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Miscellany

Bob Mackin

BC Liberal leader Christy Clark dropped out of the race. But not the one her opponents wish she would. 

Clark showed-up for the 33rd annual Vancouver Sun Run on April 23, wearing a bright yellow jacket and bib number 757. She was surrounded by various campaign workers, staff from the premier’s office and a plainclothed RCMP officer in start line photographs published on social media.

She did not finish the 10-kilometre course and the reason has not been disclosed. 

Not only did Clark drop out, but so did party liaison Pamela Martin, executive assistant Adam McPhee, spokesmen Stephen Smart and Ben Chin and party special assistant and former Trinity Wester University track and field team member Dylan Kelso. They were not among the 39,769 runners, walkers or wheelers who crossed the B.C. Place Stadium finish line, according to the Sun Run’s official database. 

CBC reporter Jesse Johnston, who did a running interview with Clark and finished in just under an hour, Tweeted that “some of them ducked away at about the 5 k mark.” A Canadian Press wire service story said Clark was heckled at the start line. 

The Sun Run database showed Liberal finishers included Shane Mills, of “Truth Truck” fame, (45 minutes and 49 seconds for 1,307th place), Vancouver Fairview candidate Gabe Garfinkel (58:40 for 8,785th), and Vancouver Hastings candidate Jane Spitz (1:44.29 for 28,094th).

None of them, however, were officially counted on #TeamBC2017 in the team results. 

WorkSafeBC won the government team category. BC Hydro and Metro Vancouver rounded out the top three. #TeamBC2017 finished 17th in the category, right behind Environment and Climate Change Canada. 

Neither Mills, Smart nor party spokesman Emile Scheffel have responded to theBreaker. 

The same database shows that Clark, when she was an opposition MLA, ran the 2000 Golden Spike Days 5 km in Port Moody, in 26:08. Last time Clark ran for re-election, she came 14,533rd overall in the 38,889-person field at the April 21, 2013 Sun Run. She ran 5,257th out of 21,378 females, in 1 hour, 1 minute and 39 seconds.

Were you a 2017 Sun Run observer, volunteer or participant? Did you witness or — better yet — photograph Clark and her co-runners leave the course? If so, please contact theBreaker. 

1 Comment

Bob Mackin BC Liberal leader Christy Clark dropped

Opinion

Bob Mackin

Pardon those British Columbians who felt shortchanged by the Rogers-produced B.C. leaders debate on April 20. 

The parent company of host webcaster News1130 and telecaster City has plenty of experience producing political debates. See the 2014 Toronto mayoral debate, featuring the late Rob Ford and eventual winner, John Tory. 

Was it the morning time slot that caused News1130 and City to use an anchor desk for a group sit-down? Liberal Christy Clark, in the middle, wearing clothes that coincidentally matched the lit backdrop, framed by the NDP’s John Horgan on the left of the screen and the Greens’ Andrew Weaver on the right.  

April 20 B.C. leaders’ debate (Rogers Media)

Clark’s premeditated touch of Horgan and “calm down, John” comment was celebrated on social media by various paid Liberal twits. Oh, you just know that they would have lit their hair on fire with righteous indignation had the roles been reversed! 

The same party flaks and lobbyists also seized upon Horgan’s complaint that he wasn’t getting enough time and gleefully took it out of context. The full quote was as follows: “I think we should focus on the issue, Bill, and I think I should have as much time as the premier to answer those questions, I’ll leave it up to you. But [turning to Clark] If you want to keep doing your thing for a while, I’ll watch you for a while, I know you like that.”

Horgan didn’t really mean he wanted to “watch” Clark; it was a sarcastic quip about her penchant for being the centre of attention and campaigning more than governing. You might know her as Premier Photo Op. I call her Premier Amor de Camera. 

Ontario Liberal Warren Kinsella, who proudly donated to the Laura Miller defense fund, emerged from his hyperbolic chamber and compared Horgan to Donald Trump. That comment was as asinine as comparing Kinsella’s own SFH punk band to the Clash. 

Two politicians and two bands. That’s where the similarities begin and end. 

City’s Toronto 2014 mayoral debate (Rogers Media)

Moderator Bill Good was more aggressive at times than he ever was on his long running CKNW morning talk show (which preceded the afternoon one that Clark hosted for three years), but he was not the traffic cop or umpire that the role demanded.

