economy, the
Liberals are doing what they should have done in the first place.
The retroactivity requirement - which was either mean-spirited or dumb -
is gone. Additional job losses to privatization are capped at 600.
The same deal should have formed the basis for the back-to-work
legislation in the first place. And if the government had done that,
this damaging confrontation could have been avoided.
Footnote: How did this happen? One answer is that Liberal MLAs seemed to
have turned off their minds during debate on the back-to-work bill. In
hours of detailed examination, there was exactly one question from a
Liberal backbencher. Not one Liberal asked about retroactivity or any
other element of the deal.
Friday, April 30, 2004
Health care hammer hurts all British Columbians
VICTORIA - There were no winners in the health care battle.
Employees lost, obviously. Hospital Employees Union members face significant pay and benefit cuts, and thousands of them still face being fired as their work is taken over by private contractors.
The government lost credibility. It walked all over the rights of 43,000 British Columbians without even a nod to fairness, and showed it can not be trusted. Premier Gordon Campbell's promise not to rip up contracts and his pledge that support workers in the health care system had nothing to fear from a Liberal government have both been proved false.
And patients have lost. Waiting lists have been climbing since the election. This dispute will make things worse.
There was no alternative to a legislated end, no matter how offensive it is to see government use legislation to cut employees' wages. (Wages that government had agreed to, and that Campbell knew about when he made his pre-election promise.)
Both sides could have handled this more effectively. The union members turned down a deal last year - one recommended by their leadership - which would have traded concessions for an end to job losses to privatization. They missed an opportunity to limit the damage.
But the government ignored its responsibility to show fairness. Those job protection provisions were acceptable a year ago. Finding a way to include them in the legislated end to the dispute would have shown good faith and a recognition that using legislation to cut wages is inherently unfair and an abuse of government power. Instead, the government rejected balance.
The hardship for employees is serious. The union has the option of working with an arbitrator to achieve the equivalent of a 10-per-cent wage cut by reducing benefits, an option which it would be wise to exercise.
The alternatives is a straight 11-per-cent wage cut. A hospital support staff worker being paid $34,000 a year will lose about $3,700. Families have bought homes and made other commitments based on the wages they had negotiated. Now that money has been taken away by government order. (The pay cuts are retroactive to April 1; employees are going to owe the government money.)
It's done now, although much fallout lies ahead.
But it's past time to acknowledge that health care labour relations in B.C. don't work, and haven't for years.
Government interference is the norm. Under the NDP, unions had little incentive to bargain because they were likely to benefit from an imposed or politically brokered deal. (That's how B.C. workers ended up with the highest wages, shortest work week and most generous vacation benefits in Canada.)
Under the Liberals, employers know that they will come out the winners in any negotiated deal so they have little incentive to bargain.
The result is a series of disruptions and contracts that don't reflect economic reality.
There are potential solutions. Some form of dispute resolution, followed by binding arbitration, could encourage productive negotiation. Neither side would likely to be keen on risking an unfavourable arbitration award.
There's one big problem with that option. The government agreed to binding arbitration in the last doctors' dispute, and then refused to implement the award when it didn't like the results. No union - or business for that matter - can agree to arbitration which is binding only if the government likes the outcome.
It's not just the mechanics of bargaining that need fixing. In this dispute the HEU has been shown to be an unworkable bargaining unit. The union includes 43,000 members, from skilled technicians to cleaners. Their issues and aims are too diverse to allow effective bargaining.
The system needs reform. That will be extremely difficult, given the current poisonous atmosphere and the Liberals' record of broken promises.
But a way has to be found - perhaps through a public inquiry - to fix a system that continue to produce chaos, conflict and disruption.
Footnote: MLA Blair Lekstrom is concerned about the retroactive provisions; he said he might not have voted for the bill if he had understood them, blaming the overnight debate for his confusion. MLA Kevin Krueger isn't - he used the opening prayer to ask God to help HEU workers do the right thing and give thanks for the legislation.
Employees lost, obviously. Hospital Employees Union members face significant pay and benefit cuts, and thousands of them still face being fired as their work is taken over by private contractors.
The government lost credibility. It walked all over the rights of 43,000 British Columbians without even a nod to fairness, and showed it can not be trusted. Premier Gordon Campbell's promise not to rip up contracts and his pledge that support workers in the health care system had nothing to fear from a Liberal government have both been proved false.
And patients have lost. Waiting lists have been climbing since the election. This dispute will make things worse.
There was no alternative to a legislated end, no matter how offensive it is to see government use legislation to cut employees' wages. (Wages that government had agreed to, and that Campbell knew about when he made his pre-election promise.)
Both sides could have handled this more effectively. The union members turned down a deal last year - one recommended by their leadership - which would have traded concessions for an end to job losses to privatization. They missed an opportunity to limit the damage.
But the government ignored its responsibility to show fairness. Those job protection provisions were acceptable a year ago. Finding a way to include them in the legislated end to the dispute would have shown good faith and a recognition that using legislation to cut wages is inherently unfair and an abuse of government power. Instead, the government rejected balance.
The hardship for employees is serious. The union has the option of working with an arbitrator to achieve the equivalent of a 10-per-cent wage cut by reducing benefits, an option which it would be wise to exercise.
The alternatives is a straight 11-per-cent wage cut. A hospital support staff worker being paid $34,000 a year will lose about $3,700. Families have bought homes and made other commitments based on the wages they had negotiated. Now that money has been taken away by government order. (The pay cuts are retroactive to April 1; employees are going to owe the government money.)
It's done now, although much fallout lies ahead.
But it's past time to acknowledge that health care labour relations in B.C. don't work, and haven't for years.
Government interference is the norm. Under the NDP, unions had little incentive to bargain because they were likely to benefit from an imposed or politically brokered deal. (That's how B.C. workers ended up with the highest wages, shortest work week and most generous vacation benefits in Canada.)
Under the Liberals, employers know that they will come out the winners in any negotiated deal so they have little incentive to bargain.
The result is a series of disruptions and contracts that don't reflect economic reality.
There are potential solutions. Some form of dispute resolution, followed by binding arbitration, could encourage productive negotiation. Neither side would likely to be keen on risking an unfavourable arbitration award.
There's one big problem with that option. The government agreed to binding arbitration in the last doctors' dispute, and then refused to implement the award when it didn't like the results. No union - or business for that matter - can agree to arbitration which is binding only if the government likes the outcome.
It's not just the mechanics of bargaining that need fixing. In this dispute the HEU has been shown to be an unworkable bargaining unit. The union includes 43,000 members, from skilled technicians to cleaners. Their issues and aims are too diverse to allow effective bargaining.
The system needs reform. That will be extremely difficult, given the current poisonous atmosphere and the Liberals' record of broken promises.
But a way has to be found - perhaps through a public inquiry - to fix a system that continue to produce chaos, conflict and disruption.
Footnote: MLA Blair Lekstrom is concerned about the retroactive provisions; he said he might not have voted for the bill if he had understood them, blaming the overnight debate for his confusion. MLA Kevin Krueger isn't - he used the opening prayer to ask God to help HEU workers do the right thing and give thanks for the legislation.
Tuesday, April 27, 2004
HEU hurting patients with a futile strike
VICTORIA - Health care workers have blundered into a strike they can't win.
The Hospital Employees' Union has forgotten that bargaining is about getting the best deal possible at the time. It's not about waging a political war, or staging a desperate 'Remember the Alamo' last stand. It's about doing the best you can and surviving to fight another day.
HEU members have a right to be angry. Premier Gordon Campbell told them he wouldn't rip up contracts, and then he did. He said workers in the health care system have nothing to fear from the Liberals, and then cleared the way for thousands of them to be fired and replaced with new people working for much lower wages. Health care workers feel they were lied to and misled by Campbell, and that they are being mistreated.
But their anger has apparently blinded them to reality.
The union's big issue is job security. By ripping up their contracts the government set the stage for wide scale privatization. HEU members have provided cleaning services for hospitals, for example, with pay scales of up to $19 an hour and generous benefits.
Now health authorities have been signing contracts with private companies to provide the same services, and firing the HEU workers. The new employer - in most cases helped by a sweetheart contract signed with the IWA before a single worker is hired - pays about $12 an hour, with few benefits.
So far about 5,000 jobs have been lost to contracting out. Another 10,000 of the union's 43,000 members face the same fate.
It's rough treatment, and a fundamental betrayal.
But the union members had a chance to soften the blow last year. Their leadership and the government negotiated an agreement that would have limited the job losses to 5,600 and extended the contract. In return the union would have seen wages rolled back by up to $1 an hour and granted other concessions.
The HEU brass recommended the deal, but 57 per cent of the members who voted turned the deal down.
That was a big mistake.
Now the union is on strike, seeking cost of living increases. The employers want concessions that would cut costs by an average $6,000 per employee and is pressing ahead with layoffs. And when the government ends the strike - as it will within days - the imposed settlement will be much closer to the employers' proposals.
The current contracts are too generous. Pay levels are the highest in Canada, in some cases significantly higher than other provinces. (Laundry workers in B.C. have a top rate of $18.65 an hour; the rate is nine per cent higher than Ontario and 44 per cent higher than Alberta.) The work week is 36 hours (increasing that to 37.5 hours, without increasing pay, would save $70 million a year). The union contract calls for seven weeks' vacation after 20 years, and nine weeks after 29.
The contracts are a symptom of our broken system of health care labour relations. During the NDP years, unions had little reason to compromise because they knew that job action would likely be resolved through a favourable settlement. Now employers have little reason to compromise, because they know that they'll come out the winners.
It's a system that hurts patients and leads to constant turmoil.
The HEU should have learned from other unions like the BCGEU, which treated recent contract talks as an exercise in damage control. They accepted some concessions, rolled over the current contracts and won continued job security for all members. That was a prudent course, (especially given poll results that show the NDP leading the Liberals).
It's not too late for that approach, especially if the Liberals offer the union a face-saving way out. The NDP proposes a freeze on new layoffs for 90 days and a mandatory return to bargaining. Some variation on that approach could provide at least the chance for a solution.
Footnote: What would Carole James do? The NDP now has a chance of forming the next government. If the NDP is elected in 14 months, will she anger union members by leaving wages at reduced levels, or put hundreds of millions back into the health budget for wages?
