Successors recall Barrett as visionary and a great wit
Former B.C. premier credited with modernizing province’s civil service
Dave Barrett was magic onstage.
“He could play an audience like a violin, and they sang back to him,” said a former colleague, Bob Williams.
But Barrett was far more than just a gifted campaigner. Another former B.C. premier, Glen Clark, marvels at how much Barrett accomplished in his three years of power between 1972 and 1975.
“I think he’s the most underestimated or underrated individual that I can imagine in British Columbia,” said Clark. “People don’t realize, but they passed a new law every three days that they were in government. I talked to him one time about what his biggest accomplishments were, and he didn’t say the agricultural land reserve or ICBC, he said protecting Cypress Bowl from development.
“I didn’t even realize he’d done Cypress Bowl. Robson Square, the SeaBus, the highest minimum wage in Canada at the time. Mincom, minimum income standards for seniors. The first daycare program in the history of British Columbia. More (social) housing built ever than in any other period in British Columbia — government housing, co-op housing, public housing.”
Barrett died Friday at 87 after a long struggle with Alzheimer’s.
The current premier, New Democrat John Horgan, lauded him as a giant.
“In just one short term, his government delivered our first modern ambulance service, the Agricultural Land Reserve and public auto insurance. We are all better off, thanks to his tireless work and immeasurable contributions to public life.”
Williams was a key figure in the Barrett cabinet.
“There’s been nobody like him in our history. He was a wonderful, joyous figure. … I think he helped create the most innovative government in the history of this province.”
“He (also) saw past the nature of bureaucracies, and felt he was standing on the shoulders of historic socialists who had created enough of an atmosphere for us to come into power.”
Barrett is credited with modernizing B.C.’s civil service after two decades of government by W.A.C. Bennett and Social Credit.
“He told me the civil service were not allowed to use long-distance phone calls when (the NDP became) government,” said Clark. Williams said Barrett came by his socialist nature naturally — he was a working-class kid from east Van whose father looked after people.
Clark said Barrett’s legendary sense of humour helped make things “understandable” for people.
“He was so quick and had such a great wit,” said Clark.
“He could take radical progressive ideas and make them real for people. I remember a speech I was at maybe 10 or 15 years ago, and he was talking about the people who want to deregulate, how the business community wants less regulations, (as well as) right-wing governments across Canada.
“He asked everybody in the audience to stand up and take out their medicare card. Then he said ‘All you people in the audience who don’t vote NDP, who believe in free enterprise and don’t believe in regulation, I want you to rip up that card, rip it up right now.
“‘You don’t believe in socialized medicine, clearly, that’s evil. And we should take out all the traffic lights, that’s clearly government regulation. Why would we have the government intrude and tell people to stop or go?’ ”
Williams choked up a bit talking about his old comrade.
“He was a gift,” he said. “He was a pleasure, he was a treasure.”