Saturday December 23, 2023 | LANGFORD, BC [Updated December 26, 2023]
by Mary P Brooke, Editor | Island Social Trends
The year 2023 that now comes to a close could easily be described as challenging if not tumultuous for many people, communities and governments. Here’s just a snapshot:
- There are now two major wars underway in the world with economic impacts for Canada.
- The grinding burden of interest rates is thrusting a range of miseries upon households and businesses.
- The impacts of climate change are upending many regions and impacting people’s lives sometimes quite directly.
- Housing is a crisis that won’t quickly be resolved; financial and lifestyle changes are urgent for many and even crushing for some.
- The overall population is aging, opening up vulnerabilities for seniors that will likely test the resolve of society to treat its elder folk well.
- The long-term impacts of the COVID pandemic are only starting to become evident — not just physical, but also emotional, psychological, financial and in terms of unexpected life interruptions and new directions. Meanwhile, strangely many of the important lessons supposedly learned during the pandemic phase seem not to have stuck — such as hand hygiene, use of masks where warranted, staying home when sick, and keeping up to date with vaccinations.
Society always needs is leaders, but especially so in such complex times.
Newsmakers of 2023
As is the custom of news media at year-end, Island Social Trends presents our newsmakers of the year 2023 — the leaders who have made a difference for communities in ways large and small — ways that matter to many people or communities in some way or another.
Here are some notes on people who’ve made an impact in 2023.
Global
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskky has lobbied around the free world for political and financial support for his country that is holding the line for democracy. News of the Ukraine war has fallen off the radar in Canada — particularly after that fiasco in the House of Commons when a former Nazi was introduced by the Speaker. But the work of doing the fighting that western countries would rather avoid has continued — to the benefit of robust economies.
United States President Joe Biden understands the world-scope nuances of the Ukraine war and has the benefit of wisdom from decades in the US capital to skillfully walk the political landmine that is the current Middle East crisis. His energy to do one of the toughest jobs in the world at his age is remarkable and the world is fortunate to have his governance skill at this time.
The coronation of King Charles III launched Great Britain and the Commonwealth into a new chapter. Charles had long been planning how to make a new sort of mark on the monarchy for several decades with his interest in urban architecture, small-scale agriculture, small business development and employment for youth. It’s possible he made more impact in the preparatory years while his mother Queen Elizabeth II was still on the throne, than he can now that he has the overarching responsibility for the entire institution that is the British monarchy.
UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has recently said the quiet problem out loud: immigration policy in Europe needs a rethink. That will start the ball rolling for North America to possibly do the same. Immigration policy has its heart in the right place in western democracies but societal adaptation and the resilience by which economies and infrastructure responds is being sorely tested.
John Horgan is now Canada’s Ambassador to Germany. Quite the stride from being ‘just John in Langford’ and even a big step from being a provincial premier (and recently getting through a significant battle with cancer). Horgan and Trudeau seem to share a philosophical thread and exhibit a palpable level of trust. Horgan being in Germany is an opportunity for Canada to glean ideas on industry, immigration and perhaps even proportional representation in government. We hear Horgan arrived home for Christmas in the Langford region.
Federal
Alistair MacGregor, MP (Cowichan-Malahat-Langford) has been the NDP’s food price inflation this year, bringing corporate grocery CEOs to Ottawa to shine a light on that aspect of the major food supply system. On the heels of witnessing grocery supply chain disruptions during the pandemic, Canadians are far more aware of the sheer size and control that food and agri-food sectors have on daily lives. The Food and Agri-Food Committee (on which MacGregor is the only NDP MP) has made Galen Weston a household name — when before did everyday Canadians handily know the name of many corporate CEOs? MacGregor has succeeded in putting a face to the struggle of working folks (many of whom used to be middle class); he openly says he seeks to challenge the status quo. The Liberal government — pushed by NDP influence in grocery prices — has now taken the results of that exposure to the next level — to examine and explore ways to improve competitiveness in the Canadian corporate sector overall. Some minor price-breaks are seen at some grocery stores … not substantial, but a nod to the fact that people are watching.