The Hospital Employees' Union has forgotten that bargaining is about getting the best deal possible at the time. It's not about waging a political war, or staging a desperate 'Remember the Alamo' last stand. It's about doing the best you can and surviving to fight another day.
HEU members have a right to be angry. Premier Gordon Campbell told them he wouldn't rip up contracts, and then he did. He said workers in the health care system have nothing to fear from the Liberals, and then cleared the way for thousands of them to be fired and replaced with new people working for much lower wages. Health care workers feel they were lied to and misled by Campbell, and that they are being mistreated.
But their anger has apparently blinded them to reality.
The union's big issue is job security. By ripping up their contracts the government set the stage for wide scale privatization. HEU members have provided cleaning services for hospitals, for example, with pay scales of up to $19 an hour and generous benefits.
Now health authorities have been signing contracts with private companies to provide the same services, and firing the HEU workers. The new employer - in most cases helped by a sweetheart contract signed with the IWA before a single worker is hired - pays about $12 an hour, with few benefits.
So far about 5,000 jobs have been lost to contracting out. Another 10,000 of the union's 43,000 members face the same fate.
It's rough treatment, and a fundamental betrayal.
But the union members had a chance to soften the blow last year. Their leadership and the government negotiated an agreement that would have limited the job losses to 5,600 and extended the contract. In return the union would have seen wages rolled back by up to $1 an hour and granted other concessions.
The HEU brass recommended the deal, but 57 per cent of the members who voted turned the deal down.
That was a big mistake.
Now the union is on strike, seeking cost of living increases. The employers want concessions that would cut costs by an average $6,000 per employee and is pressing ahead with layoffs. And when the government ends the strike - as it will within days - the imposed settlement will be much closer to the employers' proposals.
The current contracts are too generous. Pay levels are the highest in Canada, in some cases significantly higher than other provinces. (Laundry workers in B.C. have a top rate of $18.65 an hour; the rate is nine per cent higher than Ontario and 44 per cent higher than Alberta.) The work week is 36 hours (increasing that to 37.5 hours, without increasing pay, would save $70 million a year). The union contract calls for seven weeks' vacation after 20 years, and nine weeks after 29.
The contracts are a symptom of our broken system of health care labour relations. During the NDP years, unions had little reason to compromise because they knew that job action would likely be resolved through a favourable settlement. Now employers have little reason to compromise, because they know that they'll come out the winners.
It's a system that hurts patients and leads to constant turmoil.
The HEU should have learned from other unions like the BCGEU, which treated recent contract talks as an exercise in damage control. They accepted some concessions, rolled over the current contracts and won continued job security for all members. That was a prudent course, (especially given poll results that show the NDP leading the Liberals).
It's not too late for that approach, especially if the Liberals offer the union a face-saving way out. The NDP proposes a freeze on new layoffs for 90 days and a mandatory return to bargaining. Some variation on that approach could provide at least the chance for a solution.
Footnote: What would Carole James do? The NDP now has a chance of forming the next government. If the NDP is elected in 14 months, will she anger union members by leaving wages at reduced levels, or put hundreds of millions back into the health budget for wages?
Saturday, April 24, 2004
Liberals admit gambling broken promise
VICTORIA - It's just business, Tony Soprano likes to say.
Which is pretty much the way the B.C. government has decided to approach gambling.
Not entirely. The government could make more money with VLTs in bars, for example, but instead relies on Keno, a less addictive, slower way of losing money. (Although you have to wonder about the morality of trying to get people to gamble while they drink.)
And while gambling has been expanding like crazy in B.C., it has still not gone nearly as far as some other provinces.
But the Liberals' basic approach is clear - gambling is just business.
It wasn't always so. The Liberals fought expanded gambling when they were in opposition. And their New Era campaign promise was clear - a Liberal government would halt gambling expansion.
Instead they've done the opposite. By the end of this year the government will have doubled the number of slots in the province and moved them into bingo halls across B.C. The government's current plan calls for it to take $1 billion from gamblers within four years, double the profits when they were elected.
And the government's plan also calls for BC Lottery Corp. to persuade 200,000 more people to become regular gamblers, while getting everyone who buys lottery tickets or goes to casinos to lose more each month.
Solicitor General Rich Coleman, to his credit, has acknowledged that the Liberals have broken their campaign promise. "I'm not going to say that none of this is expanded gaming, because some of it is," he said in the legislature. "It is by virtue of the fact that we took what was structured gaming and tried to make it so that we gave the corporation the envelope within which to operate in order to actually do its business."
It's just business, in other words, although a business operating within some public interest limits.
But it's risky business. Letting a corporation "do its business" in the gambling world means leaving it to recruit more and more gamblers, while encouraging everyone who already gambles to lose more and more money.
Both goals are part of the BC Lottery Corp.'s business plan. We'll pump more than $3 billion in to government-run slots in B.C. this year, and the corporation hopes to increase that. It has just bought high tech equipment from a Las Vegas company that will give corporation managers in Kamloops the ability to monitor every bet and every turn of the cards at any B.C. casino. "With TableLink PT, profit-critical decisions, such as selecting bonus players, are no longer subject to human observation and guesswork," enthuses Mikohn Gaming Corp., the supplier.
Profit-critical decisions are the most important ones in the business world.
But gambling isn't just another business. Governments run gambling not just because they can make a ton of money, but because it involves serious, unavoidable damage to individuals and families.
None of this is a criticism of the BC Lottery Corp., which is just doing its job of trying to recruit more gamblers - in part through marketing campaigns that pitch gambling as both fun and a solution to your problems.
But the damage done along the way - as the Liberals used to note - is significant.
B.C. has more than 75,000 problem gamblers already; the government's efforts to recruit more gamblers ensures that number will increase every month.
And the next generation of gamblers - and problem gamblers - is already being recruited. A major study released by the McCreary Centre Society found that one-quarter of B.C. youths aged 12 to 17 said they had illegally bought lottery tickets in the last year. Young buyers are attracted by ads, prominent store displays and the chance of an instant win, according to another study of youth gambling.
The money is good. Gambling is on track to equal the forest industry as a revenue source for government.
But the cost is high - too high to treat gambling as just another business.
Footnote: The money is also good for municipal governments. Williams Lake council has just approved a bid for 120 slot machines in a new bingo hall. The town's revenue share is estimated at more than $700,000 a year, the Williams Lake Tribune reports.
Which is pretty much the way the B.C. government has decided to approach gambling.
Not entirely. The government could make more money with VLTs in bars, for example, but instead relies on Keno, a less addictive, slower way of losing money. (Although you have to wonder about the morality of trying to get people to gamble while they drink.)
And while gambling has been expanding like crazy in B.C., it has still not gone nearly as far as some other provinces.
But the Liberals' basic approach is clear - gambling is just business.
It wasn't always so. The Liberals fought expanded gambling when they were in opposition. And their New Era campaign promise was clear - a Liberal government would halt gambling expansion.
Instead they've done the opposite. By the end of this year the government will have doubled the number of slots in the province and moved them into bingo halls across B.C. The government's current plan calls for it to take $1 billion from gamblers within four years, double the profits when they were elected.
And the government's plan also calls for BC Lottery Corp. to persuade 200,000 more people to become regular gamblers, while getting everyone who buys lottery tickets or goes to casinos to lose more each month.
Solicitor General Rich Coleman, to his credit, has acknowledged that the Liberals have broken their campaign promise. "I'm not going to say that none of this is expanded gaming, because some of it is," he said in the legislature. "It is by virtue of the fact that we took what was structured gaming and tried to make it so that we gave the corporation the envelope within which to operate in order to actually do its business."
It's just business, in other words, although a business operating within some public interest limits.
But it's risky business. Letting a corporation "do its business" in the gambling world means leaving it to recruit more and more gamblers, while encouraging everyone who already gambles to lose more and more money.
Both goals are part of the BC Lottery Corp.'s business plan. We'll pump more than $3 billion in to government-run slots in B.C. this year, and the corporation hopes to increase that. It has just bought high tech equipment from a Las Vegas company that will give corporation managers in Kamloops the ability to monitor every bet and every turn of the cards at any B.C. casino. "With TableLink PT, profit-critical decisions, such as selecting bonus players, are no longer subject to human observation and guesswork," enthuses Mikohn Gaming Corp., the supplier.
Profit-critical decisions are the most important ones in the business world.
But gambling isn't just another business. Governments run gambling not just because they can make a ton of money, but because it involves serious, unavoidable damage to individuals and families.
None of this is a criticism of the BC Lottery Corp., which is just doing its job of trying to recruit more gamblers - in part through marketing campaigns that pitch gambling as both fun and a solution to your problems.
But the damage done along the way - as the Liberals used to note - is significant.
B.C. has more than 75,000 problem gamblers already; the government's efforts to recruit more gamblers ensures that number will increase every month.
And the next generation of gamblers - and problem gamblers - is already being recruited. A major study released by the McCreary Centre Society found that one-quarter of B.C. youths aged 12 to 17 said they had illegally bought lottery tickets in the last year. Young buyers are attracted by ads, prominent store displays and the chance of an instant win, according to another study of youth gambling.
The money is good. Gambling is on track to equal the forest industry as a revenue source for government.
But the cost is high - too high to treat gambling as just another business.
Footnote: The money is also good for municipal governments. Williams Lake council has just approved a bid for 120 slot machines in a new bingo hall. The town's revenue share is estimated at more than $700,000 a year, the Williams Lake Tribune reports.
Wednesday, April 21, 2004
Buy ferries offshore if that's the best deal
VICTORIA - The Liberals have got it right on the issue of whether BC Ferries should go offshore to buy new ships.
The Liberals say BC Ferries should shop for the best price, which likely means future additions to the ferry fleet will be built somewhere like South Korea.
NDP leader Carole James, and shipyard unions, want the government to order the ferry corporation to insist on a "Made in B.C." label, even if the ships cost more.
That's a bad idea, both on principle and in practical economic terms.
James claims that it's worth paying a premium - she hasn't said how much - because the money would create jobs and economic activity in the province.
But what she's really saying is that ferry users - businesses, tourists and locals - should donate money to subsidize the owners of big shipyards and their employees. After all, the extra cost of the ships has to be recovered, and that means higher prices for ferry users. Every time a shipper transports goods on BC Ferries, he'd be paying a premium to subsidize the shipbuilding companies.
