Second Session, 42nd Parliament

(2021) OFFICIAL REPORT

OF DEBATES

(HANSARD)

Thursday, April 22, 2021

Afternoon Sitting

Issue No. 56

ISSN 1499-2175

The HTML transcript is provided for informational purposes only.

The PDF transcript remains the official digital version.

CONTENTS

Orders of the Day

Budget Debate (continued)

L. Doerkson

M. Dykeman

M. Morris

D. Coulter

A. Olsen

Hon. N. Cullen

D. Davies

Committee of the Whole House

Bill 3 — Employment Standards Amendment Act, 2021

(continued)

G. Kyllo

Hon. H. Bains

THURSDAY, APRIL 22, 2021

The House met at 1:33 p.m.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

Orders of the Day

Hon. M. Farnworth: I call continued debate on the bud­get.

Budget Debate

(continued)

L. Doerkson: Thank you for the opportunity to finish my speech.

Like in most parts of British Columbia, our businesses have certainly

struggled. It does appear that we will probably watch as they struggle

through another year or, certainly, at least a summer of

restrictions.

[N. Letnick in the chair.]

The South Cariboo, parts of it known as the Fishing Highway, has

struggled, obviously, but the West Chilcotin, which is a little more off the

beaten path, has really seen its challenges. This is an area often that sees

very many overseas visitors, particularly guest ranches, guide-outfitters,

skiing operations and, of course, lodges.

I wanted to hear so much more about how we might best serve and

support our businesses. We have watched many programs roll out over the past

year, seemingly programs being introduced as new and, really, appearing to

be coming from funding that has already been announced months ago. It needs

to be deployed now.

It would appear that of hundreds of millions of dollars in funding,

only about a third of it has actually been de­ployed. Any of the

businesses that I just mentioned are in desperate need of help, and they

could have used these dollars months ago. These funds have been approved by

everyone in this place and really ought to have been de­ployed a long

time ago.

[1:35 p.m.]

I was very hopeful that new funding announcements that we’ve heard

about here were actually new. We heard about another $800 million in

potential business recovery. But with all due respect, it’s been months for

past programs to roll out, and they’re still not deployed.

In my life as a small business person myself, I have ne­ver

experienced a more trying time. I sincerely hope and would certainly support

most initiatives that would see our businesses get through these extremely

challenging times. Desperate pleas have been made by the tourism sector, and

in the budget for the Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture, we see only a

$4 million increase in spending. The Ministry of Jobs, Economic Recovery and

Innovation lists less than $1 million in increased spending.

Along with gyms that have had to close under the pressure of these new

orders, I watch with disappointment as we see our restaurants go to very

limited hours, some of them trying desperately to create outdoor eating

areas, while others try to figure out ways to change their menus to have

different selections that may be more relevant for takeout than what they’re

accustomed to preparing.

I don’t have to tell you that the layoffs in these businesses

throughout our region have been absolutely staggering. Now they face even

longer delays in getting back to business. I know that I speak for all of

the businesses in the Cariboo-Chilcotin when I say that we were hoping that

this government would come through with the funding it continues to promise

and that we don’t see a repeat of last year, with failed attempts to help so

many deserving businesses.

I’m grateful to all of the communities that have recognized how

difficult it has been for some of these small businesses and the residents

that have stepped up by en­joying more than an occasional night out.

It’s very en­couraging to see the support for all of these businesses

at a local level.

One of the focuses of conversation over the past weeks has been with

respect to agrifairs, rodeos and exhibitions. It is with great sadness that

for a second year in a row, we have lost both our beloved Indoor Rodeo in

Williams Lake and the Williams Lake Stampede as well.

Last week the 100 Mile House Car Club announced the cancellation of

the annual hot summer nights car show. These events create so much revenue

for our region. Of course, without these events happening again this year,

it will have an ill effect on very many people. Indeed, this will have a

dramatic effect throughout the entire province, with hundreds of events

cancelled.

Frankly, I was quite surprised and questioned the anticipated income

of our province. The revenues appear in the budget to drop by only $2

billion. I’m pleased if that’s all it is and that’s all it will drop, but it

does seem, with all of the lost commerce in this province and of course the

lost taxation on that commerce, that that figure may be low. It’s further

alarming how the plan shows such a brisk recovery, with our income growing

by almost $5 billion in the following year.

It would seem to me that if things return to somewhat normal, we would

fill the $2 billion gap. But for us to grow by that much, I fear what may be

around the corner with respect to taxation. Certainly we have seen a variety

of the many taxes added over the past year. The last thing any of these

businesses or, for that matter, the people of British Columbia need as we

recover is more tax burden.

With respect to the loss of these events — and it does appear as

though we will lose another summer — which will be devastating to so many

businesses, like guide-outfitters, stock contractors, guest ranches, they

have the add­ed pressure of feeding animals as part of their overhead

as well as maintaining, heating and lighting their infrastructure also. In

the case of C+ Rodeos, those expenses are more than $100,000 per year. It

would be impossible for many family-run operations to be able to pay that

kind of expense without work.

This situation is dire, and I have heard nothing in this budget speech

that was specific to this kind of funding, even though we’ve had funding in

the past, through the animal care initiatives program. It was recognized as

an issue in 2020, and funding was created. But in 2021, even with much

lobbying, this has not been recognized as an issue, and there have been no

funds directly linked to these situations.

I know at least one contractor that will have to make very serious

decisions with respect to his herd, the herd that they maintain for the

rodeo circuit. I know at least one guide-outfitter that has had to sell all

of their stock horses for lack of income from their business. I am very

surprised that there has been no focus on funding for businesses like these,

because they are unique.

[1:40 p.m.]

I am very surprised and disappointed, because nothing that I have said

here in this address should come as a shock. It’s not like these issues have

not been anticipated. It’s not like we haven’t discussed all of these things

I have mentioned here at length in this place. Not just myself either. Other

people have addressed this chamber, discussing the economy, connectivity,

floods and roads.

In some cases, problems in my riding have been there and ignored for

the past four years. It’s not just this year that issues began on Highway

20, not the first issues we have heard on Dog Creek. I think that the people

in my riding are weary and not just from COVID.

I wonder how many times one’s house has to be flooded, thanks to a

culvert placed by the province, to actually get the attention of our

provincial government, how long before the government realizes that the

topography of our region has changed since 2017 and ’18. In the case of Dog

Creek Road, this damage has continued for years, and in some cases, these

flooding events happened three times last year alone.

When constituents get to the point that they can no longer sell their

homes, no longer fix their homes, and in some cases, no longer insure their

homes, you can imagine the level of frustration for people that are caught

in this situation.

The sad

part is that I don’t think it has to be this way at all. It

has to be recognized as a problem and fixed by the province, with the help

of local governments.

I just want to take a moment to pause to reflect on the losses that so

many have endured. I’m referring, of course, to the deaths over the past

year from the pandemic, and the losses of life from the opioid crisis. The

personal loss and the pain really is immeasurable. For that, I wish to

off­er my most sincere condolences to the families that have endured

these very sad times.

I also wanted to take a moment to thank so many volunteer groups that

have risen to the challenges of these times by continuing to keep food

programs rolling, by making sure that our food banks are never

empty.

To all of our front-line workers, who never have stopped providing

safety or care, in spite of many of them not re­ceiving vaccines. I

want to thank the grocers that allow us to resupply often, the shipping

companies, the truck drivers that make sure that the supply never stops

coming, and to the vets and the vet techs who have never stopped caring for

our pets and our livestock.

To our teachers, our school bus drivers…. It is truly amazing what

these individuals have done to keep our province moving. I and my family are

extremely grateful for that.

M. Dykeman: It is an honour today to rise in the House virtually from the

traditional, ancestral and unceded territories of the Matsqui, Kwantlen,

Katzie and Semiahmoo First Nations.

It’s an honour to speak in response to the budget. It’s a privilege

truly to speak favourably of the positive and meaningful impact that this

budget will have on my constituents of Langley East.

I’m pleased to see that the budget continues to maintain its focus on

the things that matter for the people of British Columbia: protecting the

health and safety of British Columbians, supporting people and businesses as

we continue to manage the effects of the pandemic, and to undertake the

important preparation work that will allow us to be ready to seize the

opportunities that recovery will hold.

The pandemic and recovery contingencies included will support those

very time-limited COVID-19 measures that will ensure that we’re ready to

navigate the changing landscape of the pandemic. Our province has faced many

challenges this past year, and we’re still navigating these challenges. This

pandemic really has shone a light on inequality. Although the pandemic has

affected everyone, the effects have not been felt in an equal way. Some

groups have been affected more than others.

The last year really has highlighted the importance of strong health

and mental health services. As more and more people receive their

vaccinations, with our province sitting at approximately 30 percent

vaccinated with their first shot, we can see light at the end of the tunnel.

But there is much work to do. There is a lot that needs to be addressed. and

this budget really does so.

I’m thrilled to see that Budget 2021 is providing more than $4 billion

in funding for health care and mental health to continue to protect people

from COVID-19 and expand the services that people rely on. This is so

vital.

[1:45 p.m.]

Health care truly is a wise investment. Lowering wait times,

supporting seniors and investing in mental health services — areas that

suffered from significant underfunding through the years. Building a network

of mental health supports for youth through schools, new Foundry centres and

integrated child and youth supports in more than 15 school districts makes

sense. We need to ensure that there are supports in place for our most

vulnerable.

This budget is addressing something that has been systemically

underfunded through past governments: im­proving access to and quality

of mental health services through British Columbia and providing First

Nations health authorities with more funding to deliver mental health and

addictions services to Indigenous peoples.

Increasing access on a full spectrum of substance use treatment and

recovery services, including much-needed funding for opioid treatment, which

we’ve seen, through this pandemic and prior, has been a crisis. It’s one

that needs to be addressed, which this budget is working hard to address in

a way that makes sense — helping more people get on a path to recovery, with

new substance-use treatment and recovery beds.

People who are ready to make that step to go into recovery need access

to spaces. It’s a very time-contingent thing. So having those spaces ready

to help people move through the challenges of recovery is vital.

Helping more people, through the $7.8 billion in capital investments.

I’m very pleased to see this building new, critical health care

infrastructure and supporting major construction projects, like new and

upgraded hospitals. The Langleys recently benefited from our government’s

focus on ensuring that we have a strong health care system.

Myself and my colleague and friend the MLA for Langley announced the

substantial completion of the new emergency room at Langley Memorial

Hospital. We have also seen the construction of a new hospice and new MRI

suite, which directly, positively affects my community and surrounding

communities.

In conversations with those that live in my riding, they were so

pleased to see that the focus on health care is there. We are one of the

fastest-growing communities, and having spaces in hospitals and facilities

that can manage complex health needs is essential. Our government has been

addressing those, and they’ve been addressing them at a rapid rate. Our

community is so grateful for that.

I’m very excited to see such a substantial increase in funding, with

$500 million to expand mental health and addiction services. We have seen

these areas grow, unfortunately. As our community grows in Langley East, the

needs of our community become more complex.

This type of funding will make a meaningful impact on people who are

experiencing mental health and addiction challenges, and that’s something

that is a wise investment for our entire community. It affects our economy.

It affects our social structures. It affects everything. Those are areas, as

I’ve said previously, that have been chronically underfunded and that our

government is now coming in and addressing in a way that will make a

difference in the lives of people.