The federal NDP has made remarkable generational changes for Canadians this year. Through their political influence in the House of Commons (through the Supply and Confidence Agreement with the Liberals) they have made dental care free for many low and middle income Canadians. This will have long-term impacts on people’s health and social well-being which will spin-offs into savings within the health-care system and have benefits for the economy. Their anti-scab legislation has set a new bar for the responsibility of corporate employers and will benefit workers and their families for decades to come. In 2020 they brought in CERB which kept the majority of Canadians afloat. While people may still see the NDP as “the fourth party” in the House of Commons, under Jagmeet Singh’s leadership the 25 MPs of the NDP have made significant positive impact upon the quality of Canadian life.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau quietly announced his marriage separation this summer. The media and Canadians overall have spared him any glaring examination over that major life scenario while he is an active head of government; Trudeau has maintained his energy fairly well in leading the country, and may well once again surprise this nation as to his resilience in recreating his image for the next election (currently set for October 2025).
Trudeau and the Liberals have come late to the party in realizing how deep the housing crisis is, but has put one of his best ministers on it… Sean Fraser has the communication and problem-solving skills together with a calm but urgent demeanor by which to breathe some life back into the housing file; even at full bore the construction sector will only make a dent in the supply requirements but Fraser could well move his career forward in the Liberal camp by top performance in the Housing, Infrastructure and Communities portfolio.
Yves-François Blanchet is not followed a lot in BC, but as Quebec’s leader of the Bloc Quebecois he can almost always be counted on to lay bare the truth of matters in the House of Commons and to articulate them well enough in English to get people’s attention as to considering possible better choices.
Together with the NDP, Blanchet played a strong hand in the ousting of David Johnston from the role Independent Special Rapporteur on Foreign Interference and recently articulated calm resolve as to why it turns out that Greg Fergus is probably not the best pick for the speaker’s chair. The principles of liberty that seem to have spilled forth from French roots (e.g. Statue of Liberty given to the USA by France) find eloquent voice in Blanchet. He might well be seen as the one who articulates the soul of the House of Commons which is ironic coming from the leader of a national party based in serving Quebec’s interests.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has caught the attention of pollsters this year by surging the popularity of the opposition party well past the Liberals. But it’s early days yet before the next election (presently set for October 2025). If anything, this early success in the polls will give pause and motivation to Trudeau and the Liberals to do more. Poilievre is good at witty clarification of political issues and pulling stunts like the filibuster in the House of Commons right before winter break. He still has time to become a broader-range statesman. The country is watching how this scenario plays out, especially the discussion about the carbon tax which has now been hauled onto the public policy carpet for a fight.
Provincial
In 2023 there was an ever-stronger footprint of the NDP embeded into the way that BC functions overall as an economy and society.
BC Premier David Eby clearly rose up through the NDP ranks as the heir apparent to former Premier John Horgan. After swearing in a new cabinet in December 2022 that demonstrated some hardline changes, Eby has worked non-stop over the past year to embed NDP policy indelibly into the socioeconomic fabric of the province. He has built on the party’s work under Horgan but has put clarity to the delivery of the NDP mission about putting people first. It’s already hard not to think of BC as a place where child care is more broadly available, where renters are treated more fairly, and where the occasional financial break happens (e.g. BC Hydro credits and employee benefits). That is in large part why 250,000 people relocated to BC in 2021 and 2022 (with about 75,000 more in 2023). But that has brought its own challenges. Eby’s third child with wife Cailey is due in June 2024 just about the time the NDP goes into full campaign mode for the October 2024 provincial election.
Like the bad-ass cowboy who breaks through the doors of the saloon, BC Conservative Leader John Rustad has placed himself loudly into focus within the provincial political sphere. His formation of the Conservative Party of BC with now two MLAs has created ‘air time’ for he and Bruce Banman in the Legislative Assembly as the fourth official party. It’s increasingly likely that with his rally for the ‘common sense’ vote that the October 2024 provincial election will be a face-off between the NDP and the BC Conservatives, leaving BC United led by Kevin Falcon still flapping in the wind without a solid party profile within the general public awareness.
BC Housing Minister and NDP House Leader Ravi Kahlon has brought housing legislation into the 21st century, with a rapid-fire delivery of changes that will reform the profile of housing for decades if not generations. A significant shift to multi-family density (including on what are now single-family lots) and a clustering of properties along transportation hubs will make a notable change in the visual appearance of cities and the way people can find homes or acquire properties over the years. He has set data-determined housing supply targets for selected municipalities and issued the marching orders. Kahlon’s new housing directions have kick-started a kaleidoscope of associated changes like infrastructure expansion and upgrades (both structural and services). He has brought recognition of renters into the mix of the housing ecosystem.
