Mirror, mirror on the wall appears to be the battle cry of Premier Clark these days. She is making statements about prosperity funds, job explosion by 2020 and, believe it or not, she actually alluded to the real monetary deficit of $56 billion by saying that the prosperity fund would provide an avenue for debt pay-down. It all sounds impressive until reality hits home.
The idea of a prosperity fund, by name alone, is chosen to conjure up the best of intentions for the successful direction the province is going to take as a result of significant LNG development and strategic Asian marketing. It begs that a series of questions be asked. The main one is “What crystal ball are they looking at to predict that over the next 30 years this pattern will develop?” Anybody can make a projection based on “gut-level feelings.” If her reliability of predicting the future is as good as her promises of “families first,” this province is in deep trouble. The great American Poet Robert Frost said it best: “But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.” Ms. Clark’s miles seem to be quickly running out and many empty promises remain unfulfilled. I guess the big question is “What now?”
It almost seems that the biggest thing she did for families was to create “Family Day.” Big whoop! Child poverty is still a huge issue. Not much change there.
The promise of a balanced budget is, at best, laughable. Each B.C. family in some way, shape or form is paying for the $56 billion debt and families will be paying for it for some time to come. How is this balanced? If the balanced budget is a reflection of this past year, there is a problem there as well. The term balanced literally means: “A situation in financial planning or the budgeting process where total revenues are equal to or greater than total expenses.” Having said that, it makes it easy to say that the budget will be balanced. How can the budget be balanced when the Liberals are spending $15 million of taxpayer’s money to promote their Cock Robin advertising campaign which supposedly extols their accomplishments or virtues and falsely sets them up as saints? Smoke and mirrors, again?
Finally, after all is said and done, irrespective of future predictions, there is a plethora of baggage that the Liberals have left unopened and untagged. The list of old baggage is well known and yet it seems to remain unclaimed. One might liken this to a ship’s container filled with some baggage such as: BC Rail scandal; BC Ferries; Sale of BC Rail; the fast ferry giveaway; the loss of a by-election or two; child poverty issues; “Families First promise”; the John Doyle fiasco; and last but by no means least, the dissension in the ranks and the loss of Liberal MLAs. This container will not be going anywhere any time soon.
Ron Barillaro
Penticton