CLARK: YEAR ONE
New premier focuses on money.
VICTORIA — A year ago this Sunday, Christy Clark crouched on a Vancouver stage to embrace her son Hamish as she proudly accepted the job of B. C. Liberal Party leader, making her the province’s next premier.
Today, she’s had to cancel one of her daily newspaper subscriptions to keep some of the more scathing accounts of her performance away from her son.
That’s life in politics, but it’s also an indication of how things have changed.
Last year, as Clark claimed the Liberal leadership, she did so with a single motto: families first.
Now, as she struggles with sinking poll numbers and a fractured coalition on the right, Clark’s new mantra is all about money.
“We have an inescapable economic reality that we all, I think, need to come to grips with,” she said in a wide- ranging interview Wednesday.
“Spending more money on social programs may solve a problem in the short term but it creates a problem in the long term, because if you’re spending more than you’re bringing in, you’re killing jobs.”
In pursuit of this restraint, Clark’s government this week unveiled a budget that put a freeze on spending across most ministries, as well as a firm cap on funding for public sector wages.
Spending increases across government overall will be held to an average two per cent annually over the next three years, essentially tracking with the expected rate of inflation.
The day after the budget was announced, Clark cast it as a responsible set of decisions tailored to address a dramatically changed world.
But she also called it an essential weapon in her war to reunite the right.
Clark is in a difficult position because her party is a coalition of federal Conservatives and Liberals, and she has lost the support of many who view her as being too aligned with the federal Liberals.
Offering her explanation for the recent rise of the B. C. Conservative Party, she said: “I think a lot of people were angry about things like the HST, that were products of the previous government.”
“I think the answer to this coalition question is to prove that my government is different from that of my predecessor and that we are going to be prudent,” she added.
“Holding increases in spending to two per cent is something that no one in the country is doing. Not a single government — whether they have the word Conservative or Liberal in their name — is doing anything close to that,” she said.
“We’re going to be careful in spending money and we’re not going to keep going back to taxpayers for more money to fund more spending, despite the fact that there are going to be hundreds of people yelling and screaming that’s what we need to do.”
And therein lies both the hope and challenge of Clark’s new approach.
Recent polls by two major firms have shown Clark’s B. C. Liberals trailing the NDP by 12 to 14 points.
The news is mostly bad, but for one thing: in both polls, the Liberals would lead the NDP if they could only find a way to sway everyone who supports the B. C. Conservatives.
Thus, Clark has doubled down on a move to the right.
Not only has she tabled a budget of fiscal restraint, but she’s also bolstered her staff with key former advisers to Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
Earlier this month, she brought in Harper’s former senior adviser Ken Boessenkool to replace her longtime friend Mike Mcdonald as chief of staff ( Mcdonald is now her principal secretary).
On March 6, Harper’s former press secretary Sara Macintyre will arrive to be Clark’s new director of communications.
Clark sees these hires as important moves, not only because of what they signal in terms of political direction, but also as a form of endorsement from top- flight advisers she knows can get jobs anywhere they want.
“I am very proud that we can attract the very best and brightest in the country. I think that says a lot about people’s confidence in both my ability to ensure our government is doing the right thing but also our ability to win the next election,” she said.
“There is no way that Sara Macintyre would quit a press secretary job to the prime minister to come work for me unless there was every reason to believe we were going to win.”
But then there’s the challenge.
In the 15 months leading to the next election, Clark will have hundreds of people, as she says, yelling for more money.
More for the justice system, where some judges are blasting the government as they set people free, and where a major government- ordered review could well uncover a need for more resources.
More for seniors’ care — the focus of a recent report by the province’s ombudsperson, and an issue eventually to become the focus of a new watchdog.
More for whatever captures the headlines.
And then there’s the question of priorities.
New Democratic Party leader Adrian Dix was relentless this week in pressing Clark on why, given her focus on jobs and the economy, she has taken money away from skills training.
“These are difficult times. Other provinces, it’s been said, are going through difficult times. But it’s the decisions you make in difficult times that are the most important decisions,” Dix said Wednesday.