The summer 2023 by-election in Langford-Juan de Fuca brought Ravi Parmar to the BC Legislature for the fall session. People still talk about him filling John Horgan’s shoes as the riding’s MLA, something he capitalizes on while trying to sort out the great political and economic divide in Langford to his own taste. He appears tied at the hip to the interests of Sooke School District (SD62), and they to him, as the fast-growing region needs evermore classroom space. When Eby introduced Parmar as a new MLA during a swearing-in ceremony in the Legislative Assembly chamber this summer, the new premier said about the now-29-year-old’s political style: “Watch your back.”
BC Green House Leader Adam Olsen has brought a consistent strength to articulating about class-issues (unearthed during the housing legislation debates) and hasn’t let up pressuring the NDP side of the house about making changes in the Ministry of Children and Family Development. Together with BC Greens Leader Sonia Furstenau, Olsen will be fighting to maintain the presence of the ‘third party’ in the Legislative Assembly during the 2024 provincial election.
Municipal – Housing & Democracy
Saanich Mayor Dean Murdock has risen to prominence in the south Vancouver Island region and across BC by embracing the province’s new housing strategy. “Single-family homes are largely out of reach for many people looking to buy or rent in Saanich. These proposed changes help create more housing choices that meet the needs of individuals and families in the community today, and in the future. This will allow people to put down roots,” said Murdoch in an interview with Island Social Trends in November.
View Royal Mayor Sid Tobias kicked up a fuss over the new housing legislation; he and his council see the process and many of the changes as an affront to local democracy and an erosion of local decision-making powers. A View Royal open house about it was called ‘The Last Public Hearing’).
Oak Bay Mayor Kevin Murdoch was on the same philosophical page about the provincial government’s housing legislation changes as a challenge to municipal powers and overall democracy (and posted a video about it), taking the discussion to a higher level than normally seen at the local level.
Municipal overhaul
The west shore region got quite the refresh in 2023! When an entire region sees massive change (ousting four mayors — three of them long-term) there is an underlying angst in the population. What wasn’t going well that the autumn 2022 election ushered in new leadership for 2023 to 2026? Housing, transportation, cost of living? It seems more than a knee-jerk reaction for the sake of change alone. Community engagement is probably a key factor, and the willingness to accept new ideas.
The biggest story of the Greater Victoria region in 2023 was the coming together of the west shore players (at least four new mayors and two MLAs — Mitzi Dean and Ravi Parmar) to carve out an expanding unofficial footprint of policy directions and voting power: inter-workings with deepening roots.
- Langford got underway in a new path under first-time politician Scott Goodmanson as mayor with a nearly new council (only one councillor, Lillian Szpak, managed to hang on from the previous long-time regime). Goodmanson and his council have been taking suitable tracts of time to learn the ropes and introduce some new directions while the longstanding 30-year deep political and business roots of the John Horgan / Stew Young impact in the community continue to thrive.
- Metchosin also got a significant refresh under Mayor Marie-Térèse Little (previously a Metchosin councillor) after the rural area led for 30 years under a previous mayor. She is jigging up the momentum for agriculture and rural life in the small municipality while also reaching far beyond to become vice-chair of the Capital Regional District (CRD) board last month (which will put rural and agricultural issues more squarely at the regional decision-making table). Little is calling 2023 her ‘year of firsts‘.
- Colwood’s sharp-turn to business-style leadership under Mayor Doug Kobayashi is bringing federal Liberal support into the region. Renaming of the shoreline property Royal Beach to instead The Beachlands was preceded by a visit in April from federal now Minister of Citizens’ Services Terry Beech to announce funding for an oceanfront trail walkway from the Ocean Boulevard area (at Esquimalt Lagoon) over to the new robust development in the Royal Bay area along Metchosin Road. Kobayashi was a federal Liberal candidate in 2021.
Sooke – unique
Somehow Sooke has managed to spin in new directions locally, provincially and federally.
