All eyes must turn to newly minted Premier, Christy Clark, to see if her government acts responsibly and denies the new mega-size fish farm proposed for Clayoquot Sound. If she does, it will truly signal that the change in direction she promised when taking office is real. If she doesn’t, then we can expect that she will carry on as her predecessor Gordon Campbell did. The Liberals under Campbell readily took donations from the fish farming industry. It would appear from the ongoing expansion of farms along the BC Coast that they turned a blind eye to the environmental consequences of that expansion.

Open pen salmon farming in British Columbia has nothing to do with the production of affordable food to feed the masses. It has nothing to do with diversifying the economy of remote coastal locations, and it has even less to do with providing a method of sustainable fish production. What open pen salmon farming is all about is privatizing the ownership of commercial salmon production. This is being done by allowing the introduction of Atlantic salmon to the coastal waters of British Columbia and providing control of our public assets, namely our pristine sheltered inlets and bays, to foreign-based corporations. This is all being done at the direct expense of wild salmon stocks, which are a remarkable common property resource that has been part of the coastal culture and economy for as long as anyone can remember.

Any responsible government would put the public interest ahead of private corporate profits and simply say NO to open pen fish farming currently used and promoted by this industry. It would be responsible for government to do so because the well documented negative impacts of open pen fish farming are so overwhelmingly obvious to anyone taking an impartial view of the facts. Our politicians should quickly conclude that farmed Atlantic salmon can only be safely done using a closed containment method.

Open pen salmon farming is wrong on so many levels that one has to wonder what it will take for elected officials to finally insist that it be done through closed containment.

In the early 1980’s, almost thirty years ago, I was elected to the Sunshine Coast Regional District and had as one of my first obligations the requirement to review a whole host of applications from this “new” industry that had migrated from Norway and Scotland to the pristine waters off British Columbia’s coast. Many wanted to welcome the industry, as it was sold as a method of diversifying the local coastal economy through the employment of hundreds of workers. We were also told that open pen aquaculture was benign and held no threat to the wild stocks of salmon. Neither claim proved true.

Those of us who did our own research soon found out that in Norway and Scotland outbreaks of sea lice and massive algae blooms were having a devastating effect on the wild fish stocks, increasing the threat to their survival. Because of this information, our Regional District Board said a decisive NO to applications brought before us to locate open pen fish farms within the area of water over which we had jurisdiction. I took the same message forward as Leader of the Liberal Party when elected Leader of the Official Opposition in 1991 and as MLA for almost half the coastline of BC’s mainland, but the government of the day saw things differently, only imposing a temporary moratorium on new licenses and allowing the existing fish farms to continue to pollute the coast.

Almost twenty years later, open pen fish farms dot our coast located within sensitive salmon spawning channels and fry rearing bays. The tireless, thankless, and unfunded work of people such as Alexandra Morton http://alexandramorton.typepad.com/alexandra_morton/ continues to document the negative impacts of these open pen farms on the declining wild salmon stocks, yet still the provincial and federal governments turn a deaf ear and a blind eye and now are considering approving a mega-fish farm in the sensitive Clayoquot Sound.

The salmon farming industry still contents that the proliferation of sea lice found on wild salmon fry that migrate around their net-pens is not related to their industry. They continue to deny the cause and effect their industry has on declining stocks like the tobacco industry continued to insists that smoking couldn’t be proven to cause lung cancer.

I don’t hold out much hope that Stephen Harper will suddenly wise up to the negative impacts of open pen fish farming, but I think there is a chance that Christy Clark is bright enough to understand that this industry is operating in direct competition with the survival of the wild salmon stocks. I suspect that Christy Clark is smart enough to know that the devastation of wild salmon stocks by foreign-owned multinationals will have a much more profound consequence for our coastal ecosystem that has been dependent upon those fish for thousands of years.

A great deal of lip service is paid to environmental action. In the case of open pen aquaculture, there is an existing alternative that can be used. It is call closed containment and is a system for fish rearing that was developed here in British Columbia. It provides a safe alternative for those who wish to produce fish for market and it protects all the jobs in the fish farm industry.

If this government is serious about sending a signal of real change, then I expect that the premier will take the lead in saying NO to this proposed mega-farm in Clayoquot Sound. She will take the lead in moving toward a closed containment system by removing the open net pens that are devastating our wild salmon stocks, and along with them, those species who are dependent upon a healthy population of wild salmon.

As a reader of this blog I urge you to get active on this issue. Please write to your MLA and your MP. Please write directly to Premier Christy Clark and to Adrian Dix, the Leader of the Official Opposition.

There are many environmental issues that seem so huge they are beyond your control. This is NOT one of them. This is one issue YOU can fix, and our governments can control with simple legislation. We need to start by sending a clear message to those who use open net pen salmon farming to privatize our salmon resource for their personal profit that we the people will not permit them to do so, and in the process we protect a critical and valuable shared natural heritage.

I certainly did not see a Conservative majority government arising from the May 2nd vote. I suppose that if there is any consolation to be found it rests in the fact that neither the major polling companies nor the vast majority of the pundits predicted it either.

Here is a breakdown of how I saw the vote going, and what actually happened. My prediction is in brackets and the outcome in bold beside it. The provinces are listed alphabetically to keep the chart consistent with Sunday’s blog. Click on the image to enlarge.

I was able to access the results live online for most of the Maritime Provinces before somebody shut it down until the polls had closed in British Columbia. The first hint that the Liberals were in trouble became obvious as the vote in New Brunswick rolled in. The NDP were pulling Liberal vote, and so were the Conservatives. The net result was no gains for the NDP who increased their vote percentage by 9% but didn’t win additional seats. The result of the split was a two seat gain for the Conservatives.

Of course the vote results in Quebec were nothing short of staggering. In Sunday’s blog I carried Barry Kay’s predictions which did suggest the fall of the Bloc in favour of the NDP, but even this associate professor at Ontario’s Wilfrid Laurier University, didn’t predict the complete collapse of the Bloc and the defeat of their leader.