“When [ economist Don] Drummond in Ontario says the last thing I would do is cut skills training, the government of British Columbia decides the first thing it will do is cut skills training in a skills shortage,” he added.
“They’re out of step, even with people who might agree with them on ideological issues.”
Dix said one of the few true distinctions he sees between Clark and former premier Gordon Campbell is that she is willing to use personal attack ads against her opponents.
“I don’t think that’s the change people wanted from Mr. Campbell — someone who would be even more fiercely partisan than he was,” he said.
B. C. Conservative Party leader John Cummins also attacked the B. C. Liberal budget, telling the Surrey Board of Trade on Thursday it is nowhere near a demonstration of fiscal restraint.
“Tuesday’s budget was not a conservative budget. It was not a restraint budget. It was a budget devoted to out- of- control spending,” he said.
“We are doing this [ rebuilding the party] because we know that the people of British Columbia deserve better than two tax- and- spend parties. B. C. can lead Canada again, we can make B. C. the most attractive province to live, work, invest and raise a family.”
In the days ahead, Clark also has to deal with public- sector negotiations, starting right away with teachers.
Her government will also be negotiating with all the other major public- sector unions in the province this year, under a mandate that workers will only get raises if they can find savings within already tight ministry budgets.
She said she hopes to avoid a major showdown, but acknowledged negotiations won’t be easy, especially as most workers are coming off a two- year wage freeze.
“I think that we’ll find a reasonable solution to lots of these problems. I don’t think it will be without controversy,” she said.
“Obviously, they [ public sector union leaders] have got to do their jobs and fight for their members and try to get more money and I’ve got to do my job and fight for taxpayers and try to make sure that we’re controlling spending.”
There’s also the question of execution: does Clark have what it takes to convince people of her vision?
In the interview, Clark said that when she talks to people directly, they understand what she’s trying to do.
“It’s that moment, whenever I can speak directly to people, that everybody tunes in and they understand it intuitively,” she said.
“When I speak directly to people, yes they get it,” she added.
“Is it resonating or is it penetrating through the lens of the media? I think more and more,” she said, seemingly frustrated at the difficulty of getting her message through, but knowing enough not to take the battle head on.
Clark said this is part of the reason why she spent 90 minutes on CKNW’S The Bill Good Show the day before the legislature resumed. The other part was to hear directly from the public.
“It is one of the last forums that feels like a town square, an exercise in democracy where anybody can make their voice heard. It’s not perfect, because you can only get 16 callers through, or something like that, but it is real.”
Asked how the job of premier has affected her personal life, Clark allowed it has been hard, especially on her son.
“It hasn’t been great for Hamish because he really misses me and I really miss him,” she said.
“He worries about me. He doesn’t talk about it very much because he’s a 10- year- old boy and I think that he thinks that if he tells me about his worries it’s not going to help,” she added.
“Politics is unique, though, because it’s the only profession where so many people say so many bad things in newspapers and on TV about you. So that’s a hard part of it, I think, for him.”
As for her, Clark said she’s had to whittle her life down to two jobs — premier and mom — but that she remains happy.
“The biggest surprise has been on balance how happy I am, how much I enjoy the job,” she said, adding she believes that this is in large part because of her approach.
“I don’t see it as a lifetime career. I feel like I have a chance to do good things for people in this province and I don’t have forever in which to do it. And so I really want to make the most out of every day and that motivates me and it makes me feel optimistic.”
The poor polls don’t occupy much of her time. “I don’t think people are paying very close attention to politics at the moment and so I’m not sure the polls are really telling us very much,” she said.
“An election isn’t being held tomorrow. An election is being held May 2013. So we’ve got a long way until then. My view is I have to accomplish the things I promised British Columbians I would accomplish.
“People need to look at what we’ve done and say: ‘ I don’t necessarily agree with everything but they did a good job of meeting their goals and navigating British Columbia through one of the worst world economies we’ve ever seen.’”
“If people say that, I think they’ll say ‘ Christy Clark deserves to be elected premier.’ ”