Readers take issue with politicians’ records

Re: Payouts surge to children hurt on job, May 10

B. C. Liberal party spokesman Sam Oliphant: “We believe giving parents and families the flexibility ( in allowing children to work) to make these decisions themselves is the right approach”.

Philip Hochstein, president of the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association of B. C.: “I’m confident in parents deciding in the best interests of their children.”

Can British Columbians afford to be so complacent as to assume that parents and guardians will always make the right decisions, that the parents are always informed and competent?

With the results of this survey now at hand, it is obvious that legislated standards must be applied, just as they are to protect children from other forms of neglect and abuse.

KEN HAMER North Vancouver

The NDP plans to recycle failed 1990s policies: reintroducing a capital tax on banks/ credit unions, an increase to health and education funding, which is really a big salary/ benefit increase to their union friends, changes to the labour code to make unionizing easier, and increased taxes on business to fund bigger government.

In the name of supporting the environment, they will increase the carbon tax considerably.

All these backward policies will drive business away to Alberta, and NDP’s skill training program will train people for Alberta, since the B. C. economy will shrink under NDP rule. History will repeat itself — the NDP will take B. C. from a “have” province to a “havenot” province again.

PATRICK DEER Richmond

Thank you for exposing the lies about the supposedly “terrible” ’ 90s. I remember the ’ 90s. My wife had a job with decent pay, a pension and a dental plan. The Liberals outsourced her job, and now she works for half the pay, and no pension plan.

My son and daughter went to SFU and Kwantlen Polytechnic University, and the fees were half- decent. The Liberals have more than doubled the fees so they could cut corporate taxes. Students are piling up enormous debts, and the good jobs those corporate tax cuts were going to get us aren’t there.

Many people have to have two or even three jobs to make ends meet. Twelve- year- old children are working in construction without a permit.

All this Christy Clark talk about family values is just utter bafflegab. Vote these people out while we have the chance!

BILL PIKET White Rock

Re: Dix targeted in new wave of attack ads; Liberals refuse to remove debate footage as ad war heats up, May 9

Is this déjà vu or what? The Liberals made an agreement not to use the copyrighted broadcast of the leadership debate. Now they ignore that agreement, using the video on YouTube in a last- minute attack ad against Adrian Dix and refusing to take it down. Perhaps they will remove it after the election and they’ll apologize for it then.

What does that remind me of? Oh, yes, BC Rail ( we won’t sell it), HST ( we won’t bring it in), claiming a balanced budget ( Dominion Bond Rating Agency says B. C. will have a deficit of $ 1.7 billion; Moody’s debt rating agency notes that B. C.’ s debt has increased by $ 11 billion in Clark’s two years in power). It seems the Liberals

sure have a hard time being truthful or keeping their word.

Then there is the question of the use of taxpayer dollars for partisan campaigning. And the use of personal emails to avoid detection by freedom of information requests. And the plan to develop strategies for quick wins with ethnic voters. Oops, you caught us so we’re really sorry our employees did that. We just didn’t know.

Now Christy wants us to trust her on pipelines, a balanced budget based on sale of provincial assets and an as yet imaginary LNG industry and many other issues on which she won’t state her position.

Um, I don’t think so.

GILBERT SMITH Vancouver

Our resources are the very foundation of our success. They drive job creation, support vibrant communities with good health, education and social systems and infrastructure, and power our innovation and knowledge economies. We are a global centre of excellence in mining and mineral exploration which has led to unprecedented global demand for B. C.’ s engineering consultants.

Over $ 70 billion in resource or related projects are planned for northern B. C. over the next decade. Decisions made by next government will set B. C.’ s course for at least the next generation.

Adrian Dix’s pledge to begin a provincial review of the proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline is irresponsible. We have a

federal review. Common sense dictates that duplication is wasteful.

This project is critical to Canada’s future and decisions must be based on sound scientific analysis, not on emotion and opinion polls.

Canadians deserve the opportunity to get full value from the international market when selling their resources, and not be kept captive to the U. S. market. We need a government that will protect British Columbian and Canadian interests.

Dix’s opposition to Kinder Morgan’s proposed expansion — before an application is even submitted — is yet another in a long line of opposition to resource projects in the province dating back to the 1970s.

At the March Mines and Money Hong Kong conference, attended by over 3,500 miners and investors, I was asked numerous times about the potential for a change in government, and about the impact such a change might have on proposed shale gas and LNG development. International investors are watching.

The relative decline of our resource sectors has resulted in a decline of wages and family income in B. C. compared to other provinces. Dix has an obligation to British Columbians to explain how he intends to keep our economy strong, and how he intends to pay for his extravagant spending plans.