Not all of that was his fault. The furniture was all wrong. The debaters should have been separated by more than an arm’s length, at their own podiums. The director should have cut-off the microphones of those who did not have the floor, and only left all microphones open when it was time for a free-for-all. There should have been a timekeeper and a buzzer or bell. 

The biggest distraction? The most-seasoned political veteran actually looked like the least-prepared. Clark came with a thick binder full of talking points that she flipped through and the microphone caught every fwip-fwip-fwip of her pages. The former talkshow host should’ve known better, and so should her cadre of handlers. The sound of russling papers was distracting for the viewer and probably for the other leaders.

The problem for Clark and the Liberals is she is vulnerable. Horgan and Weaver can score major points in the second and final debate, if they bring questions and comments that she is not prepared for. The problem they have is whittling it down to three or five. But, armed with the right question, they will silence the smiling wonder or elicit an answer that they can fashion a campaign attack ad around. She is, after all, Say Anything Christy. 

You see, Clark quit her three-year radio gig on CKNW in 2010, became premier in 2011 and led the party to a surprise victory in 2013. Ever since, she has done fewer and fewer open line radio shows. When she has done live interviews, they have been short and controlled. She, or her army of handlers, choose the forums, such as ethnic radio stations and FM rock radio stations. She has appeared on national news programs, but the time slots were limited and the topics focused. A campaign debate that lasts 90 minutes, without commercials, is a different animal altogether. In 2013, she faced NDP’s Adrian Dix, Green Jane Sterk and Conservative John Cummins, three opponents she could topple. Not so easy in 2017.

She has forgotten how to improvise. She needs a binder full of notes to guide her, as she exhibited on April 20. This is a problem that the Liberal campaign cannot fix over a weekend. The leader could be the party’s biggest liability. 

By contrast, Weaver had a notebook and Horgan a very small stack of papers. Clark is a career politician who should really know her files better. 

That next debate, April 26, will be in prime time on all of B.C’s major channels. If it’s like the 2013 prime time debate, it will be more structured. And you can expect there will be podiums.

Maybe it’s time for B.C. to follow Washington State’s lead and strike a permanent debate organization. The Seattle City Club hosts the Washington State Debate Coalition, which organizes election year debates between candidates for governor and senator. Part of the coalition’s mandate is to improve production values and presentation standards so that the voters who tune in live or watch the archive get to know the issues. 

It’s too late for 2017, but B.C. media companies, service clubs, colleges and universities should come together and begin planning for the 2018 local government elections. 

Who’s coming to Vaisakhi?

The next big event of the campaign is Saturday’s Vaisakhi Parade in Surrey, the biggest Sikh celebration outside India. 

A source involved in the Surrey Vaisakhi organization told theBreaker that Ontario NDP provincial lawmaker Jagmeet Singh is expected to attend. Singh did not respond for comment. He spearheaded a controversial bill to recognize the 1984 Golden Temple massacre and anti-Sikh riots that killed more than 3,000 as a genocide. The wave of violence happened after India’s Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards. 

Singh’s bill failed, but Liberal Premier Kathleen Wynne’s Liberal party passed a genocide recognition bill earlier this month. 

Article 2 of the United Nations’ Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948) defines genocide as killing members of a national, ethnical, racial or religious group. Yet, Wynne’s move has raised eyebrows in Canada and India. Not everyone agrees with the genocide desgination for the Golden Temple massacre and related atrocities, despite it being a heinous, bloody tragedy.  Canada’s government has recognized the Holocaust (1933-1945), Armenia (1915), Ukraine’s Holodomor (1932-1933), Rwanda (1994) and Bosnia (1995) as genocides. 

Speculation is that Clark could promise to enact a similar genocide recognition decree in B.C. when she addresses parade participants in Surrey, a battleground where nine ridings are up for grabs. If she does, will Horgan do the same?

Members of the South Asian community were hoping that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau would also drop by. He will instead be in Mississauga, Ont. for the annual Harry Jerome Awards. Trudeau visited Vancouver for this year’s Chinatown Lunar New Year Parade and has not been timid when it comes to visiting jurisdictions where Liberals are actively running for provincial office. Liberal Sport Minister and Delta MP Carla Qualtrough is expected to be the senior federal Liberal at the event. Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan is on a mission to India and Surrey-Newton MP Sukh Dhaliwal is not seeing eye-to-eye with Trudeau for leaving him out of his cabinet. 