Sure, there is some benefit to having ships built in B.C., in terms of job creation.
But it would come at cost to the rest of the economy. BC Ferries plans to place orders for two new major ships this year, at a cost of about $225 million. Paying a 10-per-cent premium to buy B.C. means ferry users would be paying some $25 million as a subsidy to the shipyards.
Every ferry trip would cost more than it needed to, and that also has economic implications - for tourism, for businesses dependent on the ferries and for individuals.
It's not even as if the subsidies would be helping to establish a major shipbuilding industry that could someday stand on its own.
We've tried that. The $460-million fast ferry project was supposed to develop a global aluminum shipbuilding industry in the province. It failed. The Canadian shipbuilding industry has successfully lobbied for a 25-per-cent tariff on most foreign-built ships and a string of subsidies and handouts.
They haven't worked. Sales have fallen in half over the last decade, and employment across Canada has gone from 12,000 to fewer than 5,000.
Part of the problem is that other countries are doing the same thing, subsidizing their industry with tax dollars. But lower wages, especially in Asia, also mean ships can be built more cheaply there. (Slamming the door on foreign ships would deny those workers the chance to use their energy and skill - and current lower living standard - to improve their lot.)
B.C. shipyards deserve every chance to compete. And there is lots of work they will likely continue to win, especially in repair and maintenance projects where proximity is a big advantage.
But asking ferry travellers to pay a premium or hidden surcharge to subsidize B.C. shipyards is unfair and economically destructive. Unfair because there's no way a minimum wage worker who needs to use the ferries to make an involuntary contribution to the owners of B.C. shipyards. And economically destructive because the higher ferry costs created by the subsidy damage other businesses.
It's odd that James has grabbed on to this issue. The fast ferry fiasco shredded the NDP's credibility when it comes to shipbuilding policy. Leaping into this fray - on the side of unions and shipyard owners and against the interests of ferry users - just reminds voters of that disaster.
B.C. builders - which effectively means the U.S.-owned Washington Marine Group when it comes to large projects - should get every chance to bid.
But the deciding factor should be where the ferry corporation can get the best value.
That's the right thing to do for ferry users. And it's the right thing to do for the B.C. economy.
Footnote: It's ironic that while B.C. workers are suffering because of unfair U.S. trade barriers erected to keep our softwood out of their market, the New Democrats and some unions want to throw up the same kinds of barriers against foreign shipbuilders. Trade breaks down quickly when every country decides to bar the door to new competitors.
The Liberals say BC Ferries should shop for the best price, which likely means future additions to the ferry fleet will be built somewhere like South Korea.
NDP leader Carole James, and shipyard unions, want the government to order the ferry corporation to insist on a "Made in B.C." label, even if the ships cost more.
That's a bad idea, both on principle and in practical economic terms.
James claims that it's worth paying a premium - she hasn't said how much - because the money would create jobs and economic activity in the province.
But what she's really saying is that ferry users - businesses, tourists and locals - should donate money to subsidize the owners of big shipyards and their employees. After all, the extra cost of the ships has to be recovered, and that means higher prices for ferry users. Every time a shipper transports goods on BC Ferries, he'd be paying a premium to subsidize the shipbuilding companies.
Sure, there is some benefit to having ships built in B.C., in terms of job creation.
But it would come at cost to the rest of the economy. BC Ferries plans to place orders for two new major ships this year, at a cost of about $225 million. Paying a 10-per-cent premium to buy B.C. means ferry users would be paying some $25 million as a subsidy to the shipyards.
Every ferry trip would cost more than it needed to, and that also has economic implications - for tourism, for businesses dependent on the ferries and for individuals.
It's not even as if the subsidies would be helping to establish a major shipbuilding industry that could someday stand on its own.
We've tried that. The $460-million fast ferry project was supposed to develop a global aluminum shipbuilding industry in the province. It failed. The Canadian shipbuilding industry has successfully lobbied for a 25-per-cent tariff on most foreign-built ships and a string of subsidies and handouts.
They haven't worked. Sales have fallen in half over the last decade, and employment across Canada has gone from 12,000 to fewer than 5,000.
Part of the problem is that other countries are doing the same thing, subsidizing their industry with tax dollars. But lower wages, especially in Asia, also mean ships can be built more cheaply there. (Slamming the door on foreign ships would deny those workers the chance to use their energy and skill - and current lower living standard - to improve their lot.)
B.C. shipyards deserve every chance to compete. And there is lots of work they will likely continue to win, especially in repair and maintenance projects where proximity is a big advantage.
But asking ferry travellers to pay a premium or hidden surcharge to subsidize B.C. shipyards is unfair and economically destructive. Unfair because there's no way a minimum wage worker who needs to use the ferries to make an involuntary contribution to the owners of B.C. shipyards. And economically destructive because the higher ferry costs created by the subsidy damage other businesses.
It's odd that James has grabbed on to this issue. The fast ferry fiasco shredded the NDP's credibility when it comes to shipbuilding policy. Leaping into this fray - on the side of unions and shipyard owners and against the interests of ferry users - just reminds voters of that disaster.
B.C. builders - which effectively means the U.S.-owned Washington Marine Group when it comes to large projects - should get every chance to bid.
But the deciding factor should be where the ferry corporation can get the best value.
That's the right thing to do for ferry users. And it's the right thing to do for the B.C. economy.
Footnote: It's ironic that while B.C. workers are suffering because of unfair U.S. trade barriers erected to keep our softwood out of their market, the New Democrats and some unions want to throw up the same kinds of barriers against foreign shipbuilders. Trade breaks down quickly when every country decides to bar the door to new competitors.
Tuesday, April 20, 2004
Thousand-year BC Rail deal leaves Liberals looking bad
VICTORIA - The BC Rail sale is turning into a huge problem for the Liberals.
Even people who don't think government should be running a railway are worried about the Liberals' slipperiness and self-serving secrecy, highlighted by the news that CN Rail is getting the right to run the railway for almost 1,000 years.
When the Liberals announced the deal in November, they released a summary of the terms designed to sell the public on the merits of the sale. Everything else was to stay secret until the federal competition bureau approved the deal - when it would be too late for any changes.
And a centrepiece of the Liberal spin was the claim that the deal was for 90 years, with CN Rail getting a 60-year lease with a 30-year renewal option.
That was part of Premier Gordon Campbell's bogus claim that he wasn't breaking a campaign promise not to sell BC Rail.
Now columnist Michael Smyth reports in The Province that the deal includes 15 more 60-year renewal options that the Liberals never mentioned. And CN won't have to pay the government a nickle more if it exercises those options and operates the railway on public land for 990 years.
Normal business practice, says Transportation MInister Kevin Falcon. Sure CN Rail can keep operating the line until 2994 (unless centuries of global warming mean parts of it are under water). But every 60 years government can decide to buy the business back from CN. No big deal.
But if it's normal business practice, and no big thing, why did the government not only keep it secret but mislead the public with its claim the deal was for 90 years? (One answer may be that the money CN paid works out to $750 a year on the longer term.)
The government also kept secret a contract clause that specifies that CN Rail can close parts of the line - after a five-year moratorium - and buy the land for $1.
Falcon defends the provision. It protects the province, he says. If the land is valuable, the government will exercise its right to keep it. But if it's contaminated and requires costly clean-up, the government will be able to force the burden on to CN Rail. It's good business.
But if it's good business, why the secrecy? Why, even now, does the government refuse to release the details of this and other provisions that could bind the people of the province for 1,000 years?
The deal faces other big problems. The courts have ruled that before any Crown land is transferred to private ownership, local First Nations with unresolved land claims must be consulted.
The Liberals maintain that because the government retains ownership of the dirt beneath the tracks, there is no duty to consult. And they set up a $15-million development fund to try and win support from the 25 First Nations along the rail line.
It's not working. First Nations have already served notice that they believe the deal is a sale, and will exercise their legal rights.
BC Rail has turned into a nightmare for the Liberals. Campbell's 1996 campaign pledge to sell the railway helped lose him that election. In 2001, he said he had learned his lesson: BC Rail would not be sold or privatized.
But that's exactly what he's done. The government's claim that because the province continues to own the dirt beneath the tracks BC Rail hasn't been sold is bogus. CN owns all the equipment, and the business, and runs it with no strings attached.
Campbell could have defended the sale of BC Rail. He could have argued that the risk to taxpayers in owning a railway outweighs the potential economic development boost for resource communities. (It's a good argument.)
But it's much tougher to try and deny the broken New Era promise, or defend the unwarranted secrecy - and slipperiness - around this deal.
Footnote: Falcon made much of CN Rail's likely investment of some $3.5 billion in the railway over the next 90 years. But that is comparable to past BC Rail spending each year on maintenance and equipment, money that in recent years has come from the railway's profits.
Even people who don't think government should be running a railway are worried about the Liberals' slipperiness and self-serving secrecy, highlighted by the news that CN Rail is getting the right to run the railway for almost 1,000 years.
When the Liberals announced the deal in November, they released a summary of the terms designed to sell the public on the merits of the sale. Everything else was to stay secret until the federal competition bureau approved the deal - when it would be too late for any changes.
And a centrepiece of the Liberal spin was the claim that the deal was for 90 years, with CN Rail getting a 60-year lease with a 30-year renewal option.
That was part of Premier Gordon Campbell's bogus claim that he wasn't breaking a campaign promise not to sell BC Rail.
Now columnist Michael Smyth reports in The Province that the deal includes 15 more 60-year renewal options that the Liberals never mentioned. And CN won't have to pay the government a nickle more if it exercises those options and operates the railway on public land for 990 years.
Normal business practice, says Transportation MInister Kevin Falcon. Sure CN Rail can keep operating the line until 2994 (unless centuries of global warming mean parts of it are under water). But every 60 years government can decide to buy the business back from CN. No big deal.
But if it's normal business practice, and no big thing, why did the government not only keep it secret but mislead the public with its claim the deal was for 90 years? (One answer may be that the money CN paid works out to $750 a year on the longer term.)
The government also kept secret a contract clause that specifies that CN Rail can close parts of the line - after a five-year moratorium - and buy the land for $1.
