B.C. Politics Thread

[The Arrogant Worms]

Micro-unit rental building gets green light in Nanaimo

Units in the project are expected to be 322 to 365 square feet, and the building will take up 100 per cent of its Robson Street lot

 

https://www.timescolonist.com/local-news/micro-unit-rental-building-gets-green-light-in-nanaimo-8420206

[The Arrogant Worms]

Surrey, B.C., hospital to get critical care tower with acute, specialized services

SURREY, B.C. — A new critical care tower will be built at the current hospital site in Surrey, B.C., to take pressure off the overcrowded emergency room and add capacity for specialized care, Premier David Eby says.

 

https://www.timescolonist.com/bc-news/surrey-bc-hospital-to-get-critical-care-tower-with-acute-specialized-services-8427725

[Bob Long]

1 hour ago, King Heffy said:

I would argue yes, mostly due to the smaller class sizes.

 

I would argue it was worse, at least for our experience in Burnaby. 

[bishopshodan]

2 minutes ago, Bob Long said:

 

I would argue it was worse, at least for our experience in Burnaby. 

I have a sister that is a superintendent of a school district. I'll see her Sunday and get her opinion.

[Bob Long]

1 minute ago, bishopshodan said:

I have a sister that is a superintendent of a school district. I'll see her Sunday and get her opinion.

 

I don't care what her opinion is, I know what we experienced. 

[bishopshodan]

2 minutes ago, Bob Long said:

 

I don't care what her opinion is, I know what we experienced. 

ok. sorry I offered her feedback. 

[RupertKBD]

As long as we're using personal experience to judge, I'm going to say it's better....

 

.....because my daughter started working for the local school district a year and a half ago and I know how much she cares about the kids she works with.....

[bishopshodan]

2 minutes ago, RupertKBD said:

As long as we're using personal experience to judge, I'm going to say it's better....

 

.....because my daughter started working for the local school district a year and a half ago and I know how much she cares about the kids she works with.....

 

 

I am wondering what the different govs have done/ not done. I dont have kids so I dont have any direct experiences. However, a few in my fam are in the school system at different levels and my wife works for MCFD. I am interested in my eldest sisters take, even if Jim is not, as she will have a high level organizational understanding. A bit more than an anecdotal story. 

[King Heffy]

2 minutes ago, bishopshodan said:

 

 

I am wondering what the different govs have done/ not done. I dont have kids so I dont have any direct experiences. However, a few in my fam are in the school system at different levels and my wife works for MCFD. I am interested in my eldest sisters take, even if Jim is not, as she will have a high level organizational understanding. A bit more than an anecdotal story. 

I'd be interested to hear it.

[The Arrogant Worms]

There is nothing wrong with the education system.  One of the biggest problems according to my best friend who just retired is parents who put too much pressure on their kids and parents who don't give a shit.  He taught at Kelsey in Mill Bay and had a lot of private school student switch to the school who were clueless how to budget time and study because they were coddled at Brentwood private school in Mill Bay.

 

We were very involved with our son's education because of his high functioning autism.   We made sure to talk to his teachers from kindergarten to Grade 12.  The result straight A's in Grade 11 and 12 and 5 scholarships.  Plus $2000 from Uvic for his grades in 11 and 12.

 

The system is fine.

 

It's up to the students to decide to use it properly.

Edited March 11 by The Arrogant Worms

[RupertKBD]

4 minutes ago, bishopshodan said:

I am wondering what the different govs have done/ not done. I dont have kids so I dont have any direct experiences. However, a few in my fam are in the school system at different levels and my wife works for MCFD. I am interested in my eldest sisters take, even if Jim is not, as she will have a high level organizational understanding. A bit more than an anecdotal story. 

 

As am I. Please do let us know what she thinks.

[Gurn]

2 hours ago, Bob Long said:

 

Is our quality of education better under the NDP?

When you rip up contracts, you piss people off.

When you illegally rip up contracts, you should expect to be razzed and derided in public.

Teachers and Health Care workers, along with the court that had to smack down the government, were not impressed.

[Bob Long]

25 minutes ago, Gurn said:

When you rip up contracts, you piss people off.

When you illegally rip up contracts, you should expect to be razzed and derided in public.

Teachers and Health Care workers, along with the court that had to smack down the government, were not impressed.

 

Well, maybe others would like more accountability in our systems. 

[The Arrogant Worms]

17 minutes ago, Bob Long said:

 

Well, maybe others would like more accountability in our systems. 

It wasn't about accountability.  It was about trying to break the union.