The NDP gains in Quebec provided sufficient evidence, even before the Ontario votes were counted, that the NDP was poised to become the Official Opposition, something that I along with many others thought inevitable.

Jack Layton now faces an interesting problem. The election delivered a whole gang of rookies to Ottawa, many of them young and full of great expectation that will likely be frustrated by the rules of Parliament and the reality of the Ottawa bureaucracy. Many of them were elected in ridings that have traditionally supported Bloc MPs where a strong “Quebec nationalist” agenda has been delivered.

Layton had to make promises to win that vote, and even though the Quebec voters only contributed 36% of the total votes cast for the NDP across Canada, the reality that Layton has to deal with is the fact that these enthusiastic Quebec MPs will comprise 57% of the NDP’s national caucus, a caucus that has traditionally been from the west and Ontario and previously been majority Anglophone.

It was the province of Ontario that put the spike through the heart of the Liberals. We saw the constituents of Etobicoke-Lakeshore, a strong Liberal riding since 1993, toss the Liberal leader. Meanwhile, the Liberal vote in Ontario collapsed as riding by riding the NDP pulled Liberal vote while the Conservatives only needed to increase their share of the Ontario vote by 5 percentage points to win a massive 20 percent gain in the number of seats, rising from 53 to 71 and virtually sealing their majority government.

The vote result in Saskatchewan deserves a deeper analysis than I can provide here. I had predicted that the NDP would win six seats in the province and did so as a result of information from sources within the province and the recorded voter preference trends outlined in reputable polls.

Considering the NDP increased the percentage of their vote from 25% to 32.2% one would think that I was on fairly safe ground. However despite the fact that the NDP won almost a third of the votes cast in Saskatchewan, they failed to win a single seat. The primary beneficiary was the Conservatives who gained four seats with a three percent increase in popular vote as 8% of the Liberal vote appears to have fled to the NDP.

Alberta and British Columbia were more predictable. The only two safe Liberal seats in British Columbia were Vancouver Quadra, with Joyce Murray and Vancouver Center, with the seemingly unbeatable Hedy Fry. I had thought that the NDP would win North Island, Fleetwood-Port Kells and didn’t realize that both the NDP and Liberals would give Elizabeth May a pass in her riding of Saanich-Gulf Islands.

Elizabeth May is to be commended on her win. As the first and only Green Member of Parliament elected plus the responsibilities that come with her role as Party Leader, she faces a daunting task.

In all, the result was a surprise to me. I was incorrect in my prediction of a Harper minority government and correct that we would have an NDP Official Opposition, although I didn’t predict so many Quebec NDP seats.

Both results are pregnant with prospect and opportunity. It remains to be seen what, in terms of government, this new Parliament will deliver. We will see how quickly Stephen Harper, now armed with a majority, unveils his real agenda, and how effective Jack Layton will be in protecting those Canadian principles and institutions that will be targeted by the absolute authority just handed Harper.

Tomorrow’s federal election will bring about a sea change in Canadian politics. If the trends reported by virtually every credible polling company are correct, we will for the first time have an NDP Official Opposition to another Conservative minority government.

Analyses of the various polls conducted throughout the campaign show that there are many ridings where the vote will be so close that the margin of error within the poll might be enough to skew the result and that may well keep the Liberals in second place, but the trend suggests otherwise.

The National papers seem to weight those polls to incumbents, especially Conservatives, but I am not so sure that will be the case.

Global News today carried an article by Barry Kay, an associate professor at Ontario’s Wilfrid Laurier University, and a member of the Laurier Institute for the Study of Public Opinion and Policy. Mr. Kay has apparently developed a model for projecting parliamentary seat distributions from popular vote or opinion polls, and comes up with the following prediction.

Conservative: 144 Liberal: 51 NDP: 98 Bloc: 15

In order for that result to occur the Bloc vote in Quebec would have to almost collapse to give the NDP 49 of the 75 seats up for grabs. My analysis of riding polls along with a review of voting trends over the last three federal elections has me believing that while the NDP will make major gains in Quebec, the polling numbers that are showing them ahead of Bloc in terms of seats may not materialize on Election Night.

Tim Naumetz of the Hill Times on Line suggests that the election is so close that either the Conservatives or the NDP could form a minority government. In his analysis the split between the Liberal and NDP vote will be the deciding factor. He may well be right, but I suggest that it is Official Opposition that is up for grabs, not government.

That said, I don’t think that many pundits have really measured the level of discontent that Canadians feel toward the Harper government which may very well influence voter turnout.

Right across the country, record numbers of voters turned out to cast their ballots in the advanced polls. While that is encouraging for those who believe in and advocate for democracy, it doesn’t bode well for an incumbent government.

In being bold enough to put forward my prediction of the outcome of tomorrow’s vote, I have taken into account an increase in voter turnout, and have weighted those “new” voters toward the Liberals or the NDP.

So here, for what it’s worth, is one man’s view. On Sunday May 1st, the night before the vote, this is how I see the results on Election night.

Click on image to enlarge

If I am even close to being right, then Canada will have entered into a new political paradigm.

If I am actually right, the combined seats of the NDP and Liberal parties will be greater than those of the Conservatives making coalition possible without directly including the Bloc although their support will be crucial on confidence motions in the House. If that is the result, then the true measure of the our political leaders, Harper, Ignatieff, and Layton will be seen, as they will be called upon to do what is right for Canada.