Falcon defends the provision. It protects the province, he says. If the land is valuable, the government will exercise its right to keep it. But if it's contaminated and requires costly clean-up, the government will be able to force the burden on to CN Rail. It's good business.
But if it's good business, why the secrecy? Why, even now, does the government refuse to release the details of this and other provisions that could bind the people of the province for 1,000 years?
The deal faces other big problems. The courts have ruled that before any Crown land is transferred to private ownership, local First Nations with unresolved land claims must be consulted.
The Liberals maintain that because the government retains ownership of the dirt beneath the tracks, there is no duty to consult. And they set up a $15-million development fund to try and win support from the 25 First Nations along the rail line.
It's not working. First Nations have already served notice that they believe the deal is a sale, and will exercise their legal rights.
BC Rail has turned into a nightmare for the Liberals. Campbell's 1996 campaign pledge to sell the railway helped lose him that election. In 2001, he said he had learned his lesson: BC Rail would not be sold or privatized.
But that's exactly what he's done. The government's claim that because the province continues to own the dirt beneath the tracks BC Rail hasn't been sold is bogus. CN owns all the equipment, and the business, and runs it with no strings attached.
Campbell could have defended the sale of BC Rail. He could have argued that the risk to taxpayers in owning a railway outweighs the potential economic development boost for resource communities. (It's a good argument.)
But it's much tougher to try and deny the broken New Era promise, or defend the unwarranted secrecy - and slipperiness - around this deal.
Footnote: Falcon made much of CN Rail's likely investment of some $3.5 billion in the railway over the next 90 years. But that is comparable to past BC Rail spending each year on maintenance and equipment, money that in recent years has come from the railway's profits.
Thursday, April 15, 2004
Cache Creek trust broken in chicken crisis
VICTORIA - The government plan to dump dead chickens at the Cache Creek landfill relied on trust. Local farmers had to believe that the process would be safe. Local residents - and people along the route - had to trust that the governments had exhausted every alternative before using emergency powers to force dead chickens on Cache Creek.
The governments didn't really consult or explain, or justify their actions. We know best, and you can trust us, they said.
Sadly, that's a doomed position. Citizens don't trust governments. That's not a slag on any particular political party. The NDP brought us the fast ferries; Gordon Campbell vowed not to rip up contracts; the federal Liberals brought us political abuses and the sponsorship scandal. Our skepticism is reasonable.
Because we don't trust them, governments have two choices. Act unilaterally and face the consequences. Or make the effort to convince us that they are right, and that the risks are small and necessary.
The governments chose the first course, trying to force their plan through using emergency powers to let them break the written agreements developed as part of the plan to move Lower Mainland garbage to Cache Creek.
It didn't work. The local people - led by Mayor John Ranta, a politician with Liberal ties, and supported by their MLA - blockaded the dump.
The governments' initial misstep made their problem much greater.
Trust had been, once again, broken. Efforts to justify the decision - belatedly - faced a much tougher audience as a result.
So far, the arguments from the people in Cache Creek opposing the transfer make more sense than the governments' defense of the plan.
All precautions are being taken, the governments say. The dead chickens will be double bagged; the bags will be disinfected and then placed in a watertight bin which is covered with a tarp. The trucks that carry the bins will be followed by an emergency clean-up truck in case of accident. At the dump, a layer of bags will be covered with six inches of lime and two feet of clay. A second layer of dead birds will be covered by another six inches of lime and three feet of clay.
Sounds like serious precautions.
But all through the outbreak, a lot of serious precautions have been taken, and the avian flu just keeps on spreading. The newest site is in Cloverdale, well outside the containment zone. Special checkpoints have been set up at ferry terminals and truck inspection stations to halt the spread.
And people in the Cache Creek area note warily that the government so far hasn't identified the landfill at Burns Bog in the Lower Mainland as a chicken disposal site. If the process is so safe, why aren't the birds staying in the region, they ask. How will the government guarantee that a seagull won't rip open one of those bags, or human error won't allow the virus to spread to their farms?
The dead chickens have to go somewhere, but the governments will have to make their case much more convincingly before they can expect to find a community willing to become home to someone else's hazardous waste.
The best method of disposal, according to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, is on the farm. The carcasses can be composted in the barns, a process which generates enough heat to kill the avian flu virus. In European outbreaks mobile incinerators have been brought around.
The second choice is incineration at other sites.
And landfill disposal comes third.
Meanwhile, the people of Cache Creek aren't going to accept government claims on blind faith. And other communities considering allowing landfill sites - on the basis of promised protections from the province - are now going to see that those promises may be broken too easily.
No one expects a perfect response in a time of crisis. But now it's time for governments to learn from their errors and move on.
Footnote: Our methods of raising and marketing chickens may be partly responsible for this disaster. When millions of birds are being raised in a small area, the stage is set for a devastating outbreak. Our system of marketing boards - limiting the number producers to keep prices high - may be increasing the risk by encouraging centralized production and blocking smaller and regional producers unable to afford to buy quota. It's time for a closer look.
The governments didn't really consult or explain, or justify their actions. We know best, and you can trust us, they said.
Sadly, that's a doomed position. Citizens don't trust governments. That's not a slag on any particular political party. The NDP brought us the fast ferries; Gordon Campbell vowed not to rip up contracts; the federal Liberals brought us political abuses and the sponsorship scandal. Our skepticism is reasonable.
Because we don't trust them, governments have two choices. Act unilaterally and face the consequences. Or make the effort to convince us that they are right, and that the risks are small and necessary.
The governments chose the first course, trying to force their plan through using emergency powers to let them break the written agreements developed as part of the plan to move Lower Mainland garbage to Cache Creek.
It didn't work. The local people - led by Mayor John Ranta, a politician with Liberal ties, and supported by their MLA - blockaded the dump.
The governments' initial misstep made their problem much greater.
Trust had been, once again, broken. Efforts to justify the decision - belatedly - faced a much tougher audience as a result.
So far, the arguments from the people in Cache Creek opposing the transfer make more sense than the governments' defense of the plan.
All precautions are being taken, the governments say. The dead chickens will be double bagged; the bags will be disinfected and then placed in a watertight bin which is covered with a tarp. The trucks that carry the bins will be followed by an emergency clean-up truck in case of accident. At the dump, a layer of bags will be covered with six inches of lime and two feet of clay. A second layer of dead birds will be covered by another six inches of lime and three feet of clay.
Sounds like serious precautions.
But all through the outbreak, a lot of serious precautions have been taken, and the avian flu just keeps on spreading. The newest site is in Cloverdale, well outside the containment zone. Special checkpoints have been set up at ferry terminals and truck inspection stations to halt the spread.
And people in the Cache Creek area note warily that the government so far hasn't identified the landfill at Burns Bog in the Lower Mainland as a chicken disposal site. If the process is so safe, why aren't the birds staying in the region, they ask. How will the government guarantee that a seagull won't rip open one of those bags, or human error won't allow the virus to spread to their farms?
The dead chickens have to go somewhere, but the governments will have to make their case much more convincingly before they can expect to find a community willing to become home to someone else's hazardous waste.
The best method of disposal, according to the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, is on the farm. The carcasses can be composted in the barns, a process which generates enough heat to kill the avian flu virus. In European outbreaks mobile incinerators have been brought around.
The second choice is incineration at other sites.
And landfill disposal comes third.
Meanwhile, the people of Cache Creek aren't going to accept government claims on blind faith. And other communities considering allowing landfill sites - on the basis of promised protections from the province - are now going to see that those promises may be broken too easily.
No one expects a perfect response in a time of crisis. But now it's time for governments to learn from their errors and move on.
Footnote: Our methods of raising and marketing chickens may be partly responsible for this disaster. When millions of birds are being raised in a small area, the stage is set for a devastating outbreak. Our system of marketing boards - limiting the number producers to keep prices high - may be increasing the risk by encouraging centralized production and blocking smaller and regional producers unable to afford to buy quota. It's time for a closer look.
The rich do get richer, and the poor poorer
It's official - the rich do get rich while the poor get poorer.
Especially in B.C.
BC Stats reports that the income gap between the richest and poorest British Columbians has been steadily widening.
"Urban inequality in BC increased over the last two decades, as the gap between the lowest and highest-income earners expanded in both Victoria and Vancouver," BC Stats reported.
The findings come from a Statistics Canada study that compared incomes in 27 urban areas across Canada.
B.C. topped the list both for the income gap and the rate of increase in the chasm between rich and poor.
In Vancouver the poorest tenth of the population saw their real income fall 11 per cent between 1980 and 2000. Meanwhile, the wealthiest 10 per cent had a real income - that's income adjusted for inflation - nine-per-cent higher than in 1980.
Back in 1980 the top 10 per cent of the population had incomes on average 5.3 times as large as their counterparts on the bottom of the economic ladder. But by 2000, they were earning 6.4 times as much as the tenth of the population with the lowest incomes in Vancouver.
Results were similar in Victoria, where the poorest 10 per cent saw their incomes rise two per cent over 20 years. The top tenth of the population had an average increase of 14 per cent.
The gap between rich and poor in Vancouver is the greatest in Canada.
The increasing inequality may be linked to immigration levels, the BC Stats review found. Recent immigrants made up 16.6 per cent of the Vancouver population in 2000, up from 10.3 per cent in 1980.
"New immigrants often experience a period of relatively low income while they establish themselves in the new country," the report said. More new immigrants means more low-income earners.
The study found that new immigrants are increasingly likely to wind up with low-paying jobs. In 1980 about one in fine recent immigrant was working at a low-income level.
"This suggests that new immigrants are becoming increasingly isolated, economically, from the mainstream of society," the report suggested.
Especially in B.C.
BC Stats reports that the income gap between the richest and poorest British Columbians has been steadily widening.
"Urban inequality in BC increased over the last two decades, as the gap between the lowest and highest-income earners expanded in both Victoria and Vancouver," BC Stats reported.
The findings come from a Statistics Canada study that compared incomes in 27 urban areas across Canada.
B.C. topped the list both for the income gap and the rate of increase in the chasm between rich and poor.
In Vancouver the poorest tenth of the population saw their real income fall 11 per cent between 1980 and 2000. Meanwhile, the wealthiest 10 per cent had a real income - that's income adjusted for inflation - nine-per-cent higher than in 1980.