Sign of shame

The first week of the campaign ended with shocking images of spray-painted swastikas on campaign signs for North Vancouver-Lonsdale Liberal Naomi Yamamoto and NDP challenger Bowinn Ma.

The incident was widely condemned, but who did it? 

RCMP media relations officer Cpl. Richard De Jong told theBreaker that police “investigated two different political signs that were spray painted with a red swastika. Signs that were side by each were removed — no witness, no suspects — documented by police.”

De Jong said a concerned citizen, driving by on Highway 1, Eastbound near the Main Street on ramp, reported the vandalized signs to police. 

Neither Yamamoto nor Ma responded to theBreaker about why they Tweeted photos, but didn’t file a hate crime report to police.

North Vancouver RCMP’s non-emergency line is 604-985-1311. If you see a sign vandal in action, call 9-1-1.

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Bob Mackin Pardon those British Columbians who felt

Miscellany

Bob Mackin 

Taxis figure heavily in the BC Liberals election platform. But it’s a delicate balancing act for the party. 

The Liberals want to seem hip to millennials, who are demanding to get around by Uber. Vancouver is the last major city where the leading ride hailing app is banned. Prominent Liberal backroom strategist Dimitri Pantazopoulos was registered, until April 4, to lobby the Liberal cabinet on behalf of Uber. 

But the Liberals don’t want to alienate voters from the South Asian community, the source of many of B.C.’s taxi drivers.

It took until March 7 for Transport Minister Todd Stone and Taxis and Transit Minister Peter Fassbender to announce their long-awaited, “made in B.C.” scheme to allow ridesharing in B.C. 

Report that the Liberals relied on is mostly secret.

If re-elected, the BC Liberals say they will let Uber and Lyft operate as soon as this Christmastime.

In the meantime, they plan to spend $1 million of taxpayers’ money on an app for taxis (even though the big companies already have one, called eCab) and $3.5 million for crash prevention/detection technology (which will be standard anyway in upcoming Toyota models).

A month after the announcement, Stone heralded the Passenger Transportation Board’s surprise granting of 175 new taxi licences to the five-company cartel in City of Vancouver. Twenty-six of the licences will be for wheelchair accessible vehicles.

Sources tell theBreaker that taxi owners are worried competition will devalue their licences, so they are lobbying the Liberals for a buy-back program to soften the blow. 

The issue is politically sensitive in key ridings in South Vancouver, Abbotsford and Surrey. The election may be won or lost South of the Fraser.

Fassbender won his seat in Fleetwood by just 200 votes in 2013, to give the Liberals a 5-3 advantage in Surrey. With redrawn boundaries, Surrey will have nine ridings in the May 9 election. Fassbender is worried about defeat, so he was the first to open a campaign office last September. The party’s Elections BC returns for 2016 show that headquarters transferred a whopping $69,142.21 into Fassbender’s campaign account. Only failed by-election candidates Joan Isaacs and Gavin Dew got more. 

While the Liberals were hoping to set it up as a wedge issue, NDP leader John Horgan wasn’t biting. He told CKNW on March 10 that it’s “All politics all the time for Christy Clark. I tabled a bill three years ago to make sure if new entrants were coming to the marketplace, let’s make sure it’s done in a way where it balances the needs of the public as well as the existing business that have operated here.”

theBreaker asked Fassbender’s ministry, under the freedom of information law, for a copy of the business case and cost-benefit analysis behind the March 7 announcement. 

On April 20, the government sent a heavily censored copy of a KPMG report called B.C. Taxi Licenses and Potential Implications of Ride Sourcing. The 31-page, Oct. 6, 2016 report was billed as a “review of initial desktop research.” The government is clearly afraid for voters to know how the policy samosa was made.

The government speculates that disclosure would harm government finances and intergovernmental relations. It also claims the KPMG report contains protected recommendations and advice — even though the law states that the government cannot withhold a feasibility study or a report on field research used to formulate a policy.

theBreaker will appeal to the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner.

