Wednesday October 7, 2020 | VICTORIA, BC [Last update 2:20 am October 8]
Profile by Island Social Trends | Mary P Brooke, Editor
Today Wednesday October 7 is Day 17(*) on the Election BC campaign trail (*calling September 21 as Day 1, the day the election was called).
The Provincial General Election Day is on Saturday October 24. Advance voting and voting-by-mail are available. Elections BC info.
Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic which requires physical distancing, most campaign activities are done remotely online, both for the media and the voter audiences.
BC NDP: Today October 7 BC NDP Leader John Horgan will be in front of the Terry Fox memorial at BC Place to make an announcement at 9:15 am about improving health care. He will be joined by Vancouver candidates Adrian Dix and Brenda Bailey.
UPDATE 10:40 am – today Horgan and Dix announced more support for state of the art cancer services in BC, adding that health technologies and other approaches will be used to assure health services “anywhere, anytime” for people to “get the care they deserve and need”. As for the BC Liberal approach to health care, Horgan replied to media: “Those who can buy their way through health care have their options”, which is in line with the NDP view that the BC Liberals are primarily about supporting “the wealthy and well connected”. As for the NDP approach: “You can see us looking to the future,” said Horgan today. He said that the speculation tax brings in $115 million from property owners who live outside of BC. “We focus on the needs of British Columbians whether homeowners or renters.” As for the need for this Fall 2020 election: “We need a stable government. COVID has changed our province forever,” said Horgan today.
Yesterday in Vancouver NDP Leader John Horgan unveiled the BC NDP party platform which includes 154 commitments … of which “60 are brand new and the rest building on the work we’ve already started” he told media and livestream viewers. Key points include a $1,000 one-time recovery benefit, a rent freeze until 2022, a renter’s rebate for households earning under $80,000/year (if not already receiving rental support), and free transit for children under the age of 12.
A key announcement is a commitment to develop a second medical school in BC, to shore up the number of doctors in the province. With a hub-and-spokes approach, Horgan said the school would likely be based in Vancouver with outlying campuses in other areas (already there is medical training at UNBC and UVic).
UPDATE 11 am October 7: BC NDP candidate for Vancouver-West End Spencer Chandra Herbert will address media about “homophobia in the BC Liberal Party”. At 12 noon today from Vancouver. UPDATE 12:15 pm: About extremism and hatred: “It’s out there, we have to stand together. It’s far too easy to marginalize and hurt people. It’s the right thing – to look out for the most vulnerable, they need that help and protection,” said Spencer Chandra Herbert today, referencing how the BC Liberals are running two candidates which Chandra Hebert says indicates that Leader Andrew Wilkinson is anti-gay.
BC Liberal: Today BC Liberal Leader Andrew Wilkinson addressed media live on Facebook at 10 am, from downtown Vancouver, making an announcement about public safety and filling more police positions. He said that police are generally “not really comfortable dealing with mental health issues in the field”, that it would be good to have psychiatric and mental health professionals as part of police service delivery (with plans to “increase capacity with 100 more psychiatric social workers/nurses).
Wilkinson stated in a comment to media that a State of Emergency (as has been in place during the full pandemic in BC since March, and continues) is a “necessity” and that it will be required until the pandemic subsides, as “disease can rip through a community overnight,” said Wilkinson, a medical doctor by training.
Wilkinson said that under the NDP government there has been “stagnation in economic recovery” this year during the pandemic.
BC Green Leader Sonia Furstenau will hold a press conference at 12:30 pm today from Whistler regarding a platform announcement on small business and tourism.
UPDATE 12:50 pm – Sonia Furstenau announced that the Greens would provide rent support to small businesses to help get them through the COVID winter of 2020 (without requiring the commercial landlords to buy-in). She painted that as necessary, but did try to give commercial landlords a pep talk to be part of the solution (given the poor uptake by commercial landlords with the federal rent rebate program which required landlords to carry a portion of the cost/loss).
“I’ve heard from a lot of small businesses about frustrations they’ve had with commercial landlords (the problem with the federal program was that the landlord had to also agree). I think it’s important for landlords to recognize, that we are all in this together, that we’re all having to make sacrifices, and that to not support businesses that already exist undermines the financial and economic ability of the whole picture. I call on them to also recognize that they need to participate in supporting small businesses.”
Furstenau outlined how small tourism operators are dealing with not just over-winter costs but are now doing without the strong revenues normally achieved during the high-activity summer tourism season. “The tourism sector will be the hardest hit and the last to recover,” said Furstenau about the economic profile of the COVID-19 pandemic impacts.
Yesterday Furstenau focussed on early childhood education, training for ECE educators, free child care for children under age 3, additional support for working parents who choose to stay home with children under age 3, and work-life balance to enable these choices.
A televised leaders debate will be held on Global TV on Tuesday October 13 from 6:30 to 8 pm.