Back in 1980 the top 10 per cent of the population had incomes on average 5.3 times as large as their counterparts on the bottom of the economic ladder. But by 2000, they were earning 6.4 times as much as the tenth of the population with the lowest incomes in Vancouver.
Results were similar in Victoria, where the poorest 10 per cent saw their incomes rise two per cent over 20 years. The top tenth of the population had an average increase of 14 per cent.
The gap between rich and poor in Vancouver is the greatest in Canada.
The increasing inequality may be linked to immigration levels, the BC Stats review found. Recent immigrants made up 16.6 per cent of the Vancouver population in 2000, up from 10.3 per cent in 1980.
"New immigrants often experience a period of relatively low income while they establish themselves in the new country," the report said. More new immigrants means more low-income earners.
The study found that new immigrants are increasingly likely to wind up with low-paying jobs. In 1980 about one in fine recent immigrant was working at a low-income level.
"This suggests that new immigrants are becoming increasingly isolated, economically, from the mainstream of society," the report suggested.
Wednesday, April 14, 2004
Forest communities face huge crisis in 15 years
VICTORIA - The crushing economic impact of the pine beetle disaster is going to slam B.C. communities in 15 years.
The infested trees will mostly be gone, either harvested or too damaged to have any value. The next generation of trees will be decades away from maturity.
Across the Interior and North, forest-dependent communities - that's almost all of them - will be facing annual allowable cut reductions of 20 per cent to 30 per cent. There won't be enough fibre to keep mills operating, or loggers working.
That's the bad news.
The good news, or at least hopeful news, is that we have 15 years to prepare. And communities and government have taken the first step in looking ahead to the grisly problem.
Roger Harris, minister for forest operations, outlined the problem at the last televised cabinet meeting. The cabinet's reaction was a little disturbing. No minister asked about the coming crisis. (They did make sure no extra money would be spent on efforts to prepare.)
But still, the problem was placed on the table. That's remarkable. We're not as a society much good at long-term thinking. It is a huge advantage to begin working now to prepare for an economic crisis 10 years that will come after the Vancouver Olympics.
There's been lots of talk about the pine beetle infestation. An area about six times as large as Vancouver Island has been affected, and thousands of trees are dying.
The immediate focus is on using the infected wood. For 10 to 15 years, depending on the climate, the timber is still useful. Harvesting it before the value is lost will save jobs and protect government revenues. (Targeted harvesting could also slow the infestation's spread.)
But the much bigger problems are about 15 years away, when communities find themselves facing a sharply reduced timber supply.
Harris said across the Interior and North the annual allowable cut will be cut by 20 per cent to 30 per cent.
The impact is enormous. In the Quesnel area the timber supply is expected to be cut by almost one-third. About three-quarters of the 12,000 area jobs are tied to the forest industry. Do the math, and you find that about 2,600 jobs at risk. Multiply that across scores of communities, and you have an idea of the impact. (Imagine a coming economic blow that would see 300,000 people laid off in the Lower Mainland.)
It may not be that bad. But the best predictions are for a huge crisis.
There are no easy solutions. The current efforts are aimed at harvesting the beetle-infested wood before it loses value. Harris told cabinet some 500 million cubic metres of wood will be affected within three years. At current harvest levels about 200 million cubic metres of that timber will be wasted. That's more than three years' harvest for the entire province.
The solution is to use the wood more quickly, But although the government has raised the allowable cut, companies haven't found markets for the wood. Cabinet accepted Harris' plan to try and encourage new uses for the damaged wood.
The effort is worthwhile, but faces huge challenges. Solutions like an OSB plant sound fine, but a plant like the one going into Fort St. John costs $200 million and only uses about one million cubic metres a year, a fraction of the glut.
And no amount of success will change the future reality.
Harris won approval for the first steps. An economic diversification director has been appointed to help communities prepare for the crisis. A community advisory group, including First Nations, municipalities, industry and environmentalists will meet twice a year to review progress.
It's a small start.
But it's an important one, and the Liberals deserve credit for facing the problem.
Footnote: Cabinet asked no questions about the long-term crisis after Harris' presentation. Premier Gordon Campbell and Financed Minister Gary Collins did make sure no extra spending was involved this year, noting that the Liberal commitment to balance the budget has left no room for extra spending.
The infested trees will mostly be gone, either harvested or too damaged to have any value. The next generation of trees will be decades away from maturity.
Across the Interior and North, forest-dependent communities - that's almost all of them - will be facing annual allowable cut reductions of 20 per cent to 30 per cent. There won't be enough fibre to keep mills operating, or loggers working.
That's the bad news.
The good news, or at least hopeful news, is that we have 15 years to prepare. And communities and government have taken the first step in looking ahead to the grisly problem.
Roger Harris, minister for forest operations, outlined the problem at the last televised cabinet meeting. The cabinet's reaction was a little disturbing. No minister asked about the coming crisis. (They did make sure no extra money would be spent on efforts to prepare.)
But still, the problem was placed on the table. That's remarkable. We're not as a society much good at long-term thinking. It is a huge advantage to begin working now to prepare for an economic crisis 10 years that will come after the Vancouver Olympics.
There's been lots of talk about the pine beetle infestation. An area about six times as large as Vancouver Island has been affected, and thousands of trees are dying.
The immediate focus is on using the infected wood. For 10 to 15 years, depending on the climate, the timber is still useful. Harvesting it before the value is lost will save jobs and protect government revenues. (Targeted harvesting could also slow the infestation's spread.)
But the much bigger problems are about 15 years away, when communities find themselves facing a sharply reduced timber supply.
Harris said across the Interior and North the annual allowable cut will be cut by 20 per cent to 30 per cent.
The impact is enormous. In the Quesnel area the timber supply is expected to be cut by almost one-third. About three-quarters of the 12,000 area jobs are tied to the forest industry. Do the math, and you find that about 2,600 jobs at risk. Multiply that across scores of communities, and you have an idea of the impact. (Imagine a coming economic blow that would see 300,000 people laid off in the Lower Mainland.)
It may not be that bad. But the best predictions are for a huge crisis.
There are no easy solutions. The current efforts are aimed at harvesting the beetle-infested wood before it loses value. Harris told cabinet some 500 million cubic metres of wood will be affected within three years. At current harvest levels about 200 million cubic metres of that timber will be wasted. That's more than three years' harvest for the entire province.
The solution is to use the wood more quickly, But although the government has raised the allowable cut, companies haven't found markets for the wood. Cabinet accepted Harris' plan to try and encourage new uses for the damaged wood.
The effort is worthwhile, but faces huge challenges. Solutions like an OSB plant sound fine, but a plant like the one going into Fort St. John costs $200 million and only uses about one million cubic metres a year, a fraction of the glut.
And no amount of success will change the future reality.
Harris won approval for the first steps. An economic diversification director has been appointed to help communities prepare for the crisis. A community advisory group, including First Nations, municipalities, industry and environmentalists will meet twice a year to review progress.
It's a small start.
But it's an important one, and the Liberals deserve credit for facing the problem.
Footnote: Cabinet asked no questions about the long-term crisis after Harris' presentation. Premier Gordon Campbell and Financed Minister Gary Collins did make sure no extra spending was involved this year, noting that the Liberal commitment to balance the budget has left no room for extra spending.
Tuesday, April 13, 2004
Citizens' assembly makes Liberal MLAs twitchy
VICTORIA - The citizens' assembly on electoral reform seems to be making some Liberal MLAs pretty nervous.
The assembly is the most important thing that's going to happen to politics in B.C. in your lifetime. A group of 160 randomly selected citizens are getting together to decide if there's a better way of electing governments. If they think there is, a proposal will go to a referendum at the same time as the provincial election in May 2005.
It's a bold democratic move from Premier Gordon Campbell. Not many politicians would tamper with the system that got them into power; fewer would take the risk of handing the task to ordinary citizens. Give Campbell credit.
But not all the Liberals are so confident in the peoples' judgment. (Odd, since it was the people who put them in office.)
The citizens' assembly is independent, but a legislative committee has been appointed to receive its reports, including five Liberals, New Democrat Joy MacPhail and newly independent member Elayne Brenzinger.
And at the committee's first meeting this month, a couple of Liberal MLAs got mighty skittish about this democracy thing.
Kamloops MLA Kevin Krueger, the committee's vice-chair, was especially concerned about the assembly's first public report. That eight-page document set out the results of months of research and study and was intended as a starting point for 49 public meetings around the province in May and June.
Krueger accused the assembly of being close-minded. "I was surprised, Dr. Blaney, that the preliminary statement so clearly demonstrated that the assembly had made up its mind to lean in a particular direction, being proportional representation." (Jack Blaney is the government-appointed chair for the process.)
Krueger pulls one sentence from the report to back his claim, citing a passage in which the assembly says it wants to hear if the public agrees "that a more proportional system would better reflect the basic values of our province's population."
It's a risky accusation. It hardly seems sensible to ask ordinary citizens to bring their common sense, commitment and knowledge to a task only to have the government members sniping at them.
But it's bizarre in this case, because the assembly's report was remarkably balanced, noting the strengths and weaknesses of the current system and potential alternatives. The report was clear to emphasize that the assembly had reached no decision on whether any change is needed. That's why the public hearings are so important.
In fact Gordon Gibson, hired by the Liberals to come up with the assembly process, had suggested a much more specific set of proposals from the group by this point. Instead, they decided to keep the options as open as possible for public discussion.
Krueger wasn't alone in his concerns. Vancouver Kingsway MLA Rob Nijjar said he shared the worries.
And Nijjar had his own complaint, one that revealed something about life in the Liberal caucus.
Nijjar was worried about "a highly politically charged" letter to the editor in the Vancouver Sun from one of the the assembly members. Shouldn't members have to clear all letters or communications with Blaney, Nijjar asked?
I checked the letter. It was five paragraphs long. It opened with an observation that the Liberals' secret caucus suspensions might not be appreciated by constituents of the banned MLAs. And it mainly encouraged people to participate in the work of the assembly if they thought the system could be improved. It wasn't highly politically charged.
Blaney rightly responded that the process involved trust in the judgment of the assembly members.
But it makes you wonder about the Liberal MLAs' view of the world, and if they think everything they write or say has to be run past the party chiefs.
It was a disappointing start for the legislative committee.
