CKNW Editorial
for July 20, 2001

I am going to go over some old ground this morning but I think I should make myself crystal clear - I haven't any idea how much money bus drivers ought to make … it follows that I don't know whether their demands are fair or otherwise. I accept that the issue of the spare board, overtime and contracting out is a thorny question - workers see contracting out in whatever form it takes as a challenge to their integrity - management see it as part of their right to manage and, when money is involved, a question of saving taxpayers dollars.

It is irrelevant that the deal made by the provincial NDP government with the GVRD resulting in Translink was a lousy one and it's irrelevant whether or not George Puil was a damned fool to make the deal and that the Liberal Opposition of the day said so.

What is relevant is that we have a transit strike that ought never have started, once started should have been quickly ended and now is intolerable.

What is relevant is that short of a miraculous agreement between an employer who is making bags of money out of the strike and an intransigent union there is only one force that can end this strike is the provincial government. What is also most relevant is that Gordon Campbell, then Opposition Leader, excoriated the then NDP government for not stepping in when the House was in session just before the election and ordering at the minimum a 60 day cooling off period ... the wisdom of the words of Gordon Campbell, Leader of the Opposition is evidently lost on Gordon Campbell, Premier.

What is also relevant is that Vince Ready, perhaps the most respected arbitrator and mediator in the province has filed a mediation report that could be enforced either in the short or longer term.

Now ... having said all that, the government has a greater obligation than just to end the strike. It doesn't matter that the Translink deal was inked by an NDP government that either hoodwinked George Puil and the GVRD, or that the same NDP government might not have fulfilled its part of the bargain - or both. The victims of this are not Translink or the Union - both
of whom have the power to make, if necessary, a less than good bargain to end this mess. The victims are the citizens of Greater Vancouver whose suffering increases in direct proportion to their lack of money or other infirmity. It has been rightly said that if this strike involved the closing of the Lions Gate Bridge it would have been over in a day.

This government owes an obligation to two million British Columbians to make sure they have a transit system that runs. It must be fun to point to the failings of the NDP, something at which this government excels … and if the GVRD made an improvident deal with the BC government it is for the government to make it right.

Sooner or later you have to start governing and protect the citizens from immense harm from forces beyond their control, but not beyond the control of Victoria.

That moment, Mr Campbell is right now. Indeed, it’s past time that some of those 77 thus far voiceless colleagues of Mr Campbell’s started doing their duty and speaking for their constituents.