What should Canadians make of the latest national public opinion polls showing the NDP surging past the Liberal party into second place not far behind the Harper conservatives?
Even when we consider that polling numbers don’t necessarily convert to seats, that public opinion polls are at best a snapshot of voter preference at the time the poll was taken, and voters frequently tend to “shift back” when actually in the polling booth, the trend toward the NDP is remarkable and cannot be dismissed.
Yesterday’s Ekos poll showed the Conservatives have slipped from 42% at the beginning of the election campaign to 34%; the Liberals have dropped from 28% to 23%; while the NDP have climbed from 18% to 28%. Virtually every other reputable polling company shows a similar trend although their numbers may be slightly different.
The NDP appear to be making substantial gains in the province of Quebec where Bloc voters and some Liberal voters appear “soft” and leaning toward the NDP. It would appear that the party will also make gains with a larger share of the popular vote if not more seats in the Maritimes and British Columbia.
What most observers and the media seem to ignore is the fact that the trend toward a vote for the NDP isn’t something that is unique to this federal election.
When Layton took over the leadership of the NDP, the party had suffered a collapse under the successive leadership of Audrey McLaughlin and Alexa McDonough. Layton started to build the federal NDP from the base and has in three successive federal elections, 2004-2008, increased both the NDP seat count and its percentage of popular vote.
Under Ed Broadbent’s leadership the NDP achieved its best electoral result to date winning 43 seats and 20.38% of the popular vote in the 1988 federal election. The Conservatives took 43.02% and the Liberals under John Turner won 31.92%. Those are numbers that seem impossible in today’s world of minority governments.
The other consideration is that the 1988 election was fought over the Mulroney Conservatives negotiation of the Free Trade Agreement with the United States. It was a very contentious issue that galvanized the opposition to the FTA, and split votes between the Liberals and the NDP.
This election has no such contentious issue. In fact, many Canadians who aren’t directly connected to a political party are having a difficult time understanding why we are even having an election.
So to what can we attribute this accelerating rise in the popularity of the NDP?
As I have already mentioned, this contest comes hot on the heels of the 2008 election where Layton led the NDP to their second-best election result with 37 seats and 18.13 per cent of the popular vote. In defeating the Liberals, the minority Harper Conservatives were effective at labeling the Liberals then under the leadership of Stephan Dion, as ineffective crooks who mismanaged the economy. Neither allegation was true, but the campaign worked in part because Dion tried to fight the election on issues such as the environment rather than respond with hard facts that would refute Harper’s claims.
The fact that the Liberals were clean was lost on the electorate since the Liberal party did not provide the needed defence of the Liberal legacy in debt reduction, fiscal accountability and bank regulation, the very actions that saved Harper’s, and all of our bacon when the bottom fell out of the economy in 2008. Now it can be argued that it’s too late for the Liberals to build their case.
So, with the bad taste of the Liberals still in the voters’ mouths courtesy of the Conservative propaganda, and now that voters’ trust in the Harper government is falling, Jack Layton’s popularity is on the rise. I note he used a line very similar to the one that worked for me in the 1991 B.C. Leader’s debate, namely pointing to the two “other guys” and saying this is the reason that Ottawa is broken. That line seemed to resonate with some Canadians, even though many aren’t quite sure what if anything Jack Layton can do to fix it.
If the rapid rise of the NDP continues, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that we will have a minority government with the NDP sitting in the role of Official opposition. Many of us will remember the complete collapse of the Conservatives after Mulroney when the Bloc Quebecois, a separatist party, formed Official Opposition.
Neither is it completely out of the question that the NDP would invite the Liberals to join with them to form a coalition government under Prime Minister Jack Layton, although I am not sure Mr. Ignatieff would join it.
Many questions will arise if this trend toward the NDP continues and they rise to the status of Official Opposition, or even government. One only needs to look to British Columbia to see that if that were to be the case, the real coalition will happen on the right of the political spectrum, not the center and left.
May 2nd will be a fascinating evening if these trends continue. It seems almost certain that we will again elect a minority government, but it might not be a minority Conservative government. The role of the NDP this time will be critical.

If we are to accept Harper’s version of the choice Canadians face in this federal election we can either give him absolute power, or suffer the consequence of a minority government which he is convinced will spark a coalition between the Liberals, NDP and Bloc. Stephen Harper hangs up the spectre of a coalition government as a threat to the very foundation of our country. Coalition government, if you are to believe Harper will destroy Canadian sovereignty.

A close examination of Harper’s views on Parliament and his demand that Canadians must provide him the unbridled power of a majority government is quite revealing and very disturbing. Stephen Harper is not a stupid man who does not understand how Parliament works. Harper is a very intelligent man who doesn’t like how Parliament works.

There is a very real difference between the two. An intelligent man who dislikes the checks and balances that parliamentary rules places upon him, is potentially far more dangerous to the foundation of parliamentary democracy than any coalition that may be created within the context of a well established parliamentary tradition.

It seems odd that the obvious contradiction in and inherent hypocrisy of Harper’s position on the potential of a coalition is lost on so many Conservative voters aka Reform and Alliance supporters who have for years carped on about the historical voting record in Canada where votes cast for the Liberals constituted a minority of overall votes cast and yet have for many years provided the Liberals with a majority of seats. This was completely unacceptable to Harper when he was in opposition, but now seems not only to be acceptable, but desirable.

I wonder if Stephen Harper has ever given any consideration to the fact that the Canadian people don’t trust any of the three, Duceppe aside as he can never be Prime Minister, with the blank cheque that a majority government will provide. Maybe Canadians are smart enough to realize that a minority government or a coalition government may actually work in the best interest of the Canadian people who are as diverse as the land upon which we live.

I may be leaning toward a vote for Michael Ignatieff and the Liberals, but I will never support Ignatieff’s position on the Alberta oil sands, or his desire to see nuclear power expanded in Canada. Both are outdated, old fashioned positions that should not be advanced. That said, you might ask why I wouldn’t cast my vote for Layton and the NDP who strongly oppose both of those initiatives. The answer lies in Layton’s foreign policy positions. His vision of Canada in world affairs is not one that I can support.

I can say without hesitation, however, that a minority or coalition government that brings these two men together to work out an acceptable set of priorities for this country recognizing that there must be compromises on issues critical to the Canadian people, would if I could make it happen, be my first choice.