In terms of schools, I know that my riding, as well as my colleague

the MLA for Langley, is very excited to see the construction and opening of

the new southwest Yorkson elementary school, which was recently named, by

the Langley board of education, Donna Gabriel Robins Elementary.

Donna Gabriel Robins is a member of Kwantlen First Nation and, now, a

retired teacher. Donna has been instrumental in leading the Langley school

district’s journey of truth and reconciliation, always advocating and

ensuring that the students were kept at the centre of all decisions related

to their educational journey. So I was very thrilled to see the name choice.

It is just wonderful.

This school is currently under construction, slated to open in

September 2021. It will provide 555 new spaces for students in grades K to

5. The new school has a total budget of $32.2 million and is designed to

meet LEED gold standards. It is scheduled, as mentioned, to open in

September and will also feature a neighbourhood learning centre with space

for childcare programming.

[1:50 p.m.]

As I said earlier, the Langleys are a rapidly growing area, one of the

fastest ones in British Columbia.

As many will know, I started my political journey on the Langley board

of education in 2011, before I left my role as chair of the board this past

year to serve my community as MLA. What an honour and privilege that was. In

each of the three elections in the years in between, the focus, really,

never changed: “We need more facilities. We need more schools, more space,

to address our rapidly growing communities.” In my time on the board, I was

known for literally chasing ministers down hallways to bend their ear about

the need for more space.

So to say, I am absolutely ecstatic to see that over the three years

of this fiscal plan, approximately $3.5 billion will be invested to

maintain, replace or renovate and ex­pand K-to-12 facilities,

including continued investments in new school space to accommodate

increasing enrolment in growth districts, as well as in a program to

seismically upgrade or replace schools. This was just a devastating period

of time — watching our communities grow and very little investment in

capital for schools.

Seeing this being put on the forefront of the agenda for the

government is so important for our students. They need spaces. They need

modern spaces to learn. They need spaces that address the needs for the

numbers of students that are simply just enrolling.

We are growing our economy. We are bringing more people to British

Columbia, but for 15 years there was just no focus on schools and the

expansion of schools, or very little. Seeing this, I can say, coming from my

education background, it is much needed and much appreciated. People of

Langley…. As I mentioned, we’re a growing community. Our parents are

thrilled to see investments going into spaces so that our students have

places to go to school.

One of the areas I also was really excited to read about in the budget

was our key capital investments. Over the three years of this fiscal plan,

transportation and capital investments totalling $7.5 billion are allowing

our province to maintain a flow of people and goods to support B.C.’s

economy — widening ten kilometres of Highway 1 through Langley from 216

Street to 264 Street, which will accommodate high-occupancy vehicles;

reconfiguring the 232 Street interchange; looking at new underpasses at

Glover Road and the CP Rail crossing; and truck parking for High­ways

1 and 17 for up to 150 commercial trucks and 45 passenger

vehicles.

That allows our people of Langley to keep goods and services moving

and allows people to spend more time at home, not sitting in traffic. That

is something our community is so thrilled to see — that this is moving along

and that it’s moving at a pace that will allow my riding, and beyond, to be

able to get out of their cars and get home faster, and to get goods and

services moving around our riding.

Also, though not directly in my riding, I was ecstatic to see the

replacement of the Pattullo Bridge with a new four-lane bridge, which can be

expanded to six. It’s going to meet the current seismic and road design

standards — the removal of the existing bridge — and provide a safe and

reliable crossing for vehicles, pedestrians and cyclists, allowing

neighbouring ridings to mine, in Surrey and New Westminster, to be able to

move people and goods through faster and in a safer way.

Budget 2021 also is building on community infrastructure investments,

providing $147 million in new funding over this fiscal plan and supporting

further meaningful things like broadband and cellular access in rural,

remote and Indigenous communities. This is allowing people to access

essential services and work and is making the place safer for

everyone.

These investments are vital to communities. Our pro­vince is

diverse. There are strong agricultural areas, rural communities and

fast-growing urban areas, and seeing this balanced investment is vital for

our communities to address the diverse needs within our province.

[1:55 p.m.]

What I think we don’t get a lot of time to talk about is how important

capital investments are, also, in the creation of jobs. These capital

investments are anticipated to create over 85,000 jobs in this fiscal plan

period. These are direct construction jobs, as well as indirect jobs — like

off-site employment at suppliers, material manufacturing, food services —

and the benefits just ripple out into the broader economy, with additional

income being spent right in our communities and supporting recovery. Those

types of investments are what is needed during challenging times like this

pandemic.

An austerity budget doesn’t help the economy grow. The economy

growing, more people being able to go to work, people being able to have

money to spend and in­vest back in our communities is vital. Our

ridings, both myself and my colleague at Langley, are very, very

business-oriented — small businesses, really entrepreneurial, people who

have opened businesses that have been significantly affected during this

pandemic. The investments, such as our circuit breaker business relief

grants, are helping our businesses.

Through the time of this past little while, I’ve been reaching out to

businesses and seeing how they feel they’ve been supported throughout the

pandemic. Especially for our hospitality industry, it has been a challenge.

What I do hear time and time again, though, is how grateful our community is

for the very balanced and sensible approach that our government has taken to

ensuring that businesses receive the support that they need.

Our restaurants, bars, breweries, wineries really have been hit hard,

and the recent public health orders were exceptionally difficult for many.

So the 14,000 businesses that have been further impacted by recent

restrictions…. Our government has put a $50 million circuit breaker business

relief grant in place. I’m grateful to see that our government was able to

move so quickly and recognize the needs that our small businesses had during

these difficult times. This grant will provide businesses up to $10,000 in

one-time funding to help with expenses such as rent, employee wages,

maintenance and utilities.

I met recently with a local brewery in my riding. We were talking

about how grateful they were for the ability to access funding to help them.

They’re a new brewery. They just opened up, so they were facing the

challenges of growing and starting a business during a pandemic, and they

really have done so much for our community, despite all the challenges. This

brewery recently, actually, offered a place for people who were displaced

from a fire to come and have a coffee and work. They were talking about

those challenges and how vital and important it was for the government to

ensure that they had funding and had supports in place.

Our government has been responding to that, providing the ability for

businesses to access the funding that they need to continue going and to be

as careful and mindful as possible, with the changing landscape, to ensure

that the public health orders allow businesses to continue. Our provincial

government has worked hard to make life easier with things like patio access

— you know, getting patios quickly approved and getting liquor licences to

be able to respond and pivot so that they can continue to work. Those were

the things that we covered.

Those are the things that we need to continue to focus on: ensuring

that we’re being careful, that we keep people and small businesses that are

the engine of our economy at the forefront. I believe that our budget does

an excellent job of that — being mindful to look at all the different ways

the businesses are impacted and respond accordingly. That really was a very

important thing to say — that there was a strong focus on the

economy.

As I said earlier, this budget is about helping people now and

creating the conditions of a strong economic recovery. Part of that is child

care, ensuring that we have a focus on child care so that those that need to

go to work, both men and women, can access child care in their

community.

[2:00 p.m.]

Our community of Langley East recently benefited from 140 new child

care spaces. In fact, it was actually Langley East and Langley, both

ridings, that benefited from these child care spaces. Seeing that

announcement, as a single mother myself, made me so happy to know that we

were having more spaces for our growing community.

In turn, that helps the economy. Having the ability to choose child

care close to home for those that would like to work outside the home is

really essential. We saw this pandemic, which has disproportionately

affected women, was sort of viewed by economists as a pandemic that really

had a hard effect. Although on everyone, it did hit harder on

some.

Having access to child care and ensuring child care spaces could stay

open to service those that needed it, who were keeping our economy going

during the pandemic, was vital. Seeing a continued focus on ensuring child

care stays at the forefront of this government’s budget is something that I

was very excited to see, because that is, once again, a very wise investment

in our economy and ensures that we’re supporting people through the

pandemic.

I wanted to touch, very quickly, on training. My coll­eague the

MLA for Langley, who is also Parliamentary Sec­retary for Skills

Training, I know has been working very hard and ensuring that there is

training for our students and those who want to re-skill to be able to offer

their services and find meaningful, well-paying jobs when they come out

through this pandemic. Investing in people with new training and employment

opportunities is another wise investment as we’re dealing with this pandemic

economy and what it will look like as we come out on the other

side.

I was really excited to see a focus on this in the budget. Once again:

$96 million over three years for new training spaces to continue to build a

workforce that will increase, for instance, the health sector capacity; $17

million to partner with hundreds of Indigenous communities and organizations

to expand access to programs through the Indigenous skills training

program.

Another example: $6 million to support work-integrat­ed learning

placements for nearly 3,000 students in B.C. post-secondary institutions,

helping one of the hardest-hit demographics find meaningful employment. And

just a last example: $4 million to continue short-term skills-training

programs for unemployed or underemployed people to train in high-demand

sectors.

It was something that we talked about a lot when I was on school board

— the need to invest in trade programs and opportunities for people to gain

skills as they come out. You know, my son is looking forward to — he

graduates this year; he’s in grade 12 — training to become a heavy-duty

mechanic.

He is so excited to come out of grade 12 and know that there’s

training in place because of the hard work of people like our minister and

our parliamentary secretary, who have put so much into ensuring that people

have opportunities to train. That is something that I think is a very wise

investment in our economy — ensuring that people have that

opportunity.

In conclusion, just to wrap up, it is just wonderful to see a focus on

people, families, vulnerable individuals who have suffered so much through

this pandemic — ensuring that we have a balanced economic recovery and

capital plan, that we have training, that we have education for our youth

and those who need to re-skill, community infrastructure.

I believe that throughout this province, this budget will make a

meaningful impact on the lives of people as we come through this pandemic in

a way that we will ensure that people are supported in all the social ways

that we need to support people through these challenging times, focusing on

those vulnerable communities, focusing on people’s mental health, focusing

on families having options, as well as balancing the need for an economy so

that we can continue to grow with British Columbia. We can continue to have

opportunities for people to work in meaningful employment. That, in turn,

will allow people to reinvest back into their economies.

[2:05 p.m.]

I know that as the MLA for Langley East, I look at this budget and see

how my riding can benefit from this and the regions around us. I’m very

excited to see how things like agritech will be benefiting my community,

which has a fast-growing urban core and a strong agricultural history and

economy.

I am excited to see how we will be able to support our youth, those

with mental health needs through this pandemic. We are not on the other side

of it yet. We still have much work to do, but what I do know is that I feel

strongly that this budget is looking with a forward-looking lens to ensure

that we’re supporting those, as we move through this. I feel confident it’s

been done in a safe and in a very empathetic and forward-looking

way.

With that, I’d just like to say that I’m thrilled with this budget.

I’m looking forward to seeing these excellent programs and supports roll out

over the next little while. We’ll be excited to talk about that in the House

at every opportunity. So with that, I will conclude my remarks and take my

seat here virtually.

I would like to thank you for the opportunity to speak favourably

about this budget in this House today.

M. Morris: As I’ve watched the performance of this government over the last….

We’re in the second term now.

I go back to the credo that they hung their hats on in their

campaigns, leading up to the elections, about making life more affordable.

All I see, particularly after reading this budget and going through the

documents, is that it’s not going to be affordable for decades.