KPMG has donated $361,844 to the Liberals between 2005 and 2016. The firm studied the industry in five Canadian cities, three in the U.S. and Australia’s State of Victoria. Only the page about Quebec’s one-year Uber pilot program was substantially visible. 

KPMG had previously studied the taxi and limousine industry for the City of Ottawa in 2015. Unlike the secretive B.C. government, Ottawa city hall published its report. 

The national capital report included a section on the Uber-outlawed, Vancouver market. Unlicensed drivers are subject to $1,500 to $5,000 fines. The market has 3,077 taxi drivers using 588 standard permits and another 99 for Fridays and Saturdays only. 

CSC-2017-70915 by BobMackin on Scribd

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Bob Mackin  Taxis figure heavily in the BC

News

Bob Mackin

Premier Christy Clark originally dinged taxpayers for her charter flight to a mysterious Lower Mainland party fundraiser last July. 

Clark posed for photos with transgender equality advocates outside the Legislature on July 25, 2016, but later snubbed them when she skipped the vote that added gender identity or expression to the Human Rights Code. Her spokesman, Ben Chin, admitted to the Vancouver Sun that Clark attended a BC Liberal fundraising event in Vancouver, but no details were released at the time.

Documents obtained by theBreaker under the freedom of information law show that Clark and her aide, Adam McPhee, traveled on the 5 p.m. Island Express Air flight from Victoria to Boundary Bay Airport in Delta.

Clark left her seat empty July 25 to attend a party fundraiser (Hansard TV)

Clark’s office paid $1,160.54 for the flight. An undated, handwritten note on the July 20 invoice says the flight was “inadvertently charged to credit card on file.” The charge was later used as a credit for an Aug. 12 Island Express Air itinerary to Tofino for a Medal of Good Citizenship photo op attended by Clark and four others. The Tofino trip cost $3,709.48, before the $1,160.54 credit was applied.

The government claims it has no copies of internal or external correspondence about the Boundary Bay flight. It was mentioned in Clark’s agenda. Past FOI releases about Clark’s charter flights have shown correspondence between her staff and charter airline staff is the norm.

Clark and McPhee returned to Victoria the next morning by Helijet from downtown Vancouver. 

As for the fundraiser itself, the location and the donors of money remain a secret. But theBreaker found a clue in the party’s annual report to Elections BC.

A form describes a July 25, 2016 event only as “E2016-120-100 Vancouver Fundraiser.” On the form, it says unidentified organizations bought nine tickets for $5,000 each. Two unidentifed individuals also bought tickets for the same price. A $1,785 donation was reported for unspecified goods and services. The same amount was counted as the cost of the function, which netted $55,000 for party coffers. 

Mysterious Vancouver Liberal event.

The Elections BC database shows the only donation of $1,785 on July 25, 2016 came from the Monark Group, a Surrey company that boasts e-commerce, real estate and entertainment investments.

Last year, Monark launched an Uber-inspired driver-sharing app called Kater. In 2013, Monark marketed tickets for the Liberal government’s controversial $11 million Times of India Film Awards. From 2014 to 2016, Monark donated $63,685 to the Liberals.

The party told Elections BC that it received only two donations of $5,000 each on July 25, 2016. 

W.I. Woodtone Industries CEO Kevin Young told theBreaker that his company has generally donated to the Liberals in a “random way” and he was not aware of any event that day. LifeLabs representative Brenna Birkin did not respond. 

Liberal spokesman Emile Scheffel did not respond to queries from theBreaker about the name or address of the fundraising venue or the names of those who attended. 

Monark president Monty Sikka also did respond. 

July 25, 2016 would be the day that two of Clark’s biggest recent scandals intersected. 

Half of the $13.1 million the party grossed in donations last year came from cash for access events. Some of the events were held in private homes for small groups of donors who paid thousands of dollars to rub shoulders with Clark. 

B.C. has no laws limiting either the size or source of donations to provincial or municipal

Monark’s Sikka

parties or candidates. The Liberals have resisted calls for reform from the NDP, Greens and independent Vicki Huntington. Clark made a vague promise to strike a non-binding advisory committee, should the Liberals be re-elected on May 9.