This election is not about what Stephen Harper wants to advance his largely unspoken agenda; it is about what Canadians need to advance the dreams and aspirations of each of us. Canadian’s should not fear coalition, Canadians should embrace it. Our Parliamentary rules provide for such an outcome. They do so because wiser minds than most have seen the benefit of bringing people together to build a nation is preferable to giving one man the undiluted power to rule it.

With the federal election in full swing the NDP leadership race that will elect a new Leader of the Official Opposition in British Columbia on April 17, has drifted out of the news.

Four hopeful candidates remain. Adrian Dix, the one who most likely will win. Mike Farnworth, the media declared favourite to win. John Horgan, the dark horse who may have a chance if there is more than one ballot, and Dana Larsen who has proven himself to be more than a single issue candidate but is not likely to garner support beyond a first ballot showing.

Harry Lali dropped out early, concerned over the cost required to run and the bulk sign ups that were taking place within the Sikh community. Most of these signs up were being done by supporters of Adrian Dix. Given the fact that the NDP are using the same televote system that was used by the Liberals but without the “weighted” vote for interior ridings to moderate the impact of mass sign ups from the urban ridings, those bulk memberships will prove a critical component in a Dix election victory.

Nicholas Simons, my MLA from Powell River-Sunshine Coast, is an intelligent, good looking, soft spoken, somewhat hip and openly gay musician who presented the best hope the NDP had for a really fresh face who could articulate a new vision for British Columbia.

Simons dropped out a few days ago and moved his support to John Horgan. That is really too bad. It is too bad because I believe that Simons, the only elected candidate who was not part of the NDP government of the 1990s, was the best chance for the NDP to beat Christy Clark. It is also too bad for the balance of voters because had he been able to get unfiltered media exposure, he would have provided British Columbians with a real, compassionate choice in the next provincial election.

But the NDP have a long history in choosing leaders who have no chance of winning a general election. Simons isn’t part of the NDP old guard, so his campaign was written off by most from the beginning. Certainly the media considered him a lightweight, which is no surprise because politics in this province is covered by lazy pack journalists who feed off the scraps given to them by nameless “party insiders”, none of whom had a vested interest in Simons winning.

Those facts, and given that this race will be decided by anonymous phone in delegates through a system subject to widespread fraud, I fully understand why Simons called it quits. By moving to Horgan well before the vote, he hopes to give Horgan a better chance to win.

Over the course of several elections in my riding, I have come to know Dana Larsen as a candidate who is no fool. He has often been presented more as a caricature than a candidate who holds passionately to his beliefs. Ironically, through his four point campaign using the “sustainability BC lens”, Larsen has presented policies that would likely resonate with many British Columbians if he were ever given the chance to present them to the public at large. But Larsen’s passion over the legalization of Marijuana and some of his past publicity stunts have created an uneasy feeling toward him within the NDP establishment, which is one reason they tried to block his ability to run.

In many ways Dana Larsen stands like a mirror to the NDP brass presenting a “real” NDP image, rather than the more “moderate” image they would like to present. Larsen is unlikely to go beyond the first ballot and may do far worse now that he has already declared his support for John Horgan on a second ballot. Many of Larsen’s supporters may put their first ballot vote to Horgan, fearful that if they don’t there won’t be a second chance.

Horgan, who has been elected as MLA for Juan de Fuca on Vancouver Island twice during the Campbell years in government, is better known to me for his backroom role during the NDP governments of the 1990s. Then Horgan was a bombastic, somewhat ruthless and unprincipled backroom enforcer whose temper was only surpassed by his lack of diplomacy. Maybe he has mellowed somewhat, although you know what is said about leopards and their spots.

In politics there are those who are best described as “party hacks”, people who do the bidding of their political bosses regardless of the impact of their actions. Horgan made a career in politics as a party hack at both the federal and provincial level until he stepped up to run for office. In fact, one is hard pressed to know what experience Horgan has outside of the political backrooms and his two terms as an elected MLA.

Given his service to Ministers better associated with the governments of Mike Harcourt and Glen Clark, it is little wonder that NDP cabinet ministers from the 1990s Elizabeth Cull, Anne Edwards and Paul Ramsey have all provide support to his campaign. Outside of the ranks of the NDP, however, such endorsements are likely to go over like a lead balloon.

Dan Miller’s endorsement was fully expected. Miller and Horgan have a long history together in the Legislative Halls of power in Victoria. Miller was the NDP Minister of Energy and Mines and Minister responsible for BC Ferries, and was arguably one of the most incompetent ministers in the Harcourt and Clark governments.

One has to hope that Miller, who has been the loudest and most consistent voice calling for the removal of the moratorium on off shore oil and gas drilling in the Queen Charlotte Sound has limited access to Horgan if he wins. But I doubt that will be true. Horgan was Miller’s choice for Chief of Staff when Dan Miller was appointed interim Premier until Ujjal Dosanjh maneuvered his way into the office after the fall of Glen Clark. I can attest firsthand to the callous disregard for due process that was practiced by Horgan and his boss at that time. But then, perhaps he has changed.

In summary, John Horgan would make a great NDP leader if his task is to sweep the party clean and put in place a foundation to rebuild it. He is ruthless enough to do that without regard for those who he hurts in the process. But, then he should step aside for someone really new, because as Premier of BC? No thank you.

I have worked with Farnworth as a colleague in both matters affecting caucus and in the affairs of state handled in Cabinet. One thing I can say with some certainty is that Mike Farnworth is not a leader in the conventional political sense. Some observers think that is an asset and are making the comparison between Mike Farnworth and former Premier Mike Harcourt. I suggest that those who do have a very short memory.

The Farnworth camp who applauded Mike Harcourt’s endorsement last week would like us to accept their Mike is a conciliator who, much like Harcourt, will attract the “soft” Liberal vote. That is probably not a great strategy because at the moment at least Christy Clark, who is a real liberal, is appealing to that soft liberal vote. Farnworth is not likely to win a debate on core liberal values.

Mike Harcourt, who I had the privilege to debate in BC’s first ever Leader’s debate in the 1991 election, tried to mask the underlying NDP agenda in order to appear to be all things to all people. When he became premier, he foundered seriously midway through his first term precisely because he could not deliver.