The citizens' assembly is an excellent, brave initiative. Check out its web page - www. citizensassembly.bc.ca. The project deserves your attention and support.
Footnote: What's odd about the position taken by Krueger and Nijjar is that one of the main results of a shift to a more proportional form of representation would be a strong role for MLAs. We've drifted into a system in which power is concentrated in the office of the premier or prime minister; change offers a chance to give it back to elected MLAs.
The assembly is the most important thing that's going to happen to politics in B.C. in your lifetime. A group of 160 randomly selected citizens are getting together to decide if there's a better way of electing governments. If they think there is, a proposal will go to a referendum at the same time as the provincial election in May 2005.
It's a bold democratic move from Premier Gordon Campbell. Not many politicians would tamper with the system that got them into power; fewer would take the risk of handing the task to ordinary citizens. Give Campbell credit.
But not all the Liberals are so confident in the peoples' judgment. (Odd, since it was the people who put them in office.)
The citizens' assembly is independent, but a legislative committee has been appointed to receive its reports, including five Liberals, New Democrat Joy MacPhail and newly independent member Elayne Brenzinger.
And at the committee's first meeting this month, a couple of Liberal MLAs got mighty skittish about this democracy thing.
Kamloops MLA Kevin Krueger, the committee's vice-chair, was especially concerned about the assembly's first public report. That eight-page document set out the results of months of research and study and was intended as a starting point for 49 public meetings around the province in May and June.
Krueger accused the assembly of being close-minded. "I was surprised, Dr. Blaney, that the preliminary statement so clearly demonstrated that the assembly had made up its mind to lean in a particular direction, being proportional representation." (Jack Blaney is the government-appointed chair for the process.)
Krueger pulls one sentence from the report to back his claim, citing a passage in which the assembly says it wants to hear if the public agrees "that a more proportional system would better reflect the basic values of our province's population."
It's a risky accusation. It hardly seems sensible to ask ordinary citizens to bring their common sense, commitment and knowledge to a task only to have the government members sniping at them.
But it's bizarre in this case, because the assembly's report was remarkably balanced, noting the strengths and weaknesses of the current system and potential alternatives. The report was clear to emphasize that the assembly had reached no decision on whether any change is needed. That's why the public hearings are so important.
In fact Gordon Gibson, hired by the Liberals to come up with the assembly process, had suggested a much more specific set of proposals from the group by this point. Instead, they decided to keep the options as open as possible for public discussion.
Krueger wasn't alone in his concerns. Vancouver Kingsway MLA Rob Nijjar said he shared the worries.
And Nijjar had his own complaint, one that revealed something about life in the Liberal caucus.
Nijjar was worried about "a highly politically charged" letter to the editor in the Vancouver Sun from one of the the assembly members. Shouldn't members have to clear all letters or communications with Blaney, Nijjar asked?
I checked the letter. It was five paragraphs long. It opened with an observation that the Liberals' secret caucus suspensions might not be appreciated by constituents of the banned MLAs. And it mainly encouraged people to participate in the work of the assembly if they thought the system could be improved. It wasn't highly politically charged.
Blaney rightly responded that the process involved trust in the judgment of the assembly members.
But it makes you wonder about the Liberal MLAs' view of the world, and if they think everything they write or say has to be run past the party chiefs.
It was a disappointing start for the legislative committee.
The citizens' assembly is an excellent, brave initiative. Check out its web page - www. citizensassembly.bc.ca. The project deserves your attention and support.
Footnote: What's odd about the position taken by Krueger and Nijjar is that one of the main results of a shift to a more proportional form of representation would be a strong role for MLAs. We've drifted into a system in which power is concentrated in the office of the premier or prime minister; change offers a chance to give it back to elected MLAs.
Thursday, April 08, 2004
Liberals take aim at Carole James
VICTORIA - The Liberals are getting positively obsessed with Carole James.
Her name came up about 20 times in barely the space of an hour one afternoon before the legislature shut down for Easter, with most of the references from Christy Clark.
And when Labour Minister Graham Bruce did a press release to talk about the latest job numbers, he took the extraordinary step of singling out James as part of a little anti-NDP political spin. Cabinet ministers' news releases are political, of course, but not usually so blatantly partisan. (The job news was good - about 20,000 more people were working in the province in March than were a year ago.)
The Liberals have reason to be rattled. Under James' leadership, the NDP has risen steadily in the polls and is now ahead. Her personal approval rating is much higher than Gordon Campbell's.
But there's a dangerous lack of self-examination in the Liberal response. It's reasonable enough for the Liberals to try and get James to take firmer positions before the election, targets they can then attack.
And it's natural to conclude that when people no longer support you, it's because they just don't understand what you're doing, or don't have a full appreciation how much worse the alternatives are. That's the kind of thinking that leads to tactics like the focus on James.
But it's more important to consider the possibility that people have lost confidence because they don't think you're doing a good job, and think about how you need to change to regain their trust.
The Liberals took after James for her decision not to run in Surrey Panorama. Liberal MLA Gulzmar Cheema has won a federal Liberal nomination; he'll resign his provincial seat when the election is called. James should take the first chance to enter the legislature, Liberals say.
It's not going to happen. James says she can accomplish more this year by travelling around the province than she can in Victoria. She doesn't want to commit to a byelection campaign that could come anytime in the next year, depending on when a federal election is called and when Campbell decides to hold the byelection. And she doesn't want to risk defeat if the Liberals find a star candidate. Surrey Mayor Doug McCallum and Conservative MP Chuck Cadman have both been rumoured as potential Liberal candidates.
And, most importantly, what she has been doing has worked. Why mess with it now?
(The Liberals' claim that it was urgent that a party leader be in the legislature rang a bit hollow anyway. Campbell rarely shows up in the legislature, compared with past premiers. No attendance record is kept - it should be - but my last tally had him missing about 60 per cent of sitting days.)
Voters do have a right to expect more specifics from James and the NDP before the election.
She has opposed offshore oil and expansion of the current types of aquaculture, both important issues for coastal communities. Her position on mining, and balancing the inevitable land use conflicts, is unclear.
And while it is fine to talk about restoring funding to programs like child care for low-income British Columbians, voters are going to want to know where the money will come from. (Though it was striking that a recent Ipsos-Reid poll found that 60 per cent of British Columbians would pay higher property taxes for better municipal services.)
The Liberals risk making two mistakes with this approach.
The emphasis on James - and the rather blatant misrepresentation of her positions at times - is also raising her profile, and indicating just how nervous the Liberals have become.
And it is keeping them from some needed self-examination.
James will need to provide answers.
But she has a year to do that. And it's not likely that the Liberal attacks are going to bump the New Democrats from their election timetable.
Footnote: One of the things James is doing is raising money. The NDP pulled in about $3.4 million last year, up by more than 50 per cent over 2002. The Liberals still raised more, up 20 per cent to $5.5 million. And the Liberals also start with a significant advantage - about $1.5 million on hand for the coming campaign, compared with $150,000 for the NDP. The Greens raised $135,000 last year; Unity $42,000.
Her name came up about 20 times in barely the space of an hour one afternoon before the legislature shut down for Easter, with most of the references from Christy Clark.
And when Labour Minister Graham Bruce did a press release to talk about the latest job numbers, he took the extraordinary step of singling out James as part of a little anti-NDP political spin. Cabinet ministers' news releases are political, of course, but not usually so blatantly partisan. (The job news was good - about 20,000 more people were working in the province in March than were a year ago.)
The Liberals have reason to be rattled. Under James' leadership, the NDP has risen steadily in the polls and is now ahead. Her personal approval rating is much higher than Gordon Campbell's.
But there's a dangerous lack of self-examination in the Liberal response. It's reasonable enough for the Liberals to try and get James to take firmer positions before the election, targets they can then attack.
And it's natural to conclude that when people no longer support you, it's because they just don't understand what you're doing, or don't have a full appreciation how much worse the alternatives are. That's the kind of thinking that leads to tactics like the focus on James.
But it's more important to consider the possibility that people have lost confidence because they don't think you're doing a good job, and think about how you need to change to regain their trust.
The Liberals took after James for her decision not to run in Surrey Panorama. Liberal MLA Gulzmar Cheema has won a federal Liberal nomination; he'll resign his provincial seat when the election is called. James should take the first chance to enter the legislature, Liberals say.
It's not going to happen. James says she can accomplish more this year by travelling around the province than she can in Victoria. She doesn't want to commit to a byelection campaign that could come anytime in the next year, depending on when a federal election is called and when Campbell decides to hold the byelection. And she doesn't want to risk defeat if the Liberals find a star candidate. Surrey Mayor Doug McCallum and Conservative MP Chuck Cadman have both been rumoured as potential Liberal candidates.
And, most importantly, what she has been doing has worked. Why mess with it now?
(The Liberals' claim that it was urgent that a party leader be in the legislature rang a bit hollow anyway. Campbell rarely shows up in the legislature, compared with past premiers. No attendance record is kept - it should be - but my last tally had him missing about 60 per cent of sitting days.)
Voters do have a right to expect more specifics from James and the NDP before the election.
She has opposed offshore oil and expansion of the current types of aquaculture, both important issues for coastal communities. Her position on mining, and balancing the inevitable land use conflicts, is unclear.
And while it is fine to talk about restoring funding to programs like child care for low-income British Columbians, voters are going to want to know where the money will come from. (Though it was striking that a recent Ipsos-Reid poll found that 60 per cent of British Columbians would pay higher property taxes for better municipal services.)
The Liberals risk making two mistakes with this approach.
The emphasis on James - and the rather blatant misrepresentation of her positions at times - is also raising her profile, and indicating just how nervous the Liberals have become.
And it is keeping them from some needed self-examination.
James will need to provide answers.
But she has a year to do that. And it's not likely that the Liberal attacks are going to bump the New Democrats from their election timetable.
Footnote: One of the things James is doing is raising money. The NDP pulled in about $3.4 million last year, up by more than 50 per cent over 2002. The Liberals still raised more, up 20 per cent to $5.5 million. And the Liberals also start with a significant advantage - about $1.5 million on hand for the coming campaign, compared with $150,000 for the NDP. The Greens raised $135,000 last year; Unity $42,000.
