Last week in the Legislature – March 9-12, 2009

Posted March 13, 2009 by Sacha Peter - Link
Category: Legislature Comments Off

With 60 days to go before the provincial election, the Legislature enters into a one week break before the final two weeks of the session – then the writ is dropped.

Question period was mixed between new developments concerning the Olympics (mainly that Hastings Park will be closed for a month), and also questions relating to BC Liberal insider Patrick Kinsella, and his ability to raise funds for the BC Liberal party while working for the government.

The first question in question period was the following:

Layoff of Hastings Racecourse workers for Olympic Games
Job security of GM Place workers for Olympic Games
Impact of Olympic transportation plan on small business and workers
Role of Patrick Kinsella in B.C. Rail Sale

The Olympic topic is going to be a non-starter for electoral purposes – short of a declaration that everybody in BC would be forced to volunteer for the Olympics, there doesn’t seem anything in the pipeline that will swing voters from one camp to the next. The major cost overrun issue, dealing with security costs, has been mitigated with significant Federal government support.

The issue of insider fundraising, however, can probably get some traction if the NDP pushed it further – what is not relevant is the names and dates, but rather the issue that the ruling party is using government influence to raise funds for itself. Making an analogy between this and the general transgressions that happened with respect to the Gomery Commission and the Sponsorship Scandal may gather some traction with the public.

The other notable performance in the legislature was retiring MLA Corky Evans‘ response to the 2009 Budget, which had a notable speech (10:30am, Thursday March 12, 2009) which is very much worth reading. Here is a small snippet of his speech:

My rationale for running, as described in that presentation, pretty much came down to an argument for local control and against the idea of centralized decision-making. I thought then and, as a matter of fact, I still think that we run this province pretty much on a colonial model and that my time here ought to concentrate on trying to find ways to devolve power away from the Legislature or to share power with the people who live in the regions.

It’s too bad that he will be leaving the legislature, since he probably understands the “big picture” a lot better than most people. It’s not a matter of left vs. right, or socialism vs. capitalism, it’s about decentralizing decision-making and delegating power to those that are best able to make such decisions.

Finally, a humourous note ended the week with the following remarks by the Speaker:

Mr. Speaker: Hon. Members, we’ll reconvene the House. The Lieutenant-Governor will be here shortly.

Before the Lieutenant-Governor comes, it has been brought to my attention that two members of this House have been in attendance in this chamber improperly dressed, thereby contravening the longstanding traditions of parliamentary democracies throughout the Commonwealth.

The Chair considers this to be a serious offence. Therefore, it’s my decision that the offending members, whom I will not specifically name, will be excluded from attending this chamber from April 14, 2009, for the balance of the session. Should the offending members identify themselves and offer the appropriate apology, I would be prepared to reconsider this decision.

Of course, April 14th is when the election period starts. I am not sure who the offending members were or what the story was here, but it was clearly in humour.

Three government bills were introduced, specifically:

Workers Compensation Amendment Act, 2009 (Bill 8)
Labour Mobility Act (Bill 9)
Public Safety and Solicitor General Statutes Amendment Act, 2009 (Bill 10)

These three bills are not controversial in any respect – in fact, Bill 8 received bipartisan support and received royal assent during the week. It was a provision dealing with cancer and firefighters with respect to the Workers Compensation Act.

The Legislature will resume on March 23rd for go on for two more weeks. Apparently the much-awaited First Nations Reconciliation Act will be introduced in the final two weeks, although there will probably not be enough time to debate and adopt the legislation. However, it will be a campaign plank for the government in the upcoming election.