Farnworth might win a few points with his NDP colleagues who still hold Harcourt in high regard, but he should avoid being compared to Mike Harcourt on the provincial scale precisely because he is so similar in so many ways.

The problem Farnworth faces with the comparison is the image of a premier who called welfare recipients lazy cheats, and who performed so badly on the national stage during the constitutional debates of the day that he earned himself the nickname “Premier Bonehead”.

But Farnworth does project indecisiveness on some really hard issues, and that may well be compared with Harcourt’s inability to take decisive action on several key policy decisions affecting aboriginal relations in British Columbia which caused serious social unrest along with blockades on highways and railway lines. Similarly, Harcourt’s wobbly environmental policies, particularly in the Clayoquot Sound, gave rise to demonstrations and a storming of the BC Legislature. Harcourt did nothing except sit nervously in his seat while the mobs were in the hallways.

To summarize Mike Farnworth, he thinks that if he sounds and appears so nonthreatening to the center and center-left voters they will feel safe casting their ballot for the NDP. That is precisely the same thinking that went into the selection of Carole James who, even when her opponent was hardcore right wing, was so nonthreatening as to be unattractive for anyone other than those established voters who always vote for the ideals that are the underpinnings of the NDP rather than for a government. James couldn’t shift the small percentage she needed to win government. Neither could she win the political center with her “moderate” approach. Farnworth won’t either. Mike’s problem is that he is facing Christy Clark who is already appealing to and solidifying that vote.

Adrian Dix is a different kettle of fish altogether. Arguably the most effective opposition critic over the course of the last few years, Dix is a political animal who is not only prepared to fight to win; most importantly he is not afraid to win government.
Unlike Farnworth or Horgan who are trying to sell a message of consensus to the quasi liberal middle, Adrian Dix speaks directly to his base. Adrian is astute enough to know that he only needs to grow that base by five percentage points to form government, and if the ridings split his way, he will win a good sized majority government.

The Liberal opposition and media would have us believe that Adrian Dix’s personal albatross is his relationship to former Premier Glen Clark. To the extent that the NDP have done such a poor job at refuting so much of the nonsense that has been circulated by the Liberals and some NDP about the legacy of Glen Clark that might be a problem. However, Glen Clark has entered into the Vancouver corporate world and has become the Senior Vice President of the Pattison Group, one of British Columbia’s highest-profiled corporations. Anybody who knows Jim Pattison knows that he only promotes through merit, so I suspect that Glen Clark will not be as useful a dart for the right to throw as he might have been had Clark left politics to take up a position in the ranks of organized labour.

Adrian Dix, somewhat like Horgan, was a ruthless backroom player. He has all of the attributes of Machiavelli, which is a complement to his skills as a political operative. If Dix is successful, there will be no ambiguity where the line between the NDP and the Liberal party is drawn. He will shine a light upon the legacy of Campbell and promote the interests of his traditional base in the hope that first time voters who are struggling with the fallout of this sluggish economy will believe enough in what he is selling that they will give him the margin he requires.

If this was a horse race and I was to assign the odds to the four still contesting for leader, they would go like this. Dana Larsen a far off long shot at 80/1, Horgan a possible “middle” candidate at 6/1, Farnworth at 3/1 and Dix with all those “ethnic” bulk sign-ups the odds on favorite to win at 2/1. Of course like all horse races, upsets can happen, and races can be fixed.

As for the winning the province, the harder Horgan tries to persuade the business community that he is the man in the middle the more he will alienate his core vote. Farnworth’s indecisive manner and timid approach to hard economic questions will render him no more effective than Carole James. Adrian Dix presents the clearest choice for a government that reflects NDP values. That said, it remains to be seen if a majority of voters will choose that option.

There are myths created in politics which, like a lie told often enough, are accepted as true in the minds of Canadian voters. One such myth is that Conservative governments tend to be leaner in spending and better for the Canadian economy than their Liberal counterparts. For example, there is a myth that the economic policies of the Stephen Harper government are better for us Canadians than what we would face under the “fiscally irresponsible” Liberals.

There is not a single statistic relevant to average Canadians that support that claim.

On Friday, March 18, 2011, Canada’s national debt reached an all time high at $562.9 billion Canadian dollars, topping the previous high of $562.8 billion brought about during the years of Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney. What’s worse is that Harper doesn’t seem to have a credible plan in place to reduce this debt, other than to continue the very same corporate tax reduction policies that have clearly not worked for anybody other than the corporations.

Some will argue that tracking the national debt is not the best measure of Harper’s ability to manage our economy given the global recession in 2008 and 2009. Ok, then let’s examine the Canadian level of productivity during Harper’s term as Prime Minister.
Statistics Canada started tracking Canada’s level of productivity in 1961 and has reported a net cumulative productivity growth in productivity under every consecutive government until Stephen Harper came to power, when it dropped by half a percentage point. For the first time since we have kept these statistics, Canadians have witnessed under Harper the fall of the level of productivity over a sustained period of time.

There are as many reasons cited for this decline as there are economists writing about it, but one theme is consistent. The Harper government is wedded to those corporations who operate within the primary extractive sector, oil and minerals primarily, and believes their success will help to reverse the trend. With the current rise in prices for oil, copper and gold, companies are encouraged to spend billions of dollars on projects that would, under more normal commodity price conditions, be considered at best marginal, or worse not profitable.

This is why the Harper government continues to hand out government largess and tax breaks as an incentive to companies such as those pursuing the Alberta Tar Sands project. It is bad economics on two fronts. First it encourages the continued exploration for oil with the most egregious environmental and tenuous of economic consequences, and second it diverts funds from other projects that are not part of the fossil fuel economy and would do much more to stimulate growth in the economy.

It is also a myth that the Harper Conservative government is fiscally lean when it comes to government spending. Even if we are to remove the huge amount spent on the economic stimulus program, Prime Minister Stephen Harper has substantially increased federal government expenditures in every year of the last five years that he has been in office. In addition, he has added thousands of people to the federal public service. This despite his commitment to reduce government spending made while in opposition.