There is such a debt burden that our children and our grandchildren

are going to be bearing for decades to come that it’s really not going to be

affordable for anybody to pay for the lifestyle that this government wants

to put in place over the next fiscal plan that they have here. It’s a huge

deficit with no end in sight for a decade. No end in sight for a decade. Ten

years. You know, to plan….

I wish I had the ability to just spend money willy-nilly for the next

ten years and not have to worry about it. Everybody sitting on that side of

the House, on the government side — well, probably a lot of them — will be

gone and will be enjoying their pension as the folks that are coming up in

the ranks and through the world will be paying the debt off. So $9 billion

coming up for this fiscal year — $9 billion — but that’s less than what it

was projected to be, at around, I believe, $13 billion.

It’s less because of the rising house prices that we see and the

windfall that this government has reaped as a result of the taxes that are

paid on these resale transactions. Yet they campaigned continually, right

from 2017, on making life more affordable for people. But keeping the price

of housing down…. It hasn’t dropped down a bit.

Even in my community of Prince George–Mackenzie, I have young people

coming in, phoning my office, wondering what they’re going to do. They can’t

save up enough money for a home, even in Prince George, where the average

price I think is getting up close to the mid-$400,000 bracket. That’s in the

interior of the province.

Moody’s. I just have to read the comment Moody’s made recently about

this: “The province’s credit rating could face downward pressure if…direct

and indirect debt were to materially exceed our current projections,

coinciding with a loss in the financial management of the province.” That

was on the 24th of March, 2021. I think that’s a warning flag.

We hear from the credit rating agencies on a routine bas­is. I

know that when we were in government, we took a lot of credence in what they

had to say. I think that’s a warning shot across the bow, saying: “Guess

what. We’re going to have another look in a little bit and just see what

that really shows.”

[2:10 p.m.]

Under the cover of COVID, our public sector has blossomed, has

ballooned. Just in the last year, the public sector has grown by 60,000

people.

I don’t have a problem with hiring people to deal with our COVID

issues — to hire the contact tracers, to hire the resources we need to

protect the people of British Columbia — but I believe 60,000 is a

significant number of people that have been hired in the last year to add to

the public sector that we have already in place in this great province of

ours. Ten percent of B.C.’s population works for the provincial government —

about 500,000 people. That’s a lot of people.

This has happened while the private sector has still lost 40,000 jobs.

I’ll talk about that in a minute here as well.

The other thing that I found interesting in this particular budget

document…. It goes back to page 4 of their fiscal plan — notional

allocations. You know, we’ve had notional things before, but these are

notional allocations for upcoming fiscal years: “Notional allocations of

$1.5 billion for ’22-23 and $2 billion for ’23-24.” It says: “For caseload

pressures and priority initiatives that may require funding in future

budgets.”

Notional. A $2 billion notional amount of money available during an

election year in 2024. Now, is it notional that we have got an election

coming up in 2024? A person could do a lot of things with $2 billion to

shovel out the back of a truck in the few months leading up to an election

during that particular year.

I worked in the public sector pretty much my whole life in the RCMP, a

senior manager looking after budgets for the province and for my own

district. If I went to my boss and said: “Boss, you know, things are kind of

humming along here, but I’d like to throw another $500 million into my

budget for the next fiscal year and the fiscal year after that because we

might need it. Maybe we need to buy a new airplane or a couple of new boats

for my district, or maybe I want to add a bunch more manpower to it or build

some more infrastructure.” That’s primarily what this is.

To me, this is poor fiscal management when you have to budget $1½

billion in one year and $2 billion in another year for unseen things that

might happen in the future. That’s a lot of money. And that’s in addition to

all of the forecast allowances and contingency allocations that they’ve

already put into the budgets moving forward.

The other obvious gap that I saw looking through the budget…. It’s a

ledger sheet that omits the revenue side of that ledger sheet. It doesn’t

show where we have the money coming in to pay for all of these notional

budgetary items and some of the changes that they want here.

There’s no plan in place to get the private sector going. Like I said,

we’ve added 60,000 people to public sector in the last year alone. There’s

lots of talk about child care spaces, there’s lots of talk about health

care, which is all great as long as it’s not disrupting the private sector

operations and jobs that we have in the province as well.

There’s no vision in this document. We’ve got three fiscal years ahead

of us with this fiscal plan with no real vision other than to spend money

like it’s going out of style. There’s no mention on how this government is

going to create an investment climate that will attract people to this

province again and attract business investments that will get things up and

running.

Now, I’m going to talk about mining shortly, as mining is a big, big

issue in my riding. It was 2015. I used to put on the Natural Resources

Forum in Prince George. I was talking to a gentleman from the States. His

role was to find money for mining investments and getting mining off the

ground around the world.

[2:15 p.m.]

He was telling me that British Columbia had one of the best investment

climates in Canada when it came to developing mines, back in 2015. We sure

don’t have that any more. We’ve got some of the highest tax structures — the

carbon tax, the employer health tax. There are a number of taxes there that

have taken that title away from us.

There’s no mention on how to address the pending decrease in our

forest sector. They talked about reallocating volume. They talked about

value-added industry. But we have a lack of fibre right across the province

that is going to cause the forest sector to rationalize their operations

throughout the province. I think we’re going to see a significant decrease

there.

There’s no mention of the value of our resource sector as an economic

driver in our recovery in the province. They talk about a green economy —

the electrification of vehicles, reducing our use of fossil fuels. But

they’re blind to the fact that fossil fuels will continue to play a role in

our province for decades to come. This transition is going to take us

decades in order to get to become fossil fuel free.

What obviously is missing, as well, is a clear understanding of this

symbiotic relationship between a green economy — electrification of our

vehicles and our infrastructure — and our current resource sector. We can’t

have electric vehicles without our copper mines and our gold mines. We have

some of the richest copper and gold deposits in the world right here in our

province in the corridor between the Rocky Mountains and the Coast range. We

have some magnificent opportunities up there. There’s a little triangle up

there they call the Golden Triangle. Copper and gold are generally found in

the same areas. We have opportunities there.

We have infrastructure available to be upgraded and modified with the

Dease Lake rail extension that can get into that area and connect our

beautiful province to Alaska and the southern states and take advantage of

the 350 million people that live in the southern U.S.A. that would love to

come through British Columbia. I think the residual tourism we would see

here would be enormous. But there’s no mention of that.

Our mines will be critical in moving any kind of a green economy

forward. The copper in an electric vehicle…. There is anywhere from three to

ten times more copper in an electric vehicle than there is in a vehicle with

a combustion engine. That’s only the copper. There is also gold in there,

and there are other rare minerals that help that. Technology runs on copper

and gold and silver and platinum and other rare earth minerals that we have

around the province here. There are opportunities for thousands of

well-paying jobs in British Columbia in the mining industry.

The other part of this symbiotic relationship between a green economy

and our resource sector is oil and gas. We don’t have a petrochemical

industry in British Columbia, yet everything that we do in the world

operates off of petrochemicals. We have some of the richest liquid natural

gas in the world. Just north of us in British Columbia here — my colleagues

from Peace River North and Peace River South — in the Montney gas play, some

of the richest liquid natural gas in the world is sitting there.

That natural gas contains propane. The derivative, of course, is a

fuel for barbecues and for other things. We’ve got a propane export terminal

now in Prince Rupert. But also, one of the by-products of propane is

polypropylene. That’s the hard plastic that is used in our vehicle

manufacturing. Most of the electric cars can operate in an efficient manner

today because they are lightweight due to polypropylene and plastics built

into that vehicle. The technology sector runs on polypropylene. The cases

for our computers, the cases for our medical supplies and a lot of the

medical instruments themselves are polypropylene.

[2:20 p.m.]

We have polyethylene. We have millions of kilometres of water pipes

servicing all our communities right across this province. The little plastic

pipes that are in the ground that bring the water from our reservoirs to

every household in the province — polyethylene. Millions of kilometres of

those. Then we also have millions of kilometres of bigger pipe that take the

wastewater from our communities and from our households into water treatment

plants throughout the communities as well.

How could we replace that? Whether we run on a green economy and we

reduce our use of fossil fuels in our vehicles and our trucks, we still will

see a need for this.

We have those opportunities right here in this province. I was

speaking to a proponent in my riding who was talking about building a

polyethylene plant in Prince George, employing 1,000 people — one plant.

With that polyethylene plant, we could ship products from around the world.

We could take those liquids out of the natural gas with a straddle plant, as

they call it — extract those liquids out of the gas before it gets shipped

or burned in our households, so we’ll be burning cleaner gas. The GHG

emissions will be significantly reduced around our province and around the

world.

LNG Canada is building the large liquefaction plant in Prince Rupert

or Kitimat as we speak. Right through my community, we’ve got a

4-foot-diameter natural gas line that’s going to supply all this gas to LNG

Canada. The amount of money that we could make from the liquids in that

natural gas before it gets loaded onto those ships and shipped over to Asia

— where it will, no doubt, be turned into all these products that I’m

talking about — is enormous.

The polypropylene plant, scheduled for Prince George — or I anticipate

it for Prince George — will be using the existing Enbridge supply line that

supplies all of British Columbia down to the northwest United States. The

proponent claimed that he could probably extract $1 million to $2 million

worth of liquids out of the existing pipeline and turn it into these

value-added products that we can ship.

Then you look at the downstream opportunities from that that we could

have in manufacturing. We could put thousands of people to work in this

province to increase our tax base — people paying income tax, taxation from

the corporations. We would soon dig out of the debt that this province has

dug themselves into. Then, of course, we have butane, another by-product of

the liquids. Butane is used for synthetic rubber. A lot of our electric

bikes have synthetic rubber tires and whatnot on there.

You can’t have a green economy without talking about the petrochemical

industry and the resources that we have in the ground. If we look at a

petrochemical industry in British Columbia, we will have thousands upon

thousands of people employed in that industry alone. It would eclipse the

50,000 people that have lost their jobs in the forest sector over the last

ten years.

The other area that I looked at, in going through the budget

documents, is policing. Of course, it’s my critic role: Public Safety. I was

pleased to see that there is an increase to core policing operations,

provincial core policing. That’s a general duty cop that’s working in places

like Vanderhoof — that have had caseloads that have been some of the record

caseloads in the province — and other communities up there, and our

provincial resources are investigating the homicides and the more serious

crime that we have located throughout the province.

The rural communities depend upon the RCMP or the provincial police in

this community, not only to keep their communities safe from crime, but we

have seen significant events over the years with wildfires, interface fires

between our communities and our forests. We have seen massive flooding

taking place in our communities across the province.

The RCMP play an integral role in evacuations planning. When I was a

detachment commander, I had to update my evacuation plans for my community

every year. I had to count the number of station wagons and buses and trucks

and heavy equipment and who had them and the phone numbers to who had them

so that we could call if we had a provincial emergency like that.

There are always new demands being placed on our po­lice

resources. We heard the Premier talking about that the other day, where he

demanded that the police get out and start stopping people on the road to

make sure that they were not travelling unnecessarily, that they were

staying within their health district. Of course, that puts added stress and

strain on a system that is already overburdened with various

things.

[2:25 p.m.]

One of the terrible things that has escalated in recent days and weeks

is the gangland killings that we see taking place in the Lower Mainland.

Where are the resources going into that? Back when we were in government — I

was sitting in the Solicitor General’s chair — we put in an extra $25

million. We created two new gang task forces in the guns and gang area. It

was making results.