[Bob Long]

1 hour ago, The Arrogant Worms said:

It wasn't about accountability.  It was about trying to break the union.

 

Which was partly about accountability. Tell me, how do we remove an underperforming teacher?

[The Arrogant Worms]

Timeline of Christy Clark’s 12 years of chaos in education

 

An entire generation of students in British Columbia have been forced to learn in larger classes with fewer educational supports because of Christy Clark’s unconstitutional attacks on our public education system. For the last 12 years our school system has been used as a battleground by the B.C. Liberal government for their political gain. That’s why New Democrats are asking the premier to release cabinet documents detailing her government’s plans to provoke a full-scale strike in our schools.

 

Here is a short history of Premier Clark’s political meddling in education:

 

January 2002: Christy Clark, then education minister, led the B.C. Liberal government’s attack on school children with Bill 28, legislation that removed the right of teachers to bargain for smaller classes with more student supports.

 

· What Christy Clark said: “This bill… marks a move toward a more flexible, more responsive, better-managed system that meets students’ needs, one where students’ needs win out over mathematical formulas, one where decisions are made by all the education partners in the system, and one where meeting students’ needs is the absolute number one priority.” – Christy Clark, Hansard, Jan. 26, 2002

· The truth: Far from providing more “flexibility and choice,” more than 1500 teacher librarians, ESL teachers, special education teachers and school counsellors were laid off. Classes became larger, with fewer supports.

“The government prohibited terms in a teachers collective agreement restricting or regulating a board’s power to establish class size and composition; assign a student to a class; determine staffing levels or staff ratios; or determining the number of students assigned to a teacher.” –Madam Justice Susan Griffin, 2011 BCSC 469, section 250

April 2011: The B.C. Supreme Court ruled that Premier Clark’s legislation was unconstitutional. The B.C. Liberal government did not appeal the ruling.

· What Christy Clark said: “We need to go back and make sure that we address the issues that the court raised and we absolutely will do that. You know, I think whenever you bring in legislation ten years later turns out not to have worked, you have to take responsibility for that absolutely. Every time, you want to get it right and that time, we didn’t get it right.” – Christy Clark, CKNW, April 14, 2011

· The truth: After admitting that she “didn’t get it right” Premier Clark’s government began laying the groundwork to introduce legislation that B.C. Supreme Court called “virtually identical” to the law that was struck down as unconstitutional.

 

March 2012: The B.C. Liberals pass Bill 22, education legislation that is “virtually identical” to the previous law that was struck down as unconstitutional.

· What Christy Clark said: “This week our government introduced the Improving Education Act. Its aim is to keep teachers in class by suspending job action, setting a cooling off period, appointing a mediator in an attempt to break new ground with the union.” – Christy Clark, CKNW, March 3, 2012

· The truth: Far from aiming to “keep teachers in class” Premier Clark’s government “thought that a teachers strike would give the government a political advantage in imposing legislation that the public might otherwise not support. It felt that the timing of legislation to deal with a teachers strike and failure of collective bargaining could fit conveniently with the timing of legislation to address the Bill 28 Decision repercussions. The government planned its strategy accordingly so that it could have one legislative initiative at the end of the one year suspension granted in the Bill 28 Decision.” – Madam Justice Susan Griffin, 2014 BCSC 121, 384

Oct. 2012: After imposing a carbon copy of her original unconstitutional law on B.C. teachers Premier Clark claimed that her government wanted to achieve “stability” in the education system:

 

· What Christy Clark said: “It’s worth thinking about what could be achieved, for example, with a 10-year deal for teachers. Imagine a child in Grade two starting this year could go all the way to Grade 12 without any threat of labour disruption.” –Christy Clark, Prince George Citizen, Oct. 2012

· The truth: “The government had a strategy in mind that it would be to its benefit if negotiations failed and if collective bargaining resulted in a strike and impasse.” – Madam Justice Susan Griffin, 2014 BCSC 368

 

Jan. 2014: Christy Clark’s legislation is again struck down as unconstitutional. After 12 years of chaos in the public school system, the B.C. Supreme Court finds that the B.C. Liberal government has been trying to orchestrate a province-wide shut down of schools with full scale strikes for political gain.