JOHN MURRAY Nelson

Industry lobbyists know what’s at stake in this election. They are spending big money to try to buy support for irresponsible projects that would lock our province’s economy into polluting boom- and- bust industries.

Our federal government and the oil and the gas lobby have made their agenda clear: they want to use our province as an energy export corridor to move oilsands bitumen and fracked gas through B. C. to overseas markets.

This irresponsible path is threatening the quality of our air, land, and water, while creating very few permanent jobs and destabilizing our climate.

More and more British Columbians are saying this is a step backwards that will leave our environment vulnerable to tanker spills and groundwater contamination, while betting our economy on volatile global energy prices.

The benefits of building a long- term clean energy economy founded on good jobs and healthy communities far outweighs the risks of dirty energy mega- projects that could wipe out local economies and destroy B. C.’ s world- renowned environment.

British Columbians have had enough of short- sighted economic planning. It’s time to build a secure and sustainable economy founded on good jobs and healthy communities.

MICHEL NADEAU Vancouver

Re: LNG plants will scuttle emissions cuts, May 9

It is incredible that only the Green party opposes the madness of the Liquid Natural Gas proposals in B. C. The LNG industry makes no sense economically, let alone environmentally.

The industry is premised on low natural gas prices on the North American market and higher prices worldwide. But our competitors are ahead of us in serving this market. Australia already has LNG plants operating and more under construction. Russia has huge reserves of natural gas just a pipeline away from China. No need for liquefaction. It won’t be long before China will develop its own reserves. The speed things happen in today’s global market will see the world market price for natural gas at North American levels in the blink of an eye.

What is even more mind boggling is the energy required to run these LNG plants: almost the entire output of the Site C dam proposal on the Peace River to run one plant. This amounts to three- quarters of the power used by households in B. C. This is obscene. We need to give our heads a shake.

BILL MASSE Langley

Re: Netherlands port shows oil tankers not a problem, Letters, May 8

Ad Klijsen claims tanker traffic in Rotterdam proves oil can be moved safely. To infer that the topography of the Netherlands is similar to B. C.’ s coast is misleading at best. That the

Netherlands has never had a major spill probably is mostly due to chance. Other countries such as our neighbour, the United States, have had several. Klijsen also said the Netherlands has never had an oil disaster. The Netherlands is not immune from disaster related to fossil fuels. They face disastrous costs to protect their very country from rising sea levels brought on by burning fossil fuels.

STEVE GRANT Vancouver

Re: Black works to help keep Kitimat Refinery dream alive, April 30.

I hope David Black’s plan for a refinery in Kitimat comes to fruition. It would refine oil delivered by the proposed Gateway pipeline and mean thousands of high- paying secure jobs in the value- added industry.

Of course, to achieve this we may have to overcome a fanatical “pipeline bad” hysteria. Oil and gas are moved safely and efficiently around the world by pipelines and tankers. And yet, Adrian Dix seems to have latched onto the anti- pipeline and tanker policy. I hope the people of the Vancouver area, B. C.’ s largest clearcut, will think twice before voting the NDP into power and thereby putting a break on a vital part of our economy.

SVEND SERUP Prince George

Peace River Liberal candidate and incumbent MLA Pat Pimm believes the presence of special needs students in classrooms is pushing parents to enrol their children in private schools or to home- school them.

He makes the laughable statement that the B. C. Liberals have done more than any other government in the province’s history to support special needs kids. Time for a history lesson.

In 2002 then education minister Christy Clark described herself as “delighted” and “proud” to strip teachers’ contracts of class size and composition agreements, saving her government more than $ 3 billion over the course of 10 years.

This move, which was ruled illegal by the B. C. Supreme Court 10 years later, meant bigger class sizes and the loss of support for students with special needs. The ability to create balanced, manageable, well supported classroom communities was severely impaired.

To make matters much worse, from 2002 to 2005 the Liberals legislated small salary increases for teachers but refused to fund them.

Cash- strapped school districts were forced to institute massive layoffs and program reductions. More than 1,500 specialist teachers ( teacher librarians, counsellors, special education teachers, ESL teachers and aboriginal educators) were removed from the system. Since then schools have struggled to support programs of inclusion and to meet the needs of all students.

In 2011 the Liberal government was given one year to redress their illegal action, but it has been only recently, with continued pressure from teachers and the BCTF and an upcoming election, that they have finally pledged to add funds for special needs students and then only a fraction of the amount they removed through Ms. Clark’s legislation.

If anyone is to blame for an increase in enrolment in private schools it is the Liberal government. Through their legislation they have severely and negatively affected our once world- class public education system.

GILBERT SMITH Vancouver