- Few people beyond Greater Victoria had ever heard of Sooke 15 years ago. Even John Horgan (with Sooke in his Langford-Juan de Fuca provincial riding) didn’t go full-bore on promoting the town or region while he was premier during 2017-2022 (though he paid back a lot of favours that will resonate for decades — most noticeably the improvements to Highway 14 but also in many other ways for the community’s function and infrastructure such as a health clinic expansion and an outdoor sport box).
- Sooke Mayor Maja Tait is turning to federal politics in the new year, having been acclaimed as the NDP candidate for Esquimalt-Saanich-Sooke for the next federal election (currently scheduled for October 20, 2025).
- Randall Garrison as current MP for the region will retire at the end of this term but has largely used his influence in Ottawa (since 2011) to further the LGBTQIA2S cause. For islanders he attended to the work of protecting the southern resident killer whales and highlighted the need for greater food security on Vancouver Island, as well as attending to issues around the DND shipyards in Esquimalt.
- NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh made his first-ever visit to Sooke in August (noting how far flung it is beyond the Greater Victoria core), and gave Tait some national TV air time.
News Media
Who would have thought that the Bank of Canada’s governor would become a household name? Tiff Macklem is on everyone’s radar now for his decisions about interest rates. Everyone is impacted by the scorchingly fast increase in rates during 2022 and 2023. Bringing an old-style traditional Bay Street model of exclusivity a bit out of the closet, Macklem recently announced that every rate announcement in 2024 will be accompanied by a media availability as a way to build trust with Canadians who have suffered a great deal through the process of interest rate hikes.
CTV made it quite clear that the media landscape in Canada is driven by corporate interests, in firing about 1,300 journalists and production staff this fall, as a way to help balance their books. After purging unwanted staff, CTV notably changed the look and feel of their newscasts, with news anchors and reporters ever-more dressed for the theatre of high-definition TV with makeup, hair and business-style attire — keeping Todd van der Heyden on board and bringing Renee Rogers and Roger Petersen up to national news desk spots. ‘Only the top and best mainstream look’ might be the new unspoken mantra. Former national host Lisa LaFlamme is still under some sort of non-disclosure agreement with CTV; in her Jack Webster Foundation fireside chat last month in Vancouver she skirted the issue of her firing (which is rumored to have been about how she told viewers how liberated she felt over not having to colour her hair for TV).
Island Social Trends editor Mary P Brooke — after two years of daily reporting about COVID in 2020-2021 and covering the Premiers conference in Victoria in 2021 — now takes part in active journalism with the BC Legislative Press Gallery. She also reports on the Bank of Canada, as well as keeping an eye on the socioeconomic aspects of local and regional news on south Vancouver Island. Whereas many small news publications continue to struggle against the onslaught of social media, in 2024 she will take Island Social Trends in what might be called a ‘counter-trend’ direction by relaunching in print (as well as maintaining IslandSocialTrends.ca) as folks seem to want news-in-hand. In the local community she is building awareness about urban food resilience.
Tech & Entertainment
Rogers took over Shaw and in so doing has reduced competition in the telecommunications sector quite significantly. That makes Rogers a business world newsmaker. But the reduction of competition in the telecom sector will have financial impact upon millions of Canadians who use their now-combined phone, wireless and TV cable services.
Netflix took charge and figured out a way to maintain revenues amidst the practice of customers sharing passwords with non-paying customers. In so doing they kept their brand afloat with dignity, while proving that advertising revenue is the tried and true business method for the publishing industry. Posting movies online is just another form of publishing. They have a version with ads, and one without.
Matthew Perry passed away due to a drug overdose that led to drowning, at home in his own back yard pool. He had said in interviews in recent years that he didn’t want to be remembered ‘just’ for the hit TV series Friends, but for his work helping others with addiction. It seems he may have underestimated the indelible and ongoing uplifting impact he has on people through his sensitive humour in Friends. He’s been everyone’s friend, and millions of people will adore him for the special impact he will have had on their lives. Perhaps that speaks to the lopsided nature of Hollywood celebrity … mega-stars rarely meet the people they’ve impacted through their creative work.
===== RELATED:
Mitzi Dean, MLA as a Newsmaker in 2023 (December 29, 2023)
Newsmakers of 2023 – global, national, provincial, local (December 23, 2023)