· What Christy Clark said: The first time her legislation was struck down Premier Clark said “we’re going to have to make sure we get on a different footing with the teachers’ union, just as the court has suggested.”- Christy Clark, Globe and Mail, April 14, 2011

· The truth: “Their strategy was to put such pressure on the union that it would provoke a strike by the union.” – Madam Justice Susan Griffin, 2014 BCSC 121

Edited March 11 by The Arrogant Worms

[The Arrogant Worms]

Timeline of dispute between B.C. Teachers' Federation and B.C. government

https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/timeline-of-dispute-between-b-c-teachers-federation-and-b-c-government

[Boudrias]

Why hasn’t the crime, corruption and political malfeasance exposed in ‘Wilful Blindness’ by Sam Cooper led to a major BC and Canadian investigation? He asserts that Canadian politicians and government workers took bribes from Chinese gangs and even agents of the Chinese government. Chinese criminals have laundered money through casinos, created an underground banking system in Vancouver, extortion, fentanyl trafficking and manufacturing and massive investment in BC real estate with proceeds of crime. Their real estate activity is one of the major reasons for escalated land prices and thusly why Canadians cannot afford homes. 
 

Gordon Campbell was first elected with a platform of no more casinos in BC. He no sooner got elected and there was a landslide of new casinos. Far more than the NDP were considering. The BC Liberals knew vast amounts of Chinese money was coming into the province. Money that was funding criminal activity. Clarke did nothing. Since the NDP came to power they have defunded investigations and did not charge any BC Liberals or government officials. It is also suggested that BC NDP members are friendly with Chinese criminals.

 

IMHO casinos in BC should be shut down or at a minimum have betting limits established. $500,000 bets in a single night is an obvious red flag of criminal activity. 

[King Heffy]

2 hours ago, Boudrias said:

Why hasn’t the crime, corruption and political malfeasance exposed in ‘Wilful Blindness’ by Sam Cooper led to a major BC and Canadian investigation? He asserts that Canadian politicians and government workers took bribes from Chinese gangs and even agents of the Chinese government. Chinese criminals have laundered money through casinos, created an underground banking system in Vancouver, extortion, fentanyl trafficking and manufacturing and massive investment in BC real estate with proceeds of crime. Their real estate activity is one of the major reasons for escalated land prices and thusly why Canadians cannot afford homes. 
 

Gordon Campbell was first elected with a platform of no more casinos in BC. He no sooner got elected and there was a landslide of new casinos. Far more than the NDP were considering. The BC Liberals knew vast amounts of Chinese money was coming into the province. Money that was funding criminal activity. Clarke did nothing. Since the NDP came to power they have defunded investigations and did not charge any BC Liberals or government officials. It is also suggested that BC NDP members are friendly with Chinese criminals.

 

IMHO casinos in BC should be shut down or at a minimum have betting limits established. $500,000 bets in a single night is an obvious red flag of criminal activity. 

They do at least have a requirement to show the source of funds for anything over 10k.  

 

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/drake-vancouver-casino-profiling-1.4890755

[Boudrias]

28 minutes ago, King Heffy said:

They do at least have a requirement to show the source of funds for anything over 10k.  

 

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/drake-vancouver-casino-profiling-1.4890755

This is a 2018 piece. What I have read is that was being circumvented. Big gamblers were being given private rooms inside casinos where there were no limits. Some gambling was just that, gambling where $100,000 was lost on a turn. Other times the gambler only stayed for half an hour and then cashed his chips out with clean casino money. One inspector for the BC Gaming Commission had red flagged a particular person and was in the casino when he showed up. When the inspector tried to stop his gambling the casino manager defied his order and took the gambler to a private room. A report was filed but his order was overruled. I cannot say with certainty the year this happened. I will look.

[JoeyJoeJoeJr. Shabadoo]

19 hours ago, The Arrogant Worms said:

Timeline of Christy Clark’s 12 years of chaos in education

 

An entire generation of students in British Columbia have been forced to learn in larger classes with fewer educational supports because of Christy Clark’s unconstitutional attacks on our public education system. For the last 12 years our school system has been used as a battleground by the B.C. Liberal government for their political gain. That’s why New Democrats are asking the premier to release cabinet documents detailing her government’s plans to provoke a full-scale strike in our schools.

 

Here is a short history of Premier Clark’s political meddling in education:

 

January 2002: Christy Clark, then education minister, led the B.C. Liberal government’s attack on school children with Bill 28, legislation that removed the right of teachers to bargain for smaller classes with more student supports.

 

· What Christy Clark said: “This bill… marks a move toward a more flexible, more responsive, better-managed system that meets students’ needs, one where students’ needs win out over mathematical formulas, one where decisions are made by all the education partners in the system, and one where meeting students’ needs is the absolute number one priority.” – Christy Clark, Hansard, Jan. 26, 2002

· The truth: Far from providing more “flexibility and choice,” more than 1500 teacher librarians, ESL teachers, special education teachers and school counsellors were laid off. Classes became larger, with fewer supports.