The problem we don’t recognize, and this government has not

recognized, is the fact that with all of the complexities associated with

criminal investigations that we have today, the police actually get taken

off the road at the end of an investigation, to a large extent. The

investigation itself is only the tip of an iceberg. Once that investigation

is concluded…. Because of the Jordan decision, once charge approval has been

made, they have 18 months to get the individuals through the court

system.

Oftentimes, because of the complexities of these investigations, there

are thousands of pages of information to obtain: search warrants, judicial

authorities for wiretapping, for vehicle tracking, a number of those

technical things that they have there. The wiretaps themselves all have to

be transcribed and translated, a full disclosure package provided to Crown

counsel. Then Crown counsel will go through that material to see whether or

not there’s enough material in there for a charge.

To put that whole package together, that team that was doing the

investigation, doing the surveillance, doing all of the hard work to get

these bad guys off the road…. They are the ones that are tasked with putting

that package together. Maybe it’s only half their team, but they are still

necessary to do that. It might take Crown counsel months to go through all

the files, all the transcriptions and everything else in order to determine

whether or not they will lay a charge.

The surveillance teams that are required for these

in­vestigations are manpower-heavy because of the requirements that

have been placed on the police from the court decisions and from everything

else. The manpower re­quirements for this are huge. We just simply….

We. I still talk like I’m a police officer once in a while. The police

simply run out of resources at the end of the day. They’re also prohibited

from releasing a lot of information on different things. That prevents them

from advising the public of what’s going on.

I recall back in 2015, when I was the Solicitor General. When they’re

tapping somebody’s phone, and they hear a call come over the phone saying,

“There’s a contract out on so and so, and we’re going to kill them,” they

have a duty to go and notify that guy and say: “Listen, there’s a contract

out on you.” They had to do that something like 250 times back in 2015. I

think they’re just as active in that or even more so here in today’s

world.

The other concern I have here is that the government has mentioned

that they’re looking at putting pressure on the federal government to

decriminalize small amounts of drugs. I have been searching. I have looked

everywhere for some kind of a study or scientific reason for that

recommendation to be made. The argument behind that is it’s because of the

stigma attached to the criminality involved by that possession.

I’ve never heard that. I’ve dealt with a lot of drug cases over the

years. I think the stigma is more to the fact that the individual doesn’t

want it to be found out that he or she might be an addict. I think that’s

the stigma that nobody wants. They don’t want to be known as an

addict.

Small amounts of drugs. I’ve heard some organizations in this province

criticize the police forces for seizing small amounts of drugs. But it

doesn’t take a big amount of drug to kill somebody with an overdose if you

don’t know what is in that particular drug. I wonder how many of these small

drug seizures have prevented somebody from overdosing over the last five

years. How many overdose deaths have been prevented by police? I know the

RCMP…. I was talking to them the other day. I think they’ve administered

close to 700 injections of naloxone in the last couple of years in this

province, saving lives.

There are a number of issues with policing. The Surrey police

transition is another one that I didn’t see anything in the budget for. This

is going to have significant impacts on our province, on the Justice

Institute. Surrey has a police force of about 850 men and women in today’s

model, probably more by the time this new transition takes place.

[2:30 p.m.]

How many will convert to the Surrey police department depends on a

number of things. Number one, the independent police forces in British

Columbia make, on average, about 25 to 30 percent more than an RCMP officer.

So there will be a lot of officers around the province that will look at

this as an opportunity to get a 25 percent wage bump.

How are we going to fill those other vacancies in the province? That’s

going to put pressure on every detachment in the province. It’s going to put

pressure on our municipal detachments in the province. It’s going to put

pressure on the Justice Institute. How many spaces do we allot for training

purposes in the Justice Institute? How many green recruits are we going to

have to train, in comparison to who is coming in?

We see these positions vacating the RCMP jurisdiction for Surrey PD.

How is that going to impact our integrated homicide team? How is that going

to impact our Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit, which does the guns

and gang work? How is that going to affect our full-time ERT, emergency

response team, resources that we have throughout the Lower Mainland

here?

There are a number of things, which I see, that could be impacted by

this, and there’s not much mention of that.

The other thing…. I see I’ve only got about five minutes left, but I

do want to talk a little bit about ICBC, which is also another area under my

critic role.

We heard about the dumpster fire. We heard about all these different

things and that now ICBC is in the black. But it was a shell game by the

previous minister responsible. When the books were signed over to this

government in 2017, ICBC was about $250 million in the hole. Recent

documents that I’ve reviewed indicate that from 2017 until 2020, they

incurred about $3½ billion in added costs because of accidents. There were a

number of things there.

They took just over $3 billion out of their equity fund to pay that

off. They have depleted their equity fund down to the point where it’s about

50 percent less than what is normally required by law for private insurance

companies. You’re supposed to have enough equity in there to cover off those

issues. They’re back in the black, but their equity fund is down about $3

billion. It puts them further at risk because of that.

They talk about the changes that are coming — the 20 percent savings

that will be taking place here for everybody as of the first of May, when

they go to this no-fault insurance process. They don’t talk about the fact

that when they came into government in 2017 and until this year, they raised

rates 40 percent. So now they’re graciously giving 20 percent back, but

you’re still paying 20 percent more than you were back in 2016.

It’s a shell game. They’ve been moving money around. The previous

minister was very good at partisan politics and pointing the finger at the

previous government. I think the dumpster fire was probably caused by the

spontaneous combustion of the political rhetoric that was spewing out of

that office.

There’s one last thing that I want to touch on. There’s a capital plan

in there. They talk about health care across the province here. No mention

of a hospital for Prince George. It’s the largest health authority in the

province. No cardiac services in the health authority area. We have to ship

everybody down south.

What I find fantastic about this is…. Back in the 1990 NDP regime,

they said: “We are going to build a new hospital in Prince George.” They put

a budget together, and they started construction just before they left

government in 2000. They cut the construction budget. We went from a 400 bed

regional hospital down to a 200 bed regional hospital. It is now one of the

main training centres for the northern medical program, yet we still have a

200 bed hospital.

We have operating theatre rooms that are 1950s vintage and that are

too small for today’s operating equipment. It’s caused a lot of concern for

the doctors, for the staff, for everybody that’s up there. This government

is well aware of the deficiencies in that particular area, yet they do

nothing.

We can look at this term in government with no help for Northern

Health when it comes to our hospital facilities, which are, by the way,

working beyond maximum with relation to ICU patients and other people with

COVID.

[2:35 p.m.]

I want to say to our nurses, our doctors and our staff in Northern

Health, right across the Northern Health re­gion: thank you so much

for all the hard work that you do and the extra effort you put in. I know

the stress that you guys are under up there. We feel it for you, and we’ll

do our best to try and make sure that we alleviate that in whatever way we

can.

With that, I will take my seat.

Deputy Speaker: Recognizing the member for Chilliwack.

D. Coulter: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. It’s, once again, a great pleasure and honour

to be able to speak in front of you on behalf of my constituents here in

Chilliwack.

I’d first like to begin by acknowledging that I’m speaking to you

today from the traditional and unceded territory of the Stó:lō people — in

particular, that of the Pilalt and Ts’elxwéyeqw Tribes.

I’d really like to take a moment here to thank the Minister of Finance

and her team. She and her team have come up with an exceptionally thoughtful

budget that is going to help us get through and recover from this

pandemic.

There are all sorts of hard-working folks on the front lines of this

pandemic — doctors, nurses, teachers, folks in the service industry. This is

really tough on them, and I’d like to take a moment, definitely, to thank

each and every one of them. Even though we can see hope on the horizon right

now, we are a way off.

During the pandemic, many people and families have experienced the

stress of unexpected job loss, and not everyone has been affected in the

same way. We often hear sometimes we’re all in the same storm but not the

same boat.

Budget 2021 includes new investments to support peo­ple by

improving child care, making life more affordable, reducing poverty,

advancing reconciliation and investing in the services that folks rely on.

The budget continues to protect the mental health and the health and safety

of all British Columbians and expands the services people rely on, with $4

billion in health care funding over the next three years, including funding

to continue to deliver COVID-19–related health services and COVID-19 health

supports to keep people safe.

While more people are being vaccinated each day, government continues

working hard to keep people safe, and the budget allocates $900 million in

2021 and 2022 to support the province’s continued response to the COVID-19

pandemic. Obviously, this includes funding for the provincial vaccination

program so that every British Columbian can receive their COVID-19

vaccine.

I just received mine. I got a shot of the AstraZeneca vaccine. As they

changed the age requirements on Monday, I was able to get a vaccine on

Tuesday. I’m so very grateful for that. I alluded last time that I would be

able to register last Friday. I was able to register last Friday. Then,

luckily, the AstraZeneca age was lowered, and I was able to get a shot of

that. I’m very thankful for that.

Definitely I encourage everyone in this House, if you are 40-plus, to

go out and get that vaccine. The best vaccine is the vaccine that you are

first offered.

Testing and contact tracing will also be in the budget, as well as

expanded flu immunization, increased capacity at the B.C. Centre for Disease

Control, and the rural and remote collaborative framework to improve access

to health services for rural, remote and Indigenous communities. Also

included in the budget will be ongoing supports to ensure the safety of

long-term care and assisted-living facilities, including screening staff and

providing additional personal protective equipment to help keep seniors

safe.

[2:40 p.m.]

As you can see here, this budget definitely includes the kind of

investment, the kind of spending we need to get through the pandemic and

keep people healthy and safe during it. This is only one part of the budget

speech that I see a lot of hope in and that I must commend the Finance

Minister and her team for being so thoughtful about. So I fully support this

budget.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

I would like to maybe talk about child care. It’s a huge investment,

so important for families and will help people get back to work. It can’t be

said enough how great our child care program is, and it’s in the budget. So

far, over 35,000 B.C. families now have access to low-cost child care

through historic investments over the last four years. Budget 2021 more than

doubles the number of $10-a-day child care spaces, which means 75 more child

care centres and the thousands of families who rely on them will benefit

from the program.

We will continue to create new spaces every year, and more families

will have access to child care on school grounds with the expansion of the

seamless day pilot program. The current early childhood educator wage

enhancement will be doubled to $4 an hour, benefitting approximately 11,000

early childhood educators. And 2,000 more families will have access to

programs that improve inclusion and day-to-day activities for children with

support needs. Also, $20 million will provide additional health and safety

grants to child care providers to ensure centres remain safe through

increased cleaning supplies, personal protective equipment or space

improvements.

Families in the Fraser Valley will now have access to almost 400 new

licensed child care spaces as part of the province’s ongoing commitment to

increasing access to child care through the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

These new child care spaces will be a wonderful resource for families, as

the Fraser Valley’s population continues to grow.

We know having accessible and affordable child care is a top priority

for British Columbians, and that’s why it’s important that we’re seeing new

spaces open up in communities across the province. The Childcare B.C. new

spaces fund is supporting six projects that will create a total of 380 new

licensed child care spaces in the Fraser Valley — in Abbotsford, Chilliwack,

Mission and Maple Ridge. These spaces are part of the fastest creation of

child care spaces in B.C.’s history, and we’re making a milestone

here.

