Partisan politics don’t suit Ashton

For the majority of his career as a local politician in Penticton, Dan Ashton was a study in taking the high road. It was rare to hear him criticize anyone, except for the occasional zinger during election campaigns or debates.

That practice continued during his first term in Victoria as a Liberal MLA, except for the odd shot at the NDP. But, for the most part, he was happy to stay above the fray and sing the praises of his party. Not anymore. And that’s what makes his recent transformation into a vocal partisan on Twitter so jarring. Consider this tweet from Feb. 11: “Why did the NDP attack both the BC Tourism & Wine sectors this past week? Because these are industries largely powered by free enterprise. The NDP/Green coalition is powered by ideology.”

You’ll recall the NDP government had just announced it would bump back Family Day by a week to match other provinces, much to the chagrin of local ski hill operators concerned about losing business from Alberta, and that our neighbours to the east had banned imports of B.C. wine due to a dispute over the Kinder Morgan pipeline.

Does that qualify as an “NDP attack” on the tourism and wine sectors? Hardly. Unless you’re in Opposition and struggling to get your voice heard. And the hits go on. And on. And on.

Tuesday morning saw Ashton tweeting about the planned replacement of the Pattullo Bridge in Surrey being funded entirely by the B.C. government, as opposed to a three-way split between local, provincial and federal governments, which was more common for infrastructure projects during the Liberals’ rein in office. “My point is to the fact that normal Infrastructure spending is split three ways, Had the NDP done this with the Pattullo bridge that would mean 770 Million could be spent elsewhere in BC projects that if partnered would result in over $2 Billion of Infrastructure. Only 1 taxpayer,” Ashton tweeted. Sounds good in theory. So how come the Liberals never did it that way and instead let the Pattullo Bridge fall into a dangerous state of disrepair?

Speaking of bridges, how come the Liberals didn’t demand local governments and the feds chip in for the new W.R. Bennett Bridge in Kelowna? That was done as a public-private partnership between the province and SNC Lavalin.

Other frequent targets of Ashton’s tweeting of course include Andrew Weaver and the Green Party, the NDP’s new employer health tax and the speculation tax, all of which have flaws. Of that there is no doubt.

There is no doubt, too, that Ashton is doing his job as an Opposition MLA and holding the government to account (although he never tweets about the Indigenous issues he’s supposed to be watching as the party’s critic in that portfolio.)

But it just seems so unbecoming from a guy who stayed out of the hurly-burly for most of his political career and was fond of telling reporters things like, “My dad always told me to take the high road because the view is much better from up there.”

The same goes for Conservative MP Dan Albas, whose weekly newspaper columns have become little more than free attack ads against the federal Liberal government rather than updates for his constituents on all the good work he’s doing in Ottawa.

Too bad the Dans weren’t such critical observers while their own parties were in office. That would have suited them much better.

Joe Fries is the city editor of the Penticton Herald