Wednesday, April 07, 2004
Children and families' ministry plans a mess
By Paul Willcocks
VICTORIA - The Liberals have made at least a great a mess of the ministry of children and families as their predecessors.
And that is saying something.
After thousands of hours of work by volunteers across the province - and millions of dollars - the Liberals have slammed the brakes on plans to hand responsibility for child and family services over to new regional authorities.
It's an admission of massive and damaging mismanagement.
Here's what was supposed to happen. The LIberals wanted to create 10 new regional authorities, semi-independent boards like the health authorities. There would be five non-aboriginal authorities, and five aboriginal. As well, a new community living authority would take over province-wide services for the mentally disabled.
Decision-making would be returned to involved communities, producing better results. (And saving money. The Liberals' hopes of slashing the ministry budget were based on cheaper service delivery as a result of the restructuring.)
Now it's fallen apart.
All five non-aboriginal authorities and the community living authority should have been operating now, according to the plan affirmed by former minister Gordon Hogg a year ago.
They aren't. And deputy minister Alison MacPhail, brought in after Hogg's resignation, has just emailed staff and told them the changes are put off until late 2006 or 2007. The regional committees which have worked tremendously hard on the change for two years have been shut down.
The future for the community living authority also remains uncertain. Preparations became tangled up in the Doug Walls scandal. A "readiness report" on when - or if - the transition can go ahead was supposed to be ready Feb. 27. Six weeks later, it remains outstanding.
Meanwhile, the Liberals are chopping $185 million from the ministry budget over two years, with the final $65 million coming this year. (In opposition both Gordon Campbell and current minister Christy Clark said the ministry was under-funded and should get more money. Who knew they didn't mean it?)
Hogg had justified the cuts in part by pointing to the savings from regionalization. But while that's not happening, the cuts still are.
The government has also betrayed thousands of people who have volunteered to make these changes happen. They worked their way through about $7.5 million in planning money, and devoted a huge amount of energy and time. Service clubs, churches, agencies - they all pitched in.
Those people don't understand this decision. The government says it has belatedly decided that the aboriginal and non-aboriginal authorities should start operating at the same time. The aboriginal authorities won't be ready until well into 2006. So everyone waits.
But the regions say they are ready to move forward, and note the plan was always to have the non-aboriginal authorities come on-line as they are ready. They fear the government is backing away from the whole shift. They feel abused and tricked.
It's reasonable for the government to be cautious. The Liberal track record with the ministry does not inspire confidence.
But the word from the field is that the regions are ready. Joyce Preston, the province's Child, Youth and Family Advocate for six years, has worked with transition committees in the Island and Interior regions. They are on track, she says, and the change should go ahead. (Preston also wonders how aboriginal communities are supposed to develop the needed capacity when funding for that purpose is being cut.)
The government has mishandled the ministry since the election, ignoring the obvious risk of slashing budgets while trying to push forward on a major restructuring. It ha squandered money, and time.
And with that, it has lost the right to our confidence or trust.
Before the transition is put off for another three years, the people who have worked so hard on the change - and the people who depend on the services - deserve an independent review of the decision, and a full public report.
Footnote: The Liberals' handling of the ministry also raises critical questions of basic competence - the ability to develop and execute a sensible plan. The Liberals' budget plans for the ministry have been wildly over-optimistic, virtually every deadline in its restructuring has been missed, the people who signed on to support the policy changes feel betrayed and action has been pushed off past the next election.
VICTORIA - The Liberals have made at least a great a mess of the ministry of children and families as their predecessors.
And that is saying something.
After thousands of hours of work by volunteers across the province - and millions of dollars - the Liberals have slammed the brakes on plans to hand responsibility for child and family services over to new regional authorities.
It's an admission of massive and damaging mismanagement.
Here's what was supposed to happen. The LIberals wanted to create 10 new regional authorities, semi-independent boards like the health authorities. There would be five non-aboriginal authorities, and five aboriginal. As well, a new community living authority would take over province-wide services for the mentally disabled.
Decision-making would be returned to involved communities, producing better results. (And saving money. The Liberals' hopes of slashing the ministry budget were based on cheaper service delivery as a result of the restructuring.)
Now it's fallen apart.
All five non-aboriginal authorities and the community living authority should have been operating now, according to the plan affirmed by former minister Gordon Hogg a year ago.
They aren't. And deputy minister Alison MacPhail, brought in after Hogg's resignation, has just emailed staff and told them the changes are put off until late 2006 or 2007. The regional committees which have worked tremendously hard on the change for two years have been shut down.
The future for the community living authority also remains uncertain. Preparations became tangled up in the Doug Walls scandal. A "readiness report" on when - or if - the transition can go ahead was supposed to be ready Feb. 27. Six weeks later, it remains outstanding.
Meanwhile, the Liberals are chopping $185 million from the ministry budget over two years, with the final $65 million coming this year. (In opposition both Gordon Campbell and current minister Christy Clark said the ministry was under-funded and should get more money. Who knew they didn't mean it?)
Hogg had justified the cuts in part by pointing to the savings from regionalization. But while that's not happening, the cuts still are.
The government has also betrayed thousands of people who have volunteered to make these changes happen. They worked their way through about $7.5 million in planning money, and devoted a huge amount of energy and time. Service clubs, churches, agencies - they all pitched in.
Those people don't understand this decision. The government says it has belatedly decided that the aboriginal and non-aboriginal authorities should start operating at the same time. The aboriginal authorities won't be ready until well into 2006. So everyone waits.
But the regions say they are ready to move forward, and note the plan was always to have the non-aboriginal authorities come on-line as they are ready. They fear the government is backing away from the whole shift. They feel abused and tricked.
It's reasonable for the government to be cautious. The Liberal track record with the ministry does not inspire confidence.
But the word from the field is that the regions are ready. Joyce Preston, the province's Child, Youth and Family Advocate for six years, has worked with transition committees in the Island and Interior regions. They are on track, she says, and the change should go ahead. (Preston also wonders how aboriginal communities are supposed to develop the needed capacity when funding for that purpose is being cut.)
The government has mishandled the ministry since the election, ignoring the obvious risk of slashing budgets while trying to push forward on a major restructuring. It ha squandered money, and time.
And with that, it has lost the right to our confidence or trust.
Before the transition is put off for another three years, the people who have worked so hard on the change - and the people who depend on the services - deserve an independent review of the decision, and a full public report.
Footnote: The Liberals' handling of the ministry also raises critical questions of basic competence - the ability to develop and execute a sensible plan. The Liberals' budget plans for the ministry have been wildly over-optimistic, virtually every deadline in its restructuring has been missed, the people who signed on to support the policy changes feel betrayed and action has been pushed off past the next election.
Tuesday, April 06, 2004
Liberals ignoring Games cost over-run risk
VICTORIA - The Liberals sound lost on the threat of Olympic cost over-runs.
Before the first lick of work has started, Vancouver Olympics organizers are warning that they don't have enough money to build the rinks and ski trails and other facilities needed for the 2010 Games. They'll be coming back to provincial and federal governments for more cash, says Games chair Jack Poole.
That should be a cause for concern. The Games are going to cost about $3 billion; even a small percentage over-run can turn into big dollars. And the government had promised that every cost was included.
The NDP raised the issue in the legislature, asking the government what it has found out about the size of the cost over-runs and what measures are in place to control spending.
Christy Clark responded to the questions - you couldn't say she answered them - in her capacity as deputy premier.
Nothing to worry about, she said. The province won't come up with any more money. The budget is fixed. Contingency funds are built into budgets.
That's a remarkably inaccurate answer. There is no limit to the province's commitment. To win the Games Premier Gordon Campbell promised to assume all responsibility for any Olympic cost over-runs or revenue shortfalls.
It's a reasonable enough risk, but it remains a risk. And simply wishing away the problem of cost over-runs, or hiding from them, is irresponsible.
Especially because the Games' organizers are already warning that the construction cost allowances aren't adequate to cope with inflation and other pressures over the next six years. The Games has a capital budget of $620 million, with the cost shared between the federal and provincial governments. If it's not enough, BC. taxpayers -the ones ultimately on the hook - need to know.
Cost over-runs are a constant Olympic reality. The team organizing the 2006 Games in Piedmont, Italy, visited Vancouver this month to share information. Figure on up to 15 per cent in extra costs for unexpected emergencies, they advised, and 20-per-cent cost over-runs on construction.
Provincial Auditor General Wayne Strelioff has also warned that the $139-million contingency fund included as part of the Games budget might not be adequate. "Achieving the financial results predicted by the Bid Corporation will need excellent management, effective marketing and a favourable economy," he warned.
There's no reason to panic here. There will be lots of ups and downs over the next six years of work to prepare for the Olympics.
But the government's head-in-the-sand approach does a disservice to taxpayers.
Clark didn't provide any information on possible cost over-runs. She responded with a rant about how great the Olympics would be for the province. The New Democrats just hate the idea of the Games, she said, ignoring the fact that the NDP government launched the bid for the 2010 Games. "Those members don't oppose the Olympics because of the cost," Clark said. "Those members oppose the Olympics because they don't want British Columbia to do well." (It is the kind of response that should make everyone cringe. Legitimate questions deserve real answers. Failing that, call the New Democrats stupid, or incompetent. But it's just dumb to argue that they ran for office because the want the province to do badly.)
Clark likewise brushed off a suggestion that makes imminent sense. Why not appoint the province's auditor general as the official auditor for the Games committee, asked the New Democrats?
Again, no answer. But it's a sound proposal, given the taxpayers' interest in financial accountability.
The Games and the Sea-to-Sky Highway improvements are slated to cost provincial taxpayers $1.3 billion, with our share of convention centre expansion and the RAV line to the Vancouver airport on top of that.
If cost over-runs are already threatening to push our share higher, we have a right to answers, not bluster.
Footnote: Clark accused NDP leader Carole James of opposing the Games, and called on her to seek a seat in the legislature so people would know where she stands on this and other issues. The attack - part of a new Liberal attempt to focus on James - backfired when MacPhail noted Campbell is rarely in the legislature either; his attendance is the poorest of any premier in history, she added.
Martin's Dosanjh move makes mockery of democracy
By Paul Willcocks
VICTORIA - How dumb does Paul Martin think we are?
Mr. Democratic Deficit has been going on about the need to give politics back to the people, promising a new way of doing things.