These are just going to be wonderful for my community. I’m so happy

that of the 380 new spaces, 138 will be here in Chilliwack. Since July 2018,

more than 20,000 new licensed child care spaces have been funded in British

Columbia, 422 right here in Chilliwack. Throughout the province, the

Childcare B.C. plan has helped parents save up to $1,600 a month per child

through the affordable child care benefit and child care fee reduction

initiative. As a result of these investments, parents in the Fraser Valley

have saved nearly $60 million on child care — $60 million. That’s

amazing.

Early childhood educators in these communities have received over $3.2

million in wage enhancements. With B.C.’s combined affordability

initiatives, more than 36,000 children have received child care for $10 a

day or less since the beginning of the Childcare B.C. plan.

[2:45 p.m.]

Maybe I’d like to stop here. Child care is such a wonderful thing, and

it’s such a great thing that we’re doing for families, yet I hear the

opposition get up and complain about it during question period. They wonder

why we talk about their 16 years of mismanagement of our province. They talk

about a fudge-it budget. I myself think that their budgets are fudge-it

budgets, where they did things such as loot ICBC to balance their

budgets.

Instead of asking questions about great things like affordable child

care, affordable rental housing and social assistance rates, they should be

asking questions…. They shouldn’t be asking questions about what they didn’t

do and then complaining about why we are doing them. They should ask

questions about what they did.

Instead of maybe asking about affordable rental housing and having the

AG dunk on you in question period, perhaps you should ask a question like:

“Why aren’t you selling public assets off for pennies on the dollar?” That

would be a question that would be more with their brand. Or instead of

asking questions about social insurance rates, which weren’t raised for ten

years under a B.C. Liberal government yet have been raised by $325 since the

B.C. NDP took over…. Instead of asking questions about that and having the

Premier skate circles around you in question period, perhaps you should ask,

“Why aren’t you looting ICBC?” or a question such as that.

They can take my advice or leave it, but I’ll just put it there.

That’s why when we are asked about things that we are doing that they didn’t

do, they’re going to hear about why we are doing them and how they didn’t do

them.

I’d like to talk about the B.C. recovery benefit. It’s helped

approximately 2.5 million British Columbians with more than $1.2 billion to

date, while stimulating local economies. When folks — working people or poor

people — get money, they spend it in their local communities. So it really

is economic stimulus for local communities. The benefit provides a one-time

tax-free payment of up to $1,000 for eligible families and single parents

and up to $500 for eligible individuals. I don’t think I’m telling anyone

anything new here. Budget 2021 includes $100 million to continue to fund the

B.C. recovery benefit.

I can tell you that for my constituents, the B.C. recovery benefit has

meant a lot. I have one constituent, who’s a senior and is on a fixed income

of about $13,000 a year, and $500, to this man, was life-changing around

Christmas and was so important and so impactful. That’s the power of a B.C.

NDP government. It makes positive material changes in folks’

lives.

I would like to turn here and talk about education briefly. As the

members of the House know, I used to be a school trustee. I’ve said it

before, but under the B.C. Liberal government, we didn’t get much investment

in education, especially here in Chilliwack. We had our budgets cut back,

but even more important is that we didn’t get any capital projects or

capital spending in Chilliwack.

We ballooned our portable population. We know kids learn better when

they’re in a brick-and-mortar school and not out in a portable. Worse than

that, portables are something that we shouldn’t strive for. School districts

have to purchase portables and pay for their upkeep out of their operating

capital.

[2:50 p.m.]

Instead of building capital projects and building class­room

spaces in Chilliwack, the B.C. Liberal government was downloading its costs

onto the backs of the kids in Chilliwack. That’s what it was doing. There’s

a whole generation of kids who were robbed of everything that they deserve

in education.

I will just speak about a couple of the capital projects that are in

Budget 2021. Our government has made it a top priority to address urgent

enrolment needs for schools throughout B.C., and the expansion of capital

projects in Chilliwack will move students out of portables and into modern

new learning spaces while helping them get the most of their education.

We’re proud to see multiple school projects currently under construction in

Chilliwack. I can’t wait to visit students and staff in their new learning

spaces, once it’s safe to do so, myself.

We are getting a ten-classroom addition to Vedder Elementary School in

our community, which will provide over 240 new student spaces. This is an

$11.8 million investment from the provincial government to education in

Chilliwack. We are going to get an addition to a secondary school, which

will provide 450 new student spaces. That’s a $23.9 million project — very

exciting and entirely in the provincial budget.

I remember the B.C. Liberal government had a rule where if you wanted

a capital project built, for them to okay it, you had to pony up money out

of your operating capital — once again, stealing from the per-student

funding, basically…

Mr. Speaker: Member.

D. Coulter: …forcing us to use our operating capital.

Mr. Speaker: Member, be careful with your language, please, with your

words.

D. Coulter: Okay. Sorry, Mr. Speaker.

In the previous budget, Chilliwack was also funded for an integrated

arts and technology school. It’s going to be called Imagine High. That’s a

$15.4 million provincial in­vestment. We’ve got a new elementary

school that’s already in construction — Stitó:s elementary-middle school.

That’s a $48.6 million provincial investment.

Another thing I’m really excited about is the widening of Highway 1.

While it doesn’t reach all the way out to Chilliwack, it will benefit my

constituents greatly. It will eventually come past the Watkins Road exit,

which is almost to Chilliwack, but that will ease traffic congestion from

that point into the city. Many of my constituents will undoubtedly benefit

from that and be able to make it to and from work quicker. Folks will have a

lot more time to spend with their families and stuff.

What’s great about these large infrastructure projects — not the

school capital projects but the large infrastructure projects, like highway

widening or other large infrastructure projects like that — is that they’ll

be built under community benefit agreements. Community benefit agreements

are terrific.

Nearly 20 percent of our construction workers are currently 55 or

over, and only 12 percent are under the age of 25. Women only represent 14

percent of the total workforce and only 6 percent of the on-site employment,

while Indigenous peoples represent just 8 percent of total

em­ployment.

[2:55 p.m.]

Community benefits agreements look to change that dynamic. They will

help youth. They will help Indigenous people. They will help women all find

meaningful employment in the construction industry. It will help to train

the new generation of workers. It increases apprenticeship opportunities,

with a target of 25 percent participation rate on community benefit

agreements. That is so good for young people who want to get into the

building trades and make that their life and make that their

living.

So many people who work in the building trades go from job to job to

job, and they don’t always have apprenticeships on these jobs. That’s why

the workforce is aging in the construction industry. Increasing

apprenticeship opportunities will provide a more achievable path to red seal

trade certifications for apprentices and achieve a more stable and more

equitable labour relations environment. I’m pretty excited about community

benefits agreements, as well as very excited about the widening of the

highway.

What I would like to talk about here for a second as well, which has a

great impact on my constituents here in Chilliwack, is mental health and

addictions, and the investments that this budget is going to mean for my

constituents. We have quite a bit of mental health and addiction issues here

in Chilliwack. We have folks using drugs on the street often.

We recently had a spate of overdoses. We had 15 in under an hour. It

was because someone was mixing benzoids into the opioids. People thought

they were getting opiates, and they were getting benzoids instead. Narcan

does not work on that type of overdose. Those people, unfortunately, lost

their lives, and it was tragic.

When we’re talking about mental health, this budget…. So $97 million

to build a network of mental health supports for youth, through increased

mental health funding for schools; new Foundry centres that provide young

people health and wellness resources in their community; and integrated

child and youth support teams for 15 more school districts. That’s quite

exciting stuff.

Also, there will be $61 million in funding over three years, to

improve access and quality of mental health services, including expanding

eating disorder care and better access to suicide prevention services, and

early psychosis intervention. And $14 million for the First Nations Health

Authority to deliver mental health and addiction services to Indigenous

peoples.

Substance use and overdose. There will be a substance use and overdose

emergency response, which will have $330 million over the fiscal plan to

provide a full spectrum of substance use treatment and recovery services,

including $152 million for opioid treatment. And 195 new substance use

treatment and recovery beds in communities throughout the province, to help

more people on a path to recovery. That's really exciting stuff for the

constituents of Chilliwack and really, the constituents around the

province.

[3:00 p.m.]

We obviously have a crisis here. Many people are calling it the other,

or second, health crisis that we’re having in our province, as well as the

pandemic. Resources and investments in this area have been needed for…. Our

government has been making them and continues to make them.

This budget is focused on supporting people through the pandemic and

after — to support people through the pandemic and to help insure people

don’t fall further be­hind as B.C. moves towards recovery. The budget

includes supports and services to make B.C. more affordable for everyone,

creating a more affordable B.C. for everyone. We are going to come out of

this pandemic and recovery work stronger and more inclusive and make a more

affordable and more equitable British Columbia.

Another exciting thing coming out of this budget: free public

transportation for children 12 and under. Over 340,000 children 12 and

under, around the province, will be able to ride public transportation for

free in time for classes this September. The government is investing $26

million here, including $50 million from the federal-provincial restart

agreement, to help families get around more affordably. Families in the

TransLink service area alone will save up to $672 a year for each child that

uses a monthly pass. That’s amazing. That’s great stuff, and this budget

delivers that.

I talked a little bit about education capital funding, but we’re going

to support education in other ways. The pandemic has been especially hard on

B.C.’s youth, teachers and support staff, and the budget continues to make

in­vestments in B.C.’s education system to improve access to mental

health supports in schools and to develop a framework to address racism and

reconciliation so that the next generation can continue to develop with the

safety and support they need to thrive.

The budget invests $1.2 billion in operating funding, over the fiscal

plan, to support the growing number of students in B.C.’s K-to-12 system and

to support wage in­creases negotiated under the sustainable services

negotiating mandate. Of course, I spoke about the capital investments

before, but there are going to be $3.5 billion in capital investments in

education, over the fiscal plan. It’s exciting.

I spoke briefly about affordable housing. We have built 26,000 new

homes or that are underway. This is exciting. This is all going to be

affordable housing.

I’m just going to maybe start a bit of a conclusion there. This budget

is forward-looking. It’s inspirational; it’s very thoughtful. I thank the

minister and her team. They have done a great job here. This budget is going

to help us to get through this pandemic healthy and safe and to come out the

other side a stronger province. I urge all my colleagues to support this

budget.

A. Olsen: I am pleased today to stand and speak to Budget 2021.

In the first few lines of the budget speech, the Minister of Finance

offers the lens that the B.C. NDP government wishes British Columbians to

view their effort through: “They’ve got our backs.” We should not be

surprised, as this rhetoric has been framing everything that this government

has been saying for the past four years. Even while they’ve been talking

consistently about “making life more affordable,” they have yet to show the

courage to take the decisive and even unpopular actions to tackle systemic

issues like inequality and affordability. The same goes for Budget

[3:05 p.m.]

Even as we welcome investments sprinkled across different program

areas in this government, what is lacking is the ambition to set British

Columbia up for a strong future. This is especially clear in how the B.C.

NDP is tackling inequality and climate change.

In Budget 2021, the B.C. NDP offer little in the way of a unified

sense of what they are trying to achieve — a common agenda or a purpose. At

the beginning of the pandemic, people expressed their hope that their

government would take the opportunity to transform the economy, through bold

vision and audacious policy proposals. However, while the B.C. NDP say they

have our backs, they deliver a throne speech and a budget that takes a

buckshot approach at spending billions of dollars while not clearly

articulating the outcomes that they’re trying to achieve.