Through last spring, Clark had spent more than $600,000 over five years on charter jet flights to photo ops with her entourage. Many of those trips were single-day round-trips between Vancouver and her riding in Kelowna. She broke a 2013 by-election campaign promise to buy a house in the Okanagan city.

 

#AirChristy to party fundraiser by BobMackin on Scribd

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Bob Mackin Premier Christy Clark originally dinged taxpayers

Miscellany

Bob Mackin

Part of the BC Liberal campaign rhetoric is the suite of positive opinions from the world’s major credit ratings agencies. 

They are paid handsomely to evaluate a borrower’s ability to pay interest and repay principal.

The ratings agencies are a necessary evil. Not necessarily evil. But they are far from infallible.

B.C.’s total debt, in the February budget (tabled but not passed before the election), is estimated to hit almost $70 billion by the end of next March. The debt was $45.2 billion when Christy Clark took over the premiership from Gordon Campbell in March 2011.

Finance Minister Mike de Jong likes to trumpet the high marks given by credit ratings agencies, but he is keeping a secret.

Career politician de Jong

For three years, between 2012-2013 and 2014-2015, the government paid nearly $1.2 million in fees to three of the ratings houses: Standard and Poor’s, Moody’s and DBRS. Fitch is the only ratings agency that is not paid.

The government signed sole-source contracts to pay fees through March 31, 2017 with S&P ($210,000) and Moody’s ($242,900). The justification form said S&P was “the only credit agency to offer Standard & Poor’s credit rating.” Likewise for Moody’s.

S&P was also paid $207,112,50 for the previous fiscal year. In its contract, the small print reminded the B.C. government that credit ratings are “statements of opinion and not statements of fact.”

The reliability of opinions from credit ratings agencies has come under world media scrutiny since the 2008 Great Recession.

In a 2012 story by the Guardian, headlined “How credit ratings agencies rule the world,”  Patrick Kingsley wrote:

Part of the problem is that ratings agencies are funded by the very companies they rate. If you want to be rated, you must pay an agency between $1,500 and $2,500,000 for the privilege, depending on the size of your company. In theory, this creates a conflict of interest, because it gives the agency an incentive to give the companies the rating they want. It could explain why, for much of the past decade, agencies seemed happy not to question either the risks banks were taking, or the accuracy of their accounts.

In 2014, under the headline “Big three credit rating agencies under fire,” the Financial Times reported:

The three main rating agencies, Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s and Fitch, have been seen as at least partially culpable for elements of the financial crisis, from the fiasco of subprime mortgage securitization to tipping Greece into disaster when its sovereign credit rating was downgraded.

Their actual ratings have also come under attack, with academic papers and bank economists analyzing them to find evidence of home bias, subjective error and over-lenient analysis.

One prominent example of a rating gone wrong? In 2009, Moody’s famously reported that investor fears over Greece’s liquidity were “misplaced.”

The European Union stepped in and gave the Greeks tens of billions of dollars in bailouts, to keep the birthplace of the Olympics from collapsing.

Clark’s misleading 2013 “Debt-Free B.C.” campaign bus.

In January, Moody’s raised a red flag about BC Hydro, which had

an $8.1 billion debt in 2008 that has ballooned to $18.1 billion. The Crown corporation building the controversial Site C dam’s finances are “among the weakest of Canadian provincial utilities.”

“The anticipated increase in debt continues to pressure the province’s rating since it raises the contingent liability of British Columbia,” Moody’s reported.

In a 2011 report about BC Hydro, then-auditor general John Doyle accused the biggest Crown corporation of creative accounting. He famously wrote:

“Expenses that would ordinarily be counted in calculating net income have been deferred to future years (allowed under rate-regulated accounting). While this practice is currently acceptable under Canadian generally accepted accounting standards (GAAP), it creates the appearance of profitability where none actually exists.”

Brad Bennett, the Liberal back roomer that Clark-appointed chair of BC Hydro, is part of the premier’s traveling campaign entourage.

Just like he was in 2013, when Clark’s bus included the ironic slogan “Debt-Free B.C.”

Response Package FIN 2016 63633 by BobMackin on Scribd

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Bob Mackin Part of the BC Liberal campaign

Miscellany

Bob Mackin

Man the Twitter stations! 

That’s how BC Hydro CEO Jessica McDonald reacted after a Nov. 8, 2016 interview with New York Times reporter Dan Levin. 