“The government prohibited terms in a teachers collective agreement restricting or regulating a board’s power to establish class size and composition; assign a student to a class; determine staffing levels or staff ratios; or determining the number of students assigned to a teacher.” –Madam Justice Susan Griffin, 2011 BCSC 469, section 250

April 2011: The B.C. Supreme Court ruled that Premier Clark’s legislation was unconstitutional. The B.C. Liberal government did not appeal the ruling.

· What Christy Clark said: “We need to go back and make sure that we address the issues that the court raised and we absolutely will do that. You know, I think whenever you bring in legislation ten years later turns out not to have worked, you have to take responsibility for that absolutely. Every time, you want to get it right and that time, we didn’t get it right.” – Christy Clark, CKNW, April 14, 2011

· The truth: After admitting that she “didn’t get it right” Premier Clark’s government began laying the groundwork to introduce legislation that B.C. Supreme Court called “virtually identical” to the law that was struck down as unconstitutional.

 

March 2012: The B.C. Liberals pass Bill 22, education legislation that is “virtually identical” to the previous law that was struck down as unconstitutional.

· What Christy Clark said: “This week our government introduced the Improving Education Act. Its aim is to keep teachers in class by suspending job action, setting a cooling off period, appointing a mediator in an attempt to break new ground with the union.” – Christy Clark, CKNW, March 3, 2012

· The truth: Far from aiming to “keep teachers in class” Premier Clark’s government “thought that a teachers strike would give the government a political advantage in imposing legislation that the public might otherwise not support. It felt that the timing of legislation to deal with a teachers strike and failure of collective bargaining could fit conveniently with the timing of legislation to address the Bill 28 Decision repercussions. The government planned its strategy accordingly so that it could have one legislative initiative at the end of the one year suspension granted in the Bill 28 Decision.” – Madam Justice Susan Griffin, 2014 BCSC 121, 384

Oct. 2012: After imposing a carbon copy of her original unconstitutional law on B.C. teachers Premier Clark claimed that her government wanted to achieve “stability” in the education system:

 

· What Christy Clark said: “It’s worth thinking about what could be achieved, for example, with a 10-year deal for teachers. Imagine a child in Grade two starting this year could go all the way to Grade 12 without any threat of labour disruption.” –Christy Clark, Prince George Citizen, Oct. 2012

· The truth: “The government had a strategy in mind that it would be to its benefit if negotiations failed and if collective bargaining resulted in a strike and impasse.” – Madam Justice Susan Griffin, 2014 BCSC 368

 

Jan. 2014: Christy Clark’s legislation is again struck down as unconstitutional. After 12 years of chaos in the public school system, the B.C. Supreme Court finds that the B.C. Liberal government has been trying to orchestrate a province-wide shut down of schools with full scale strikes for political gain.

· What Christy Clark said: The first time her legislation was struck down Premier Clark said “we’re going to have to make sure we get on a different footing with the teachers’ union, just as the court has suggested.”- Christy Clark, Globe and Mail, April 14, 2011

· The truth: “Their strategy was to put such pressure on the union that it would provoke a strike by the union.” – Madam Justice Susan Griffin, 2014 BCSC 121

Christy Clark

Unfair when

Negotiating with

Teachers

[The Arrogant Worms]

1 hour ago, JoeyJoeJoeJr. Shabadoo said:

Christy Clark

Unfair when

Negotiating with

Teachers

2014: Christy Clark’s legislation is again struck down as unconstitutional. After 12 years of chaos in the public school system, the B.C. Supreme Court finds that the B.C. Liberal government has been trying to orchestrate a province-wide shut down of schools with full scale strikes for political gain.

[bishopshodan]

@aGENT

 

Superintendents are obviously not part of the teachers union, it's one of the reasons I want to ask about her experience of  the diff governements...

 

She's in mexico this weekend, so it will have to wait anyway.

[aGENT]

1 hour ago, bishopshodan said:

@aGENT

 

Superintendents are obviously not part of the teachers union, it's one of the reasons I want to ask about her experience of  the diff governements...

 

She's in mexico this weekend, so it will have to wait anyway.

 

Sorry, I was just chuckling at how it felt very @Elias Pettersson-eque  I half thought it was sarcasm!

Edited March 13 by aGENT

[bishopshodan]

4 minutes ago, aGENT said:

 

Sorry, I was just chuckling at how it felt very @Elias Pettersson-eque  I half thought it was sarcasm!

 

You half thinker.

 

Did you know, I'm also an astronaut and my brother is the King of Atlantis? 

Quite the family.