Do the B.C. NDP have our backs? Let’s explore that. In Budget 2021,

there is approximately $110 million invested in British Columbia’s

reconciliation effort this fiscal year. As I’ve previously noted, I

appreciate the investments the government has made in housing for Indigenous

people, both on reserve and off. I have been thrilled with the spending in

earlier budget cycles on Indigenous language revitalization. However, I feel

I must return to a common theme for me, and that is the disappointment I

feel when parsing the signals from the noise.

For the past few years, I have consistently highlighted an important

signal that the B.C. NDP could send to Indigenous people about their

commitment to decolonization and reconciliation. The remains of our

ancestors lie in basements of museums around the world. Along with our

sacred items of cultural importance, they stand for a time when it was

acceptable to raid the graves of Indigenous people.

The administrative work to repatriate our ancestors and items of

cultural significance is expensive, time-consuming and traumatic. Just as

the government found a key action of reconciliation was to awaken our

sleeping languages, so too is the importance of the repatriation effort that

need not take decades and hundreds of thousands of dollars that could be

better spent on other programs that the money was actually designated

for.

I will say it again, and I will continue to say it until this

government puts in place a meaningful program that doesn’t rely entirely on

Indigenous Nations but can support those Indigenous Nations in these

efforts. This would be excellent work for the Royal B.C. Museum as they try

to mend their relationships with Indigenous people in British

Columbia.

The B.C. NDP detailed several programs they are supporting this year:

anti-racism initiatives in health care, skills training, increased

administrative capacity in the provincial government to support the

execution of the reconciliation and other agreements, child care, housing,

tourism and environmental efforts. The largest expense is $60 million which

will provide “dedicated funding that supports Indigenous participation in

land and resource activities…negotiations and engagement on legislation,

policy and programs.” There is no doubt that this money is necessary,

especially considering the B.C. NDP government remains committed to the 19th

and 20th century extractive economy.

What the B.C. NDP are going to wrap their heads around is that

prosperity for Indigenous people must be more than being yoked to the

priorities of the provincial government, which are focused on the

destruction of ecosystems. We need to create the space for Indigenous people

to bring their own initiatives for economic development and prosperity to

the table. For instance, a Narwhal

article this week featured a

Gitanyow project to set up an Indigenous protected area and, specifically,

the response from our provincial government: “Well, industry doesn’t want to

hear it.”

Well, I raise my hands up to the provincial government for the

important contribution in a variety of useful programs that will help

Indigenous people. They will prove that they “have our back” when their

promises of self-determination are allowed to influence the discussion and

outcomes at the table and when Indigenous people no longer have to plead to

have the remains of our ancestors returned to the rightful place in our

homelands. Until the latter happens, there will continue to be significant

disturbance in our territories.

[3:10 p.m.]

I have mixed feelings about the B.C. NDP’S approach to housing in this

2021 budget. On one hand, they announce a $2 billion announcement to

increase the lending capacity of the successful HousingHub program. The

Minister of Finance claims this novel financing program will lend the

capital for the construction of 9,000 new housing units for middle-income

families over the next three to five years. This is a good program. I know

many organizations and non-profits in Saanich North and the Islands are

looking to this program to support the construction of affordable housing in

our communities, mostly on the southern Gulf Islands, where housing is

desperately needed.

However, despite this program on housing affordability, I don't

believe the B.C. NDP has our back. In fact, this B.C. NDP government is

shying away from taking meaningful action on housing by trying to build our

way out of a housing crisis, and the B.C. NDP is not going to succeed at

making housing any more affordable for British Columbians than the B.C.

Liberals before them by taking the same approach of that former

government.

In the 2018 budget, the B.C. NDP minority government set out what

looked like it could be a promising path to begin tackling housing

affordability with the 30-point housing plan, including some demand-side

measures. However, since that time, the market has continued to escalate,

and it has become clear that earlier measures are not making much

difference. Yet we see no willingness to update these measures and take new

actions to actually cool the market. Instead, it seems this government is

content to watch as housing stretches further and further out of reach for

British Columbians, particularly lower- and middle-income families and young

people.

The truth is that this Finance Minister, like every Finance Minister

since Bill Vander Zalm and probably before that, is too reliant on the

revenue generated by real estate transactions to take any significant action

to cool the super-heated real estate market. Housing prices are out of

control, not just in the greater Victoria area, not just in the Lower

Mainland, but in communities right across our province. However, housing

supplies substantial revenues to the provincial coffers.

No doubt, measures to cool the housing market would be controversial,

but what we need is a courageous Premier and Finance Minister who will speak

honestly and directly to British Columbians about the necessity of those

measures. Until the provincial government diversifies the sources of revenue

into the treasury, we are going to, unfortunately, resemble that dog that

relentlessly chases its own tail, only to never catch it and to stop briefly

to celebrate that yes, we are still chasing our tail.

In addition, for anyone who is planning a construction project right

now, they must have a serious look at the cost of building materials. Even

as the B.C. NDP pumps billions of dollars into financing programs to

en­courage the construction of new homes, the cost of lumber has

exploded 300, 400 percent. As a result, marginal projects are now

unsustainable. In-stream projects are blowing through their contingencies

and are likely to go over budget.

The truth is that the HousingHub program we celebrate has been

exhausted for months. Applicants have been waiting for this government’s

decision on whether the Treasury Board was going to re-up on the program or

move on. While this government dragged its heels month after month, projects

that could have been up and out of the ground while the cost of building

materials was still reasonable now have to be prudently reconsidered. As my

colleague pointed out in her budget res­ponse, the situation is having

a disproportionate impact on low- to moderate-income British Columbians and

young people who had the dream of home ownership and are now having to

reconsider.

[3:15 p.m.]

The Ministry of Health budget continues to grow, now well over $20

billion and counting. Certainly, this past year our health system has been

tested. COVID-19 has exhausted our front-line health care workers. I raise

my hands up to them as they continue to face what seems like an endless

battle with a vicious pandemic.

A Vancouver Sun

article from yesterday noted that 60 percent

of nurses in British Columbia are showing signs of “emotional distress

leading up to early signs of PTSD.” The head of the Nurses Union, Christine

Sorensen, was unequivocal. The platitudes from the politicians are not

enough. Hearing the Health Minister refer to the number of beds that are

available does not reflect the current reality facing nurses in our health

care system. As Sorensen said of nurses in B.C.: “They have done a

remarkable job over the last year and have not been given enough credit.

They feel incredibly undervalued by the employer and government.”

I have fundamental questions of this government about the

decision-making process that chose to ignore the experts warning of an

impending third wave that now has our health care system bursting at its

seams, but that will come in the inquiry later.

There are welcome investments into health care in this budget: $585

million to train more health care support workers, $495 million over three

years to increase diagnostic imaging and $45 million over three years to

ad­dress the systemic Indigenous racism. I’m pleased to see the $253

million in the budget on team-based and urgent primary care. The specific

mention of supplying British Columbians “faster access to doctors and nurse

practitioners” should not be overlooked.

If I were to ask the 14,000 residents of the Saanich Peninsula who are

without a family doctor if they felt that the B.C. NDP government have their

backs, what do you think that they would say? If I asked them if they think

a bigger walk-in clinic, when what they want is a relationship with primary

care practitioners, was a sign that their government has their backs, what

do you think that they’d say? What I need to see is how this quarter-billion

dollars is going to be spent. Will it be on more urgent care clinics or

primary care networks?

My constituents want a family doctor or a team of primary care

practitioners to build a meaningful relationship with. It is still to be

seen, after four years of promising team-based primary care homes and

networks attaching British Columbians to longitudinal care, if the B.C. NDP

government is actually going to deliver on the promise they made in

Five years ago public health officials declared an emergency due to

drug overdoses. This tragic situation did not just happen overnight. The

mental health crisis in British Columbia had been growing for years before.

But since they declared the emergency, more than 7,000 British Columbians

have perished to illicit drug poisonings. In Budget 2021, $500 million will

be invested in youth-focused care, First Nations mental health and

addictions, early psychosis intervention, eating disorder care, substance

use treatment and recovery and opioid treatment services. There is no doubt

in my mind that these cash injections into the mental health support network

will help a great deal.

These investments have been a long time in coming. Over the five

years, there has been so much grief and sadness. So it is in this context

that I must note that the B.C. NDP continues to be reluctant in their

reactive and painstakingly slow approach. This government launched the

Pathway to Hope plan in June 2019. Finally, in Budget 2021, we see the first

large investment in the plan.

[3:20 p.m.]

This government remains in response mode. For mon­ths, the B.C.

Green caucus has been asking government to cover psychiatric services for

mild-to-moderate mental health concerns in our existing health care model.

There is no recognition that mental health is part of the overall health of

our bodies. The mind is indeed part of the body. Unfortunately, that basic

reality continues to be ignored.

To prove that this government has our backs, they need to be

proactive. More importantly, British Columbians de­serve preventative

mental health services. To get the correct treatment and therapy, we need to

see the correct professional. It’s unlikely that our family doctor can offer

much more for us than a prescription. Currently only British Columbians who

can afford to get the help that they need get it.

None of this, of course, is good enough. It is when the B.C. NDP

change their philosophical approach to mental health care that they will

truly show that they indeed have our backs.

A robust public education system will always be a priority for the

B.C. Green caucus. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, we’ve heard a great

deal of fear, stress and tension coming from those working in our public

education system. Many British Columbians are questioning whether this B.C.

NDP government has had the backs of educators, administrators, support

workers and students.

The provincial government supplied a one-time a­mount, a cash

injection, to fund the extra costs in PPE, hand sanitizers and other

materials to follow public health requirements. That money hasn't been

extended in Budget 2021. From the perspective of this document, it looks as

if the B.C. NDP are taking the approach that by September 2021, this

pandemic will be all completely behind us.

In the lead-up to this budget, we’ve heard from school districts from

across the province that they’re facing significant budgetary challenges.

The $438 million investment in public education brings our total

contribution to the ministry to $7.1 billion in operational funding. That’s

the second-largest sum of any ministry. These funds will be enough to cover

the increases to teacher and support staff contracts only. However, this

falls far short of what is needed.

I’ve heard from many of my constituents that their children are not

receiving the educational support that they need. I’ve heard that

administrators are often asked to de­cide which students get extra

help and which students are to go without. I’ve heard stories about delays

in getting assessments for our children, so there are many students that may

need extra help who are not even given a consideration.

This is simply not good enough. As a parent with children in our

public education system, I do not feel like these actions are of a

government that has my back, the backs of my child’s educators or of our

children.

Child care has been a policy priority for the B.C. NDP government

since the 2017 election. Experts, parents and advocates have been clear that

child care is a key factor in affordability for families in British

Columbia. During the fall election, the Premier committed to $250 million

per year for child care. After he made this promise, advocates came to us to

tell the B.C. Greens — quite apologetically — that our commitments fell well

short of these new expectations that the Premier had set.

Premier Horgan delivered a juicy election promise. But when called on

to deliver it….

Mr. Speaker: Member, no names.

A. Olsen: The Premier. Sorry. Thank you.

It is this B.C. NDP government that has fallen well short of their own

expectations, and $250 million over three years is a fraction of the money

they promised to invest in this ministry. Even the provincial government’s

own bud­get documents needed to remind the reader of the 2018

investments, likely to distract from the underwhelming commitment this

fiscal year.

[3:25 p.m.]

I’m thankful that, finally, the B.C. NDP government is going to move

child care into the public education system, where it belongs. For the B.C.