New York Times story on B.C.’s Site C dam

Levin came to northern B.C. on assignment in late October to tour the Site C dam construction site. He later had a phone interview with McDonald, the BC Liberal insider who runs the $5.66 billion utility under chair and patronage appointee Brad Bennett. Her ex-husband, Mike McDonald, is the Liberal campaign manager and a senior associate at BC Hydro contractor Kirk & Co. 

How did those interviews go? It’s a secret. Internal reports were censored. BC Hydro claimed disclosure would harm personal privacy. 

After Levin was toured around the site by Hydro’s David Conway, Conway sent a summary on Oct. 28 to various BC Hydro spinners. The version released to theBreaker was all blacked-out. 

On Oct. 29, Conway prepared McDonald for her interview with Levin. He told the boss that he anticipated Levin would ask her about First Nations rights and title and Amnesty International’s human rights concerns, geological/geotechnical surprises, safety and the impact on the project cost. 

On Nov. 12, Hydro’s policy and reporting director Chris Sandve sent a similar email summary of McDonald’s interview to his cohorts. Same deal. All blacked-out. 

The next day, Jordan Keim wrote that “Jessica has asked us to prepare a series of tweets in advance of an NY Times article on the project…” 

Thirty-eight Tweets, to be precise. 

Levin’s story was published Dec. 10 and read, in part: 

Within a decade, water will flood a 51-mile stretch of the river, the result of a $7 billion (8.8 billion Canadian dollars) hydroelectric dam and power station, known as Site C. It will be one of the largest public infrastructure projects in Canadian history.

The project has prompted mounting opposition and legal challenges from industry experts, former government officials, local landowners, aboriginal communities and others who say Site C poses a risk to the environment and violates constitutionally protected indigenous rights.

But opponents cite another simple reason the project should be stopped: After a decade of flat demand for electricity and the emergence of cheaper energy alternatives, the dam, they say, is an enormous boondoggle that will saddle taxpayers with huge debts for generations to come.

On Dec. 13, BC Hydro responded with a letter to the editor, which McDonald also Tweeted. She seemed miffed that she didn’t wake-up to find her name in one of the world’s most-famous newspapers. How dare a journalist from a respected foreign publication question the wisdom of spending almost $9 billion of other people’s money! 

“Mr. Levin’s article leaves the reader wondering why on earth BC Hydro would even want to build this project,” McDonald wrote.

British Columbians, her ultimate bosses, might be asking two other questions: 1) Why on earth wasn’t there a referendum, for citizens to decide Site C? 2) Why on earth is the Liberal cabinet not letting the B.C. Utilities Commission do its job and review the project? 

 

2017-170_Final Response (Sent 28 Mar 2017) by BobMackin on Scribd

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Bob Mackin Man the Twitter stations!  That's how BC

News, Sports

Bob Mackin

Did Christy Clark and Rich Coleman bend elbows with BC Liberal donors, lobbyists and bidders on public contracts in a B.C. Place Stadium suite during the 2014 Grey Cup game?

British Columbians may never know.

After a two-year investigation, the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner found someone inside the BC Liberal government deleted or destroyed the Nov. 30, 2014 guest list and food and beverage invoice. 

Two years later, investigation finds “records were not retained.”

According to an April 11 letter, the information and privacy watchdog found Clark’s office broke the section of the Freedom of Information law that requires the government to “make every reasonable effort to assist applicants and to respond openly, accurately, completely and without delay.” 

We do know that the premier was there to see the Calgary Stampeders beat the Hamilton Tiger-Cats. She was photographed with late Alberta Premier Jim Prentice in a luxury suite. Coleman, the deputy premier and natural gas minister, was also there, because the B.C. government and Malaysian-owned Pacific NorthWest LNG hosted more than 100 elementary school students from around B.C. at the game. One of the proud co-owners of the Stamps was Alberta oilman and Clark bagman Murray Edwards.

In her findings, OIPC investigator Shannon Hodge wrote that she asked the Premier’s office “how a no records response was possible as it was my understanding that the Premier and Deputy Premier Coleman attended the event.  

“[The Office of the Premier] responded and advised me that the invitee/attendance list was coordinated by Government Communications and Public Engagement (GCPE), that it had now reached