Another year has come and gone, so it’s time to ask the politicians what they’ve been up to for the past 12 months.
Question: How would you describe 2023? What has been your most challenging issue?
Answer: 2023 has been challenging with BC United. We’ve got an excellent caucus of 26 of us that are extremely talented and smart with their critic roles. It’s been a bit of a challenge with the name change, so it’s important that we get to have people realize that it’s the BC Liberal party that it was. The challenge is trying to get B.C. back on track with our natural resources and getting forestry and mining and agriculture back up and running and creating a good economy and creating jobs for people in this province.
Question: As shadow minister for the Ministry of Agriculture and Food, what is the most pressing issue for B.C. farmers?
Answer: I’ve always said in my speeches in the last couple of years, the three Fs that are really hurting farming in B.C. – feed, fuel, and fertilizer, and you can throw in labour shortages … we’ve called for axing the carbon tax for farmers immediately. We called for getting rid of the provincial tax on fuel at gas stations. The carbon tax is costing people in this province a lot of money because of the transportation costs involved in agriculture.
Question: How can B.C. better prepare for wildfires that seem to be a regular occurrence every summer?
Answer: … we’ve got to expand our forestry industry where we’re clearing out trash from clearcut forestry so there isn’t that kindling, the stuff that catches on fire so easily, with lightning strikes. And we better ramp up our local emergency response units throughout B.C. and encourage and finance our volunteer fire departments and local emergency response units to get on to fighting fires.
Question: Would BC United remove any of the NDP government’s housing measures?
Answer: We voted against almost all of the housing legislation that came through. It’s just the way it was rammed through, it never gave us a chance to debate these things or look into them. We voted against the fact that you can take a single-family home in Ladner or Tsawwassen and tear it down and replace it with four homes. It doesn’t even have to go to public hearing, which is very undemocratic. People are very upset about that.
And they haven’t thought about the infrastructure. Do we have enough parking for all these cars?
Question: Do you think renaming the BC Liberal party to BC United was a good move?
Answer: Absolutely, I do. I’ve spent countless hours door knocking in all my past election campaigns and we were always confused with the federal Liberals … there’s probably 22 out of the 26 of us with BC United, are probably card-carrying federal Conservatives anyways … The reason we used the name United, and it was overwhelmingly voted on by our members in B.C., that we want to feel inclusive to everyone, no matter who you pray to, who you happen to love, what your faith is, what the colour of your skin is. We’re a united party and we want it to be that way and include everyone.
Question: Are you running in the next B.C. election?
Answer: Absolutely. I think we’re making some sort of a formal announcement when I get back on Jan. 29. … I’m excited. (BC United leader) Kevin Falcon just motivates me so much with the direction he wants us to go.
He certainly has a lot of confidence in me, in my background in agriculture, to move forward with that. There’s just so much common sense comes from Kevin Falcon and the ideas we have moving into this next election.
Question: How has B.C. changed since you were elected (in 2017)?
Answer: Things have changed for the worse. The NDP has brought in legislation and I think it’s 29 or 30 new taxes since I was elected in 2017. The carbon tax keeps going up. There are so many taxes I can’t even remember them all … I want to see agriculture thrive in this province. And businesses, unfortunately, we’re seeing businesses are leaving B.C. because of high tax rates and trying to compete with other provinces and states in the U.S. with the carbon tax. A lot of people are moving to Alberta and I’m seeing this as a discouraging trend here in B.C.
Question: Would BC United merge with the Conservative Party of B.C. in order to defeat the NDP?
Answer: That’s going to be something we’re going to be discussing at great length in an upcoming caucus retreat. I think Kevin Falcon has suggested, as well as (Conservative leader) John Rustad, that they’d be willing to talk to each other about it.
It just boggles my mind that John Rustad, who was with us, desperately would like to defeat the NDP, but by doing what he’s doing, he’s simply creating the possibility of votes being split between BC United and the B.C. Conservative party . . .
Question: How will Delta evolve in the next 50 years?
Answer: I hope Delta evolves in the next 50 years by using the common sense of what we’re bringing forward with the BC United Party. . . . . We have a lot of pressure on our highways and our railway lines … it’s so frustrating for me because I was such a huge proponent of the $100 million that had already been spent to have the bridge underway and the NDP killed it and the bridge would have been open a year and a half ago . . .
I just want to see Delta retain our nice, open farmland pieces and build density around the inner cores of Tsawwassen and Ladner.
Question: As a serving MLA for two terms, what is your proudest achievement?
Answer: The fact that I’ve been able to travel to all parts of B.C. with my agricultural role … all these areas where I get a chance to sit and talk to farmers and ranchers.
It’s gratifying when I come away from meetings with them and they go, “This guy gets it. He understands it,” because I was born and raised with agriculture and was a dairy farmer myself for a great part of my life …
I get such gratification out of people coming into my office, knowing that they probably didn’t vote for me, but once they get to know me and know my staff, we do everything we can to help them out.