NDP to truly have the backs of families, there needs to be affordable,

high-quality early childhood education systems as well as before- and

after-school care available for our children. While the $4-an-hour wage

increase is welcome, I’m sure that if the B.C. NDP is to have the backs of

our early childhood educators, they are going to have to do much better than

$23 per hour.

I’ve heard the B.C. NDP members stand in this chamber and talk about

their climate action and their commitment to our environment. Just this

morning the member for Nelson-Creston delivered a two-minute statement about

the desperate need to transition from fossil fuels. I believe she meant it.

However, what she and all other members of the B.C. NDP caucus, who care

about addressing climate action…. What are they doing to force our Premier

to stop subsidizing fracking and the gas liquefaction industry?

As the Pembina Institute said in their response to the 2021 budget,

the government’s plans equal “small steps” for climate action. I’m with the

member for Nelson-Creston. But what is needed is for the B.C. NDP to reflect

the sense of urgency that I heard in her voice this morning.

I’m happy to see Budget 2021 follow through on the commitment to

create a $500 million strategic investment fund for British Columbia. We’ve

been calling for a fund like this for years. We see other important

investments, commitments like the $130 million for clean transportation,

including investments in rebates and zero-emission vehicles and active

transportation and the PST exemption on e-bikes. However, I stand to deliver

this speech in this chamber on Earth Day. I must recognize that this budget

is striving only for a greener economy, tinkering around the edges and

missing the opportunity that was there to be taken.

We have been encouraging the B.C. NDP to lay out a comprehensive

vision for a green recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. We want them to

embrace the vision of their member for Nelson-Creston, to match the

desperation in her voice by using our competitive advantages to be leaders,

not followers. Instead, this B.C. NDP government does not have the focus or

the ambition that’s necessary, lacking the political will to match what

other jurisdictions are doing or, better yet, to get ahead of

them.

When I think about the frame of this speech, a government that claims

to have our backs, in the short term, the B.C. NDP has offered us some

trinkets and blankets. But over the long term, they continue to try to be

all things to everybody and shy away from tackling systemic issues with

systemic solutions. The B.C. NDP’s own throne speech from last week said:

“Too often, economic growth in our province has come at the expense of the

environment. That must change.” But we’re not seeing anything in this budget

to make that change.

The B.C. NDP has failed to outline or fund a paradigm shift in the

forestry sector, as they promised. The budget for the Ministry of Forests is

set to decline over the next few years. Every time the Premier has promised

to implement all the recommendations of his own old growth strategic review

panel and promised wholesale changes to land use and landscape management.

How­ever, his government has invested nothing to deliver in a

transitional way from old-growth logging. Without proper funding to

implement the recommendations of the old growth panel report, this

government’s promises on old growth are meaningless.

[N. Letnick in the chair.]

As I stated clearly in my response to the throne speech, benefits

agreements with Indigenous people are specific to certain resource

extraction activities. They are not broad economic development tools. To

protect old growth, the B.C. NDP need to step up with a fund for

conservation financing to compensate for the lack of revenue that was

promised in those benefits agreements that will not be realized if those

forests are not to be cut. There is no fund­ing for that in this

budget. There is no funding for Indigenous-led protected areas or to support

communities through transition.

[3:30 p.m.]

Here we are again with a government that believes you can change the

status quo by doing the same thing over and over and over again, while

standing up, members in this House, to talk about the change that they dream

of.

As I said at the beginning of this response to Budget 2021, the B.C.

NDP have offered little in the way of a unified sense of what they are

trying to achieve, a common vision, agenda, or purpose. They have failed to

take the opportunity to transform the economy through bold vision and

audacious policy proposals. The B.C. NDP claim to have our backs, yet their

throne speech and budget spend billions of dollars while not clearly

articulating the outcomes they are trying to achieve.

With that, I’ll take my seat and thank you for the opportunity to

speak to Budget 2021.

Hon. N. Cullen: I hope I’m coming through okay. I’m some hundreds of kilometres away

from you and the Leg­islature, but with the powers of our technology

today, so much that once was thought impossible is now possible. Legislators

gathering from around B.C. and in our capital, across Canada — able to talk

to one another about issues that matter.

I am speaking to you today from Wet’suwet’en territory, specifically

Gidimt’en territory, where I have the honour and privilege of being able to

live with my family and represent the much larger area of Stikine, the

largest riding in British Columbia and, I would argue, the most beautiful,

although I’m sure my friend from the north coast and some other places may

argue differently. I think, at least, we have a good conversation about who

represents the most beautiful place in our Legislature.

It is an honour and privilege to stand here today and address Budget

2021, in which our government — as all budgets do, our government in this

document, in this plan — outlines our values, what we believe to be

important, setting out to British Columbians what our priorities are and

what our plan is for the coming year.

It’s been said once, but it bears repeating: these are more than

challenging times for all of us, including for our government — for our

ability to address the problems and challenges not just of today, but also

to seek out the opportunities that British Columbians recently elected us to

office to do.

It does bear mentioning that, of course, this is the first time in

B.C. history that a New Democrat Premier was re-elected to office. I think,

in large measure, it was this government’s ability in the last session, in

the last sitting of the House, to be able to manage through incredibly

uncertain times — challenging times for all of us — but also to see and take

advantage of those opportunities that are so important for us as a province

and in our individual communities. I think Budget 2021, in its broad strokes

and its specific efforts, continues that legacy forward for British

Columbians.

We’ve had to be careful. We’ve had to be nimble and change to the

adapting times. I think the Finance Minister deserves an enormous amount of

credit, and, of course, all of her officials and the many, many British

Columbians who gave their input into this budget cycle, into the document

that we have before us, and to outline what their priorities are.

Too often, in previous governments under the Liberals and whatnot,

this was a very insulated process, in which the very wealthy and the well

connected were always given access to the Finance Minister — to the

Premier’s office — where their list of demands were always front and centre

in the government’s thinking, and also came front and centre in the

government’s spending initiatives through various budgets.

I can recall those dark days here in the northwest when Liberal

budgets would come down, and entire swaths of our community would be cut

out, not just deep cuts to civil servants, which, in the end, turned out to

be a “cutting off your nose to spite your face” exercise, as resource

development couldn’t happen, as consultations were abrupted, because we just

didn’t have the staff. Those who are not wealthy and well-connected, those

working-class British Columbians, those on the lower end of the economic

scale just couldn’t get the attention of the then government, and we see the

contrast and the difference here today.

[3:35 p.m.]

In a number of places, we can see a very stark contrast, as the Cullen

commission that is going on right now in British Columbia — no relation —

where that inquiry is going on into money laundering in British Columbia,

where current sitting members of the Liberal caucus, former cabinet

ministers, the former Premier herself, Christy Clark, have had to testify

under oath about the practices of their government in office, by their

actions and inactions when it came to something so devastating to our

communities and economy as money laundering for some of the most nefarious

drug cartels and crime syndicates in the world who were pushing through

casinos and pushing through the housing market, particularly in the Lower

Mainland, where a government, at the very best, had turned a blind eye and,

at the very worst, had enabled and participated in something more

nefarious.

Now, one of the most important things for any of us to do as elected

people is to work our best each and every day to represent the people who

sent us to work. In Stikine, being such a large and remote part of the

province in some instances, it is often felt that we don’t have our voices

heard. When I look through this budget, I find item after item, program

after program, where the needs of small communities, the needs of rural and

remote communities, of Indigenous communities are heard time and time

again.

This is through the efforts of those communities, of those advocates

who say: “Working people matter. Rural British Columbia matters, and we just

need a partner in Victoria in the provincial government who can work with us

to take on the challenges that we have, which we can enumerate, and also

seize those opportunities.”

I want to take a small step away from the issues specifically of the

budget to make note of, as has been done by other speakers, the ongoing and

heroic work of our front-line workers. Those in the health care system, the

nurses, the doctors, the long-term-care aides who are able, each and every

day, to get up in challenging circumstances and go to work and do all they

can to keep our communities safe — this budget responds to them. Our

government responds to you and hears you and knows what the stresses have

been.

We have watched the efforts of the CDC and of the Northern Health to

be able to get vaccines out into our communities. They have the staffing and

the resources that have been allocated in previous budgets, and continue to

be allocated in this one, to make sure that when we have vaccine supply —

that is, of course, controlled by Ottawa and the suppliers that they’ve

lined up — that vaccine moves to the most vulnerable communities first. That

has immediate and important effects.

Of course, it’s been in the news just recently…. The community of

Prince Rupert, which my friend from the North Coast represents, had some

incredibly difficult times. There were outbreaks that, despite the best

effort of local officials and the community abroad, were very difficult and

challenging to contain. The decision was made by our health authorities and

by Dr. Bonnie Henry’s office to go in and vaccinate in an all-of-community

approach.

The results have been incredible. These results matter not only, of

course, for the people of Prince Rupert and Port Edward and the communities

surrounding those two centres, but, I would argue, for the entire province.

When we see the vaccination rates go up in Prince Rupert and we see the

hospitalization rate drop consistently, we know that they work.

For those having concerns or doubts, it is fine to do some research.

The Internet can be a dangerous place for that type of research. Find

reliable sources. Do the research yourself. Understand that the risks of

COVID-19 and the variants that we now see are so much greater than the

infinitesimally small risks that have been identified through some of these

vaccines. If offered a vaccine, go and get it. It keeps you safe, your

family safe. Eventually, it will be the path out of this difficult time that

we’ve been in for more than a year now.

To the people in Prince Rupert, to the people in Port Ed and Haida

Gwaii and all of those coastal communities, thank you for showing up. For

all the volunteers that made that community-wide vaccination possible, thank

you for your efforts. What you did is an example, not just to each other,

but to the larger population here in British Columbia of what is possible,

what that light at the end of the tunnel actually looks like, and that hope

is coming. I look forward to being able to visit my many friends on the

north coast when it is safe to do so once again.

Now, Stikine, the place I represent, part of the northwest of British

Columbia here…. Being far away, we also have seen times of great

uncertainty. We’ve seen the ups and downs because we are predominantly a

resource-based economy. Markets fluctuate that have little to do with us, if

anything, but affect us greatly.

[3:40 p.m.]

One of the things that we look for, when the provincial government and

the federal governments make their budgets known, is: is there any way to

provide more of the stability, more of the ability to plan long term, of

building up our communities?

Towards the end of the speech, perhaps if I have time, I’ll enumerate

all the different investments we have made, from Old Massett in the far

northwest edge of our pro­vince and country all the way to Fort St.

[audio interrupted] George and up into the northeast. Places I would also

note that oftentimes are not represented by members of the sitting

government.

Our government has decided, for good reason, that those investments

still matter. Not only did we do affordable housing in Prince Rupert; we

also did it in Kitimat. Not only are we building hospitals in Surrey and

Richmond and other places; we’re building them in Terrace and Fort St.

James. And that matters. When British Columbians elect their government,

they want a government that works for all British Columbians.

I am one who firmly believes that the moment the election is decided,

the moment voters have made their determination, it is incumbent upon the

government of the day to do our best to put aside the partisanship and the

partisan interests of specific places and times and opportunities and seek

the projects and identify the investments that are best for the province as

a whole. I think investments like those schools and those hospitals and

those affordable housing places across B.C. — across northern B.C., in

particular — do us all well.

