CKNW Editorial
for April 17, 2001

Yesterday I spoke of the need of the NDP to re-invent itself … today I want to look at the Liberals.

If the Liberals win a huge victory – which the polls tell us they will – the world should be their oyster for some time to come. What will be interesting to see is if Gordon Campbell does bring in reforms such as work for parliamentary committees. I frankly think he will and I don’t underestimate as one of the reasons that he has promised to do so. But any sort of sizeable caucus brings with it the problems of keeping idle hands busy. It’s much different than it was in my day because then there were only 57 MLAs and a big majority was 10-12. Now there are 79 and even if the Liberals won 50 seats only they’ll have a large back bench to keep busy.

I don’t want to leave the impression that make work is what Mr Campbell will be looking for because that would say that one doesn’t need committees. One does – especially if one believes that problems and their relief should well up from the people not be diagnosed and dealt with from above. In fact one of the main reasons the public feel disengaged from their representatives is because they are. The problems of justice, labour, families, the environment and so on are people problems and need to be assessed with the people involved.

As always, the devil is in the details – also in the motivation of the leader. If the Committee is simply to become the premier’s pet poodle, always doing what it is told and never presenting awkward findings, better not to start it in the first place. If, on the other hand, it really does look into problems, find the facts and make recommendations irrespective of the politics of the matter the people will surely feel much more part of the process.

To accomplish this the premier must permit the caucus to appoint the committees and the committees must be able to set their own agendas. Even then, the influence of the premier will be ever present but it’s a good start. And committees will have to operate for a year or two as they find their feet – after all, they haven’t in fact been used, as the lawyers say, since man’s mind runneth to the contrary.

But back to the point – what will the Liberal Party become, after they’ve been in power awhile?

What it cannot do is supplant both the left and the right at the same time. It can become center right as the Bill Bennett Socreds were, leaving the left to the NDP or it can be what the Reform Party hoped to be, a party of the right. My guess is that it will try for the center right. If it can do so – and it’s a fine balancing act – they could, barring egregiously bad government on their part, be around for a long time. The NDP, no matter how they re-position themselves have left too bad a memory engrained to hope for much for the next decade. The right, once a center right party is in place, has little room to maneuver in this province. It’s a center sort of a province really and the true conservative hasn’t done well here for 70 years. It was always fashionable for the NDP to call the Socreds a far right party but the fact simply is they weren’t. Whether it was Hospital Insurance then Medicare, privatizing BC Hydro, or bringing in cutting edge consumer legislation, the Socreds were anything but a right wing government.

What will be interesting is how the BC Liberals, once in power, relate to the National Liberals. Will we see more of the Prime Minister? Or Paul Martin? Or dare I mention Sheila Copps? And how will the BC Federal Liberal caucus behave? Will Hedy Fry be embracing the Provincial government and vice versa?

It is always said by higher purpose persons that there should be cordial relations between Ottawa and Victoria – that Ottawa bashing, long a BC blood sport, ought to be discontinued. In fact kissing Ottawa’s backside is the wrong way to go. Which is not to say that the Victoria government ought to kick Ottawa as a knee jerk reaction or pick fights … it is to say that in order for the system to work a degree of systemic tension is essential. Let’s take softwood lumber, for example. If BC were to take an "Ottawa knows best" attitude they would be subject to negotiations that pleased Ontario and Quebec. Because while that may not be where all the lumber is cut it is where the votes lie. Again I don’t suggest a "screw you" approach, just a firm British Columbia line. Dealing with Ottawa isn’t a matter of getting it to be nice but to do what is appropriate.

Moreover, the system works on tension – it isn’t only BC that’s accused of Ottawa bashing. It’s the old squeaky wheel getting the grease story and it works for Ontario, Quebec and to some degree for Alberta. Other provinces, being on the dole, are forced to use the begging bowl method.

It’s impossible to see how the Liberals will turn out. It will depend on how they behave in their first term. If Mr Campbell brings in real reform … if he continues in the old Socred fashion of being a slightly right wing party with a strong social conscience and if he avoids being seen as a pal of much less extension of the federal party he could well occupy the ground the Socreds once held. If he has the brains to do all that and change his party’s name, to, say, the "Reformed Liberal Party of BC" he could have a very long run indeed.