In the last year of the Liberal Paul Martin government in 2005-2006, overall program funding was $175 billion. Last year, under Harper, it had climbed to $245 billion. Even if these numbers are measured against the overall growth of the Canadian economy, program spending has increased more than 25% over the five years of the Harper government.

The bulk of this expenditure has not been in areas of health, education and social service, where Canadians may argue that the expenses are worthwhile, but rather Harper has targeted higher spending in areas that fit with his Conservative ideological thinking. Millions of additional dollars have been given to law enforcement, the armed forces, and government regulatory authorities.

Over the last five years Harper has increased the RCMP budget by more than 45% relative to GDP, the Department of National Defence has had a 21% lift and the Canadian Citizenship and Immigration regulatory authority and border police services has received a 52% budget increase.

Where some of the growth in spending has been through transfers to provinces, which includes money from Ottawa to help provinces pay for health care, education and other services, those transfers are obligatory under legislation that was established under Paul Martin. So Harper’s government has not chosen to add any money to these important social services.

Now that we’ve looked at government expenditures and debt, what are the other economic indicators to help us measure the Conservative government’s performance?

The trend in unemployment under Harper is upward. The unemployment rate now stands at 7.8 per cent, up from 6.8 per cent in 2005 when Harper took office. This trend is particularly disturbing when one considers that while the number of Canadians employed continues to fall, and long-term unemployment is increasing, Harper’s economic solution is causing a dramatic rise in involuntary part-time employment with an ever increasing number of Canadians forced to take one or more part time jobs at minimum or slightly higher than minimum wage.

Under the Liberal action plan to end child poverty in the 1990s, the number of children under the age of 18 years old living in poverty was virtually cut in half from 18.4% to 9.5%. After five years of Harper government that rate has climbed back up to 12% and the trend is upward. Add to that the Gini coefficient, which is a measure of income equality, the gap between the rich and poor, and the Harper government fails in that category also.

The market income Gini coefficient was 42 when Harper took office and has climbed to 51.1 a record high and it continues to grow. In the case of the Gini, the lower the number the better the score. Sweden a country that Canada is often compared to scores 23, while Canada at 51.1 is closer to that of some emerging economies.

No matter how one looks at the numbers or what numbers you look at, there is no truth to the myth that the Harper Conservatives have been sound money managers.

Water is our most precious resource. It should not be treated as, or considered to be, a commodity subject to the trade agreements that will ultimately remove Canadian control over this public resource. When one considers that we pay more for a litre of bottled water than we do for a litre of gasoline, it is understandable that within this decade the pressure for private corporate control over potable water will be equal to or greater than what we are currently witnessing over oil.

One of the outcomes of the meltdown of the Fukushima nuclear power station following the devastating earthquake and tsunami has been a tenfold increase in the export of bottle water from British Columbia to Japan.

From a purely humanitarian point of view, I suspect that most Canadians would not think twice about making potable water available to those who have suffered such a natural tragedy. The issue, however, is that this bottled water is being sold into general distribution in Japan, not being provided as free aid for humanitarian purposes.

Quite apart from the moral issue of profiting off the hardship of others, the increased amount of revenue through the sale of this water advances the argument long held by those who covet Canadian water that it’s a commodity and should be considered as such within our international trade agreements.

The privatization of Canadian water resources has been going on for years. To date Canada has 65 water bottling companies with others seeking provincial licenses to take water from remote Canadian lakes, streams and aquifers. Ontario has led the country in regional sales of bottled water claiming about 49% of domestic sales, followed by Quebec at roughly 24%.

That should come as no surprise as the majority of Canadians live in Ontario and Quebec, and the vast majority of sales in bottled water are domestic. But British Columbia companies, which account for about 12% of domestic sales, are increasing their margins through exports to Japan, Taiwan and Korea. It is the export of water as a commodity which threatens our ability to maintain control over Canadian water, as any who have paid attention to the negotiations over the Free Trade Agreement with the U.S. and later the North American Free Trade Agreement will attest.

Now Canada is involved in negotiating the Canadian European Trade Agreement (CETA) with EU countries, and understandably there is a great deal of interest being shown by European water bottling companies in getting access to Canadian water sources for export to their established markets in Europe and the Middle East.

Successive Canadian governments have held that water is not a commodity and therefore water is not on the table with respect to free trade between parties to trade agreements. But these discussions have historically been between U.S. and Canadian negotiators where, because of the proximity of our two countries, the issue has been framed around water diversion, and bulk export of water by pipeline or tankers. The idea of licensing foreign companies to have access to Canadian lakes, rivers and aquifers in order to bottle water that will be directly exported to foreign markets is new. The problem is, if we continue to allow Canadian companies to export water and to expand into foreign markets, it will be difficult under the new global trading paradigm to restrict foreign companies who become licensed in Canada from also doing so.

Some federal and provincial politicians have argued that allowing foreign companies into the country to bottle water for export is no big deal as it enhances the local economy through employment opportunity. What they fail to realize is that bottling plants aren’t located at source along the remote inlets of British Columbia or high in the Canadian Shield. The water is transported in bulk to bottling plants in the cities. It is not unlike catching salmon off our coast then transporting them to the cities for canning, and we should have learned our lesson from that industry.

Once water is deemed a commodity and a license is procured, we will no longer be able to insist that the “processing” be done in Canada any more than we can insist that Canadian caught salmon must be canned in Canada. In short we will have let bulk water exporters in through the back door.

For the first time there are both federal and provincial representatives at the CETA negotiations and we as Canadians have a right to know where our federal and provincial governments stand on the export of bottled water.

This should be a major issue in the current Federal election. I would like to hear directly from each party leader what their position is on CETA and where they stand on the matter of water export; not bulk export, but bottled water export. Similarly, we should hold our provincial political leaders to account on this vital issue.