I also very much appreciate the caution and precaution in this budget

— to look at making sure that there’s money set aside, contingency funds. If

things that we can’t predict — who could have predicted what we’ve been in

for the last year? — come forward, we have some room to manoeuvre. We have

budget available to us to be able to go into, without any great shock or

surprise, and draw from to make sure that the supports for communities,

businesses and families are there to go forward.

Now let’s get into the specific topics. I think that’s where things

really start to light up for British Columbians in terms of what they can

expect — the investments that are being made in this budget document, in

this budget plan.

Taking infrastructure alone, this is the backbone, the skeletal

system, of our economy and our society: the roads and the bridges and the

new infrastructure, like the high-speed Internet and cell service that we’re

putting in. A little north of $26 billion over the next few years, which

translates directly to 85,000 jobs, 85,000 family-supporting jobs for people

to go out and build British Columbia back up stronger.

Not only does this budget take us through this crisis, but it looks to

the recovery. It looks to what’s next in the investments. That takes me over

to the small and medium-sized business community, particularly the tourism

sector, the restaurant sector.

We can say — and it’s true — that more than 100 percent of

pre-pandemic job levels have returned to British Columbia. Let me say that

again, because this is important. British Columbia, when you look across all

the provinces in Canada, has had the best economic recovery of anybody. That

has to be seen, in large part, to the supports that we’ve given, which have

also been the best per capita for any province in Canada during this entire

time.

This is about values and priorities. We’ve seen the recovery, but it

hasn’t been equal across the board. Of course, the tourism sector has been

hit hard. So we have put in money, significant contributions, which was

called for by the tourism industry, to make sure that the promotion is

there, that the infrastructure is there. When people are able to return,

people are able to safely travel again, our tourism sector will be there,

and it will be strong.

For the restaurants, we know that the circuit breaker announced

recently, the new health orders that came down from Dr. Henry’s office to

make sure that people are kept safe…. A healthy society leads to a healthy

economy. For those that say it’s one or the other, it’s consistently baffled

me. We know the circuit breaker funding is there for restaurants to make

sure that they can keep adapting.

I’ve been meeting with restaurants virtually, standing on the street

two metres apart with our masks, and talking about how things are going.

Some have really, really struggled with this, how to adapt their businesses

on the fly. Others have been able to thrive and grow new ventures and new

avenues and new ways of doing things. I’m thinking of a number of the

entrepreneurial small businesses here in Smithers and Hazelton that have

done so well.

Health care, the primary reason for much of our conversation. I’m

looking at my friend from North Vancouver and all that she’s done over the

many years. Our investment of $4 billion into health care and $500 million

into mental health…. It has been said by many, and my friend from Saanich

North and the Islands talked about this. We’ve said sometimes a dual

crisis…. That’s often referred to the opioid crisis, which has been

devastating to so many communities and families. We’ve put money into that —

$500 million to make sure that we’re doing more.

[3:45 p.m.]

We were bending that curve down. We were reducing the number of

deaths. When COVID hit, you could see the curve come back up — the lethal

supply, the challenge of being able to get at people and have access to them

to help them through the crisis that they were going through.

We’ve seen this third challenge, a broad challenge that has faced us

these last number of years, with respect to mental health, this year in

particular. When we go into isolation — out of an abundance of caution and

because that’s what the science tells us, that we need to not mingle with

people — we also know that there’s a knock-on effect, that people struggle

more with mental health needs. It’s often been a part of the health care

system not properly acknowledged by governments.

We can see the physical form. We can talk about making sure that if

somebody injures themself or feels physically sick…. We need to have a

public health care system. It was the NDP, of course, who launched that

initiative first, in Saskatchewan under Tommy Douglas, and then pushed for

it federally and arrived with a mostly funded public health care

system.

We know that. The mental health component has been difficult to talk

about. It is so encouraging that we see pol­itical leaders, sports

figures, celebrities, leadership from across the board in the faith

community and the Indigenous community being able to at least begin to talk

about mental health struggles more. Then we see government supports start to

realize the importance of it. We see it here in this budget, which is so

incredibly encouraging.

Often in the past, budgets have seen things like child care as an

afterthought, rather than a central plank, as an important piece. I can

remember the credit unions of British Columbia some years ago really

challenging the business community more broadly when health care was seen as

a social issue, not an economic one. We’ve seen, through our government, the

35,000 spaces and the doubling, importantly, on this.

We’ve often undervalued early childhood educators — in their wages, in

their training programs. This budget seeks to correct that, bringing the

early childhood education workers’ wage up to $25 an hour. I know — I’ve had

many Zoom calls, talking individually and collectively with child care

groups across the northwest — that this was a huge barrier to attracting new

people in.

We don’t have enough workers. We don’t have enough spaces. Well, you

start to see how this is being addressed — the creation of more spaces, the

creation of the $4 top-up per hour per worker — to make sure that that’s a

living wage, that we can attract people into that industry and into that

worklife.

Now, the B.C. recovery benefit grant. We can look at the numbers — 2½

million British Columbians, some billions of dollars that have gone directly

into the pockets of British Columbians. Again, it shows where our priorities

are.

I can imagine…. I don’t have to imagine it. I can look across the

country at conservative governments, one after another — I think the B.C.

Liberals would find themselves in that category — not really concerning

themselves overly with working people, people that are looking paycheque to

paycheque. Suddenly a pandemic is upon them, and all of that uncertainty,

all of that risk and worry increases greatly.

Our government came forward with that contribution to make sure people

understood that we were going to be there, that we understood the stresses

and that as we built back the economy, made those jobs available once

again…. When the free flow of people and goods became the norm rather than

the exception, we would be there.

The recovery grant was there as well as all of those pocketbook

issues: more affordable child care, reducing ICBC rates, making sure people

weren’t evicted out of their homes, rent freezes for businesses, tax

changes, the bulk policy of buying alcohol sales for restaurants. All of

these things affect people’s bottom lines, the immediate

concerns.

Getting rid of MSP premiums, the single largest tax cut for working

people in this province’s history. I have yet to hear a B.C. Liberal, or

anyone, address that issue. They’ve always gone on about tax cuts, but

they’ve often been for the most wealthy and well connected, which is really

unfortunate.

Young people. So 5,000 future leaders identified and put in this

budget and funded to allow 5,000 young British Columbians to enter various

workplaces, with funding, to be able to do the cleanups, to be able to do

the helping out at the community level.

I’m just trying to imagine these 5,000 young people that are going to

be hired and deployed across this province. How will this affect the

trajectory of their lives? What will they be able to do — the jobs, the

participation in society? Will they be able to…? That’s going to affect them

for the rest of their lives and benefit us all.

It’s exciting to think about, because there’s so much that we need. We

need young people to be able to participate but not always in a volunteer

capacity. They’ve got bills too, and this is one of the funds that we’ve put

forward to help people out.

[3:50 p.m.]

On the environment, an enormous contribution, an upping of CleanBC.

This is what helps people with retrofits. This is what helps green our

economy. This is what allows those innovators and entrepreneurs to get

better at producing goods and services in a more environmental

way.

We see the negotiations happening in the world right now, almost a

positive bidding war, looking at who can do what reductions — the new

administration in the United States, new commitments from Canada,

commitments from our government to reduce our climate change im­pacts.

Well, a lot of that is going to have to happen through innovative ways.

Taking the tax off e-bikes. We know what the interest is like. Good luck

trying to buy one of those vehicles right now. To get your hands on an

e-bike is more than a little challenging right now.

We need to bring in that manufacturing capacity, the ability to

produce on our own. If the pandemic has taught us nothing else, we as a

country, we as a province need to up our manufacturing game. We need to go

back to being a society that makes things. Being always reliant on the

global supply chain when it comes to things like PPE and other important

things in life…. Maybe relying on all those carriers across the world wasn’t

the most brilliant idea. Relying on vaccine production in other countries

also maybe was not such a brilliant idea that the federal government took

on.

Fifteen million dollars for shoreline cleanup. I know British Columbia

doesn’t think of itself as a maritime province per se, and fair enough.

We’ve got a lot of big territory on the inside. But a great deal of our

population huddles right up against the coast, which is also understandable

— very beautiful, very powerful. For too long, it was just left as a global

trash can. I know the efforts on the north coast, central coast and all the

way down through the south have collected tonnes and tonnes of waste, one of

our most successful programs. Well, we’re reinvesting back into

that.

Also, $27 million to enhance watersheds. Now, this goes all across the

province. We know a watershed strategy, which the Ministry of Environment is

tasked with, is going to be able to bring strategy and security to our

watersheds to make sure that they are sustainable, the resource development

that’s happening within them.

The new and more complex impacts that are happening, particularly in

rural B.C., are getting more and more attention, more and more interest from

people who would maybe traditionally not have seen themselves interested in

living the rural life. We know that’s going up. We know that the impacts and

the sustainability, the carrying capacity of our watersheds need to be

better understood and better managed, because it is something so precious to

us. We continue to invest back in that.

Of course, the contribution to one of our absolute gems, the B.C.

Parks system, the trail system. We know that British Columbians love this.

We know that people, when they can travel from all over the world, admire

and hold us up for this. That’s why we’re investing more money into B.C.

Parks.

A question on reconciliation. Not only are we doing investments in

housing on reserve, which traditionally the B.C. government, under previous

governments, would never touch. Our government, somewhat and understandably

impatient with the progress coming from Ottawa sometimes, simply decided we

need to go in and work with our partners in those First Nations communities

and build housing. We’ve done that, and we’re doing more.

On the legal and justice side, more investments. On the Aboriginal

head start program, more investments to make sure that kids get a fair shot

at a good start in life.

On reconciliation. This is where the rubber hits the road for many

First Nations in British Columbia, particularly those in the more rural

parts of B.C. when the negotiations happen — that when we are meeting as a

nation to nation, government-to-government negotiations, we have the support

there to make sure that the capacity is on the other side of the table. The

science and the negotiating capacity is there so that when First Nations

engage with the Crown, they have what they need to make sure they get the

best deal possible. We put a further $60 million into that, which is

outstanding.

One of the things that came to me from First Nations leaders right

across the northwest is around skills development — a further $16 million

identified in skills development for Aboriginal people to make sure that

they can participate in society. I’m thinking of the Tahltan right now, who

have been able to build up, after decades of colonial rule and destruction

of the traditional governance system, a robust and incredible diversity

within their own governance.

President Chad Day, Vice-President Kenneth Edzerza and others deserve

an enormous amount of credit for that, and the Tahltan people. There is now

virtually zero unemployment in the Tahltan Nation. There are virtually zero

kids in government care.

We have seen what it looks like when we can build wild­life

strategies together, when we can take the nation as a whole, meet them as a

government to a government and begin to negotiate. I think there are great

things ahead.

[3:55 p.m.]

If I could for a moment, Mr. Speaker, divert from the specifics of

this budget to an event that the Premier, the Minister of Indigenous

Relations and Reconciliation and I were able to attend just recently in

Lower Post — virtually, of course — which is in the northern very edge of

British Columbia, up against the Yukon border.

For decades, the Daylu Dena Council was forced, when going to work at their community

centre where their governance office was, to walk into the same building

that had been the residential school for that community — not just for that

community but for Tahltan, Taka River and the Kaska Dena people. For

decades, the abuse and the horror and the torture that went on in that

building was the same building that the