But then he rolled in to Vancouver and did exactly the opposite, a genial despot with a pleasant smile.
Martin wiped out the democratic right of thousands of voters to decide who should represent them in Ottawa, turned our system on its head and still maintained he's the champion of political reform.
By appointing Liberal candidates - or clearing the way for them - Martin exempted his favourites from that irritating nomination process, where you have to win community support and sign up members in order to become a Liberal candidate. That's apparently for the lesser lights. If Martin thinks you have the right stuff, you can skip all that annoying democracy stuff - just like ex-premier Ujjal Dosanjh.
I like Dosanjh. And while his move from provincial NDP leader to federal Liberal candidate raises lots of interesting questions - where are the provincial Liberals on the political spectrum, if an alleged federal Liberal finds a more comfortable home in the NDP - it's his decision.
But it's outrageous that Martin presumes to dictate to the Liberal voters in Vancouver South who their candidate will be. Basic democracy gives them the right to make that choice. Martin is taking it away, because he knows best.
Which is one of the problem with politics as practised today. Martin doesn't know best. We do. Martin, Gordon Campbell, Stephen Harper, Jack Layton, Carole James, they are all very smart I'm sure. But we are, collectively, smarter.
It's bizarre on so many levels.
The Liberals don't actually need a lot of help in arranging nomination contests to get the results the party bosses want. A guy named Bob Russell worked for a long-time to win the Liberal nomination over here in Saanich-Gulf Islands. But he wasn't on the good side of the Martin machine, which backed a succession of candidates against him. The first two dropped out; the third, Pia Shandel, was pushed out of the race by the Martin people only days before the nomination meeting.
That should have clinched it for Russell. Party rules say would-be candidates have to declare at least seven days before the nomination meeting. But rules are apparently meant to be bent. With three days to go, lawyer David Mulroney - a former vice-president in MP David Anderson's riding association, whose firm gets almost a $1 million a year in federal government work - got special permission to enter the race. And surprise, with no time to campaign or sign up members, he won. (Fired Liberal aide David Basi had earlier signed up hundreds of new members in the riding.)
Dosanjh is the only candidate officially imposed by Martin so far. But the way was also cleared for former Canfor head David Emerson and Shirley Chan, with similar treatment likely for B.C. party president Bill Cunningham.
Either through dictate, or backroom dealing, Martin and his people arranged for their favourite candidates to get special treatment.
Voters lose in at least two ways. Their right to choose a candidate has been stolen.
And the favoured candidates owe their loyalty not to the people in the riding, but to Martin and his team. How independent are MPs who owe their nominations to the boss going to be?
Martin is counting on the hand-picked candidates to be high-profile enough to turn around the Liberal fortunes in B.C.
It's a risk. In Dosanjh's case, two other Liberals had already been working to get the nomination. Brushed aside by Martin, neither they nor their supporters are likely to work terribly hard in this election campaign.
And for voters concerned about the Liberals' scandal-plagued reputation for political favoritism, Martin's machinations have just reinforced their worst fears about the "new" Liberal government.
Footnote: Dosanjh's jump to the federal Liberals prompted rare agreement between provincial Liberals and New Democrats - all agree it's a bad thing. New Democrats accused Dosanjh of opportunism and betrayal, lending legitimacy to the Martin government. And provincial Liberals not only don't look forward to dealing with Dosanjh in Ottawa, they aren't happy with Martin's endorsement of a key player in the former NDP government.
Before the first lick of work has started, Vancouver Olympics organizers are warning that they don't have enough money to build the rinks and ski trails and other facilities needed for the 2010 Games. They'll be coming back to provincial and federal governments for more cash, says Games chair Jack Poole.
That should be a cause for concern. The Games are going to cost about $3 billion; even a small percentage over-run can turn into big dollars. And the government had promised that every cost was included.
The NDP raised the issue in the legislature, asking the government what it has found out about the size of the cost over-runs and what measures are in place to control spending.
Christy Clark responded to the questions - you couldn't say she answered them - in her capacity as deputy premier.
Nothing to worry about, she said. The province won't come up with any more money. The budget is fixed. Contingency funds are built into budgets.
That's a remarkably inaccurate answer. There is no limit to the province's commitment. To win the Games Premier Gordon Campbell promised to assume all responsibility for any Olympic cost over-runs or revenue shortfalls.
It's a reasonable enough risk, but it remains a risk. And simply wishing away the problem of cost over-runs, or hiding from them, is irresponsible.
Especially because the Games' organizers are already warning that the construction cost allowances aren't adequate to cope with inflation and other pressures over the next six years. The Games has a capital budget of $620 million, with the cost shared between the federal and provincial governments. If it's not enough, BC. taxpayers -the ones ultimately on the hook - need to know.
Cost over-runs are a constant Olympic reality. The team organizing the 2006 Games in Piedmont, Italy, visited Vancouver this month to share information. Figure on up to 15 per cent in extra costs for unexpected emergencies, they advised, and 20-per-cent cost over-runs on construction.
Provincial Auditor General Wayne Strelioff has also warned that the $139-million contingency fund included as part of the Games budget might not be adequate. "Achieving the financial results predicted by the Bid Corporation will need excellent management, effective marketing and a favourable economy," he warned.
There's no reason to panic here. There will be lots of ups and downs over the next six years of work to prepare for the Olympics.
But the government's head-in-the-sand approach does a disservice to taxpayers.
Clark didn't provide any information on possible cost over-runs. She responded with a rant about how great the Olympics would be for the province. The New Democrats just hate the idea of the Games, she said, ignoring the fact that the NDP government launched the bid for the 2010 Games. "Those members don't oppose the Olympics because of the cost," Clark said. "Those members oppose the Olympics because they don't want British Columbia to do well." (It is the kind of response that should make everyone cringe. Legitimate questions deserve real answers. Failing that, call the New Democrats stupid, or incompetent. But it's just dumb to argue that they ran for office because the want the province to do badly.)
Clark likewise brushed off a suggestion that makes imminent sense. Why not appoint the province's auditor general as the official auditor for the Games committee, asked the New Democrats?
Again, no answer. But it's a sound proposal, given the taxpayers' interest in financial accountability.
The Games and the Sea-to-Sky Highway improvements are slated to cost provincial taxpayers $1.3 billion, with our share of convention centre expansion and the RAV line to the Vancouver airport on top of that.
If cost over-runs are already threatening to push our share higher, we have a right to answers, not bluster.
Footnote: Clark accused NDP leader Carole James of opposing the Games, and called on her to seek a seat in the legislature so people would know where she stands on this and other issues. The attack - part of a new Liberal attempt to focus on James - backfired when MacPhail noted Campbell is rarely in the legislature either; his attendance is the poorest of any premier in history, she added.
Martin's Dosanjh move makes mockery of democracy
By Paul Willcocks
VICTORIA - How dumb does Paul Martin think we are?
Mr. Democratic Deficit has been going on about the need to give politics back to the people, promising a new way of doing things.
But then he rolled in to Vancouver and did exactly the opposite, a genial despot with a pleasant smile.
Martin wiped out the democratic right of thousands of voters to decide who should represent them in Ottawa, turned our system on its head and still maintained he's the champion of political reform.
By appointing Liberal candidates - or clearing the way for them - Martin exempted his favourites from that irritating nomination process, where you have to win community support and sign up members in order to become a Liberal candidate. That's apparently for the lesser lights. If Martin thinks you have the right stuff, you can skip all that annoying democracy stuff - just like ex-premier Ujjal Dosanjh.
I like Dosanjh. And while his move from provincial NDP leader to federal Liberal candidate raises lots of interesting questions - where are the provincial Liberals on the political spectrum, if an alleged federal Liberal finds a more comfortable home in the NDP - it's his decision.
But it's outrageous that Martin presumes to dictate to the Liberal voters in Vancouver South who their candidate will be. Basic democracy gives them the right to make that choice. Martin is taking it away, because he knows best.
Which is one of the problem with politics as practised today. Martin doesn't know best. We do. Martin, Gordon Campbell, Stephen Harper, Jack Layton, Carole James, they are all very smart I'm sure. But we are, collectively, smarter.
It's bizarre on so many levels.
The Liberals don't actually need a lot of help in arranging nomination contests to get the results the party bosses want. A guy named Bob Russell worked for a long-time to win the Liberal nomination over here in Saanich-Gulf Islands. But he wasn't on the good side of the Martin machine, which backed a succession of candidates against him. The first two dropped out; the third, Pia Shandel, was pushed out of the race by the Martin people only days before the nomination meeting.
That should have clinched it for Russell. Party rules say would-be candidates have to declare at least seven days before the nomination meeting. But rules are apparently meant to be bent. With three days to go, lawyer David Mulroney - a former vice-president in MP David Anderson's riding association, whose firm gets almost a $1 million a year in federal government work - got special permission to enter the race. And surprise, with no time to campaign or sign up members, he won. (Fired Liberal aide David Basi had earlier signed up hundreds of new members in the riding.)
Dosanjh is the only candidate officially imposed by Martin so far. But the way was also cleared for former Canfor head David Emerson and Shirley Chan, with similar treatment likely for B.C. party president Bill Cunningham.
Either through dictate, or backroom dealing, Martin and his people arranged for their favourite candidates to get special treatment.
Voters lose in at least two ways. Their right to choose a candidate has been stolen.
And the favoured candidates owe their loyalty not to the people in the riding, but to Martin and his team. How independent are MPs who owe their nominations to the boss going to be?
Martin is counting on the hand-picked candidates to be high-profile enough to turn around the Liberal fortunes in B.C.
It's a risk. In Dosanjh's case, two other Liberals had already been working to get the nomination. Brushed aside by Martin, neither they nor their supporters are likely to work terribly hard in this election campaign.
And for voters concerned about the Liberals' scandal-plagued reputation for political favoritism, Martin's machinations have just reinforced their worst fears about the "new" Liberal government.
Footnote: Dosanjh's jump to the federal Liberals prompted rare agreement between provincial Liberals and New Democrats - all agree it's a bad thing. New Democrats accused Dosanjh of opportunism and betrayal, lending legitimacy to the Martin government. And provincial Liberals not only don't look forward to dealing with Dosanjh in Ottawa, they aren't happy with Martin's endorsement of a key player in the former NDP government.
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