I am really struggling to understand what it is about this federal budget that plunged us into an election that makes it more offensive than those that have been introduced and passed by a Harper minority Parliament over the last few years.

I am not a supporter of the Harper Conservative government but with all that is happening in the Middle East, where Canadian armed forces have been committed into battle without a syllable of debate in our Parliament, I really have to question the wisdom of the opposition parties in biting on the obvious baited hook cast by the Conservatives and thus taking the country into an election.

Gilles Duceppe is quite within his rights to argue that Quebec should receive the same “incentive” funding to compensate the introduction of the HST as Ontario and British Columbia received; of course Quebec harmonized in 1992 during the Chretien years while Ontario and British Columbia had to be bribed to go along with harmonization under Harper. But we have all known for years that Stephen Harper doesn’t give l’âne d’un rat about Quebec except where Conservative votes are concerned.

Jack Layton is right when he says that Harper caters to the large corporations and far right thinkers. We know he does. He has consistently lowered the tax rate for the largest, richest corporations in Canada with every budget he has brought forward.

Ignatieff is right when he suggest that the Harper government is in contempt of Parliament and does not respect our democratic institutions. Yes, we saw that firsthand when Harper prorogued Parliament in order to avoid a vote that would have cast him into an election that was not of his timing and more recently when he committed Canadians into Libya without any debate before doing so.

So what is different this time?

One has to wonder if the real issue on this timing lies within the leaders themselves.

Gilles Duceppe, arguably one of the most successful politicians in the history of Canadian politics, has been advancing the Quebecois cause for decades. When Gilles took over in 1997, the question of Quebec sovereignty was high in the minds of Canadians. The Parti Quebecois had risen from a fringe party to forming the provincial government, and the Bloc Quebecois, led by defecting federal Conservative cabinet minister Lucien Bouchard, was a powerful federal voice for separatism. Duceppe took over when, in the minds of the political philosophers of the day and the people they influenced, there was the potential for real political success for separatism.

None of that is true today. One has to wonder what goes through the mind of this intelligent man knowing that he has already achieved the best he can accomplish, namely to win the majority of seats in Quebec and continue to represent those interests in a federal Parliament that he does not support. Duceppe has nowhere more to go in terms of political achievement. “So… why not roll the dice one last time?”

Jack Layton has other issues to contend with. The NDP during the heady days of David Lewis was considered the conscience of the nation. It was this party that achieved advances in the areas of women’s rights, health care, aboriginal rights, and the rights of working Canadians. Canada still leads the world in those areas, not because we continue to advance, but because so many other parts of the world have regressed or are emerging from colonialism, abject poverty, and military or totalitarian rule. By comparison Canada looks pretty good, which makes the traditional role of the NDP much more difficult to sell.

Layton also has the matter of his health to deal with, and while he presents a bold face and has the support of Canadians for his personal health, in reality there are only so many days to spend with family, and politics can be very punishing in that regard. So given that the traditional ground over which the NDP had control is no longer as fertile, their chances of making gains is slim to nil. So one wonders if at this time Jack Layton is thinking, “So… why not roll the dice one last time?”

Then there is Michael Ignatieff. This was the man who Liberals were promised was the new Trudeau. He is an intellectual with the highest of University credentials. He is well connected with world leaders, and well published on matters of global consequence. This man is the actor who has studied and trained for the role, has his lines down flawlessly, but has yet to connect emotionally with his audience, the Canadian people, once on stage. In the business of politics that is crucial if he is to be seen to be credible in the role of Prime Minister. Unlike Trudeau, who had an inexplicable charisma about him, Ignatieff has not shown that he has this same quality.

Ignatieff came home to Canada and the Liberal party largely by invitation. There were those who thought that he would be the natural successor to Paul Martin. He left academia, the way of life that he loved, and entered the world of politics. There he has tried to tackle issues that he feels passionate about, but seems unable to connect with the Canadian people to make that passion translate into baseline support.

The fact that he will have a hard time out-campaigning Harper during the election has to be obvious to Ignatieff and his team. Last summer saw the Liberal leader travel to every part of Canada to bolster support, and yet the Liberals have failed to gain much visible support and, if we believe public opinion polls, currently trail the Harper Conservatives. If he wins this election he will be Prime Minister, if not, he will almost certainly leave politics and go back to a place he remembers fondly. So, in the mind of Michael Ignatieff it is understandable that he might think, “So … why not roll the dice one last time?”

Meanwhile Stephen Harper desperately wants to win a majority so that he can fully advance an agenda for Canada that has remained under wraps since he knows he cannot achieve it as a minority Prime Minister. Harper was very believable in his last interview with Peter Mansbridge on CBC, where he admitted that he had learned that he has to govern for all Canadians; that is, as long as he cannot have his way by virtue of a majority government. I strongly believe that Canadian voters are wise enough to understand that, and will if enough of them actually go to the polls on Election Day, refuse to give him the majority that he requires.

Armed with that knowledge, Harper, who I am sure feels aggrieved at having not been given the majority parliament that he believes is owed him, has tabled a budget that puts him in the role of Pied Piper. The musical notes of taxpayer funded gifts to critical ridings and large national organizations like the Canadian Medical Association will, he hopes, lead Canadians to the polls like the Pied Piper led the children from the village of Hamelin; apologies to Robert Browning.

In the final analysis, I think this election is less about what is good for Canadians, and more about the political leaders, long in the political tooth, and tired of trying to be a square peg in a world of round holes, collectively saying, “it’s time… let’s roll the dice.”

Sadly for all Canadians, Harper is counting on it to win his majority. Once more, with a sigh, Canadians are likely going to go to the polling stations and send the same message: a minority Parliament, regardless of which party is called upon to form government, is the best option presently in front of us.

Today marks the first day of Christy Clark’s premiership. Lieutenant-Governor Stephen Point administered the oath of confidentiality and oath of office to our new Premier and her chosen members of the Executive Council during a ceremony at Government House in Victoria.

With the swearing in came the answer to the first of three very critical questions that Clark faced as Premier elect, and it gave us a glimpse into the answer on the second. But we are really no closer to knowing the answer to the third.

The three questions were first and foremost, will she be able to put a truly new face on the government of Gordon Campbell? Second, will she remain true to her commitment to make children and families her highest priority in government? Third, will she seek a seat in a by-election or will she look for a broader mandate and call a provincial election?

Clark missed the opportunity to put a fresh face on the government of Gordon Campbell. If fact the very first minister that she proudly named during the Government House ceremony was Kevin Falcon, as Minister of Finance and Deputy Premier.

Given that opposition to the HST was the catalyst for widespread opposition to the former premier, so much so that it forced Campbell to resign, one has to wonder why Clark would choose Falcon who openly supports the HST. During the leadership contest he was the only candidate who actually stuck to his guns and tried to defend it. Falcon’s solution to the HST was to reduce the percentage of the tax not remove it.

Clark had other choices. Blair Lekstrom quit the caucus over both the manner by which the decision was taken and the tax itself once the detail of the HST was known. If Clark had chosen Blair Lekstrom as her Minister of Finance she would have sent a clear message to the people that she had heard them and was taking the first step to correct the error of introducing the HST by putting in place a minister who spoke with his feet when he walked out on Campbell.

Unfortunately she didn’t, choosing instead to elevate Falcon, positioning him to tinker with the tax, speak for her in the House until she holds a seat, and carry on business as usual.

Clark then moved to appoint Rich Coleman, hardly a fresh face, as Minister of Energy and Mines and the Minister responsible for Housing. This appointment is worth noting as Coleman was one of Campbell’s tough guys. Not only is he an ex-cop and a big man, but his bombastic my way or the highway style of dealing with issues is troubling when one considers the first issue that he will be tackling as Minister of Mines.

The proposed “Prosperity Mine” in the Chilcotin was turned down by Jim Prentice on environmental grounds when Prentice was the federal Minister of Environment. Prentice is no longer in government and so a renewed challenge is being made against the successful argument that the mine would completely destroy Fish Lake. The lake is a destination spot for anglers who annually catch an estimated 4,500-5,000 rainbow trout from the estimated 85,000 fish that populate the lake. It is also a prime source of drinking water which is one reason why there is such strong opposition from the First Nations.

Christy Clark made it quite clear that she supports Vancouver-based mining company Taseko Mines Ltd. in their amended application to establish a gold-copper mine at Fish Lake. She has said it would be a top priority to reverse the decision against the mine and now she has the cabinet enforcer positioned to take on the federal government and the public to get Taseko mines licensed to proceed. That is hardly a fresh approach.

And what about the second question? Christy Clark said that her first priority would be to look after the children and families in this province. It would appear that now that she holds the office of premier, she believes that first priority is best looked after by working with the corporate interests of British Columbia to create jobs. That is exactly the same approach that was taken by Campbell when he was premier, and yet while some companies in the corporate sector did very well under Campbell, many B.C. families did not.

The question that bears asking is why Clark chose two relative lightweights to deal with the two most critical ministries relating to children and families. Mary Polak, the new Minister of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation, and Mary McNeil, the Minister of Children and Family Development, both hold critical portfolios with respect to the wellbeing of the most vulnerable British Columbians.

Aboriginal communities were very poorly served by the Campbell government, who took the view that the B.C. Treaty Commission should take the lead on treaties, and the federal government needed to look after the social demands of Aboriginal people living within British Columbia. What is missed in this approach is the fact that the fastest-growing segment of the British Columbia population is urban-based Aboriginal youth. These young people are amongst the first to fall through the cracks and are frequently exploited; abused and generally forgotten by those you could offer legitimate help.

Polak, MLA for Langley, was the Minister of Children and Family Development and a minister who was also a proud and vocal supporter of Campbell, as shown on her web page where she announced, “I am proud to stand with Gordon Campbell and the BC Liberal team to ensure that Langley has a bright future”. I am not sure that anyone can point to anything that she did for the children in this province let alone urban Aboriginal youth, when she was Minister of Children and Families; it is hard to imagine what experience she can bring to the very critical and highly complex issues of Aboriginal people both living on reserve and in our cities.

What makes this so-called commitment to the families of British Columbia even more vacuous is the fact that Mary McNeil, a complete novice to the Executive branch of government, has been given this extremely important Ministry. McNeil and her commitment to law and order might have been a better choice for Solicitor General than the Minister responsible for the children and families of our province.

So at first blush it would appear that the answer to the second critical question, will Christy Clark make children and families her highest priority, is no; at least not directly.

Christy Clark is in a precarious position because she has to keep the conservative business members of the right wing coalition onside. That’s why Falcon is where he is, and that’s why Coleman has been given mining as his portfolio. It is also why lip service has been paid to the interests of Aboriginal people and middle and low income families. The agenda today seems no different than that of Campbell; although the sharply dressed Christy Clark hopes you think it is.
All of this brings me to the last question facing our new premier. While she may have won the mandate of her party no matter how suspect the process used might be, the rude fact is that she does not hold a mandate to govern by the people.

Premier Clark has already said that she plans to move up the referendum on the HST to the end of June. I would argue that her only hope to remain premier is to make that referendum one on her “new fresh direction” and go to the people in a general provincial election.

By June the NDP will have selected their new leader, and the people of the province will have had time to make an assessment in terms of those they wish to have in government. If Clark is really committed to a fresh approach to government she will put her fate in the hands of the people she purports to serve.

If today’s events are any indication of her approach, look for her to duck that obligation, hold a “safe” Vancouver Point Grey by-election and win her seat. She will then manage a province-wide referendum on the HST which will be heavily influenced by a very well-financed, Vancouver-based corporate sector, all of whom have benefited from the HST tax shift.

Clark has a real opportunity in front of her to take the reins of government and change its direction. Sadly is seems that she wears the reins that are pulled and tugged by the right wing coalition who want to continue along the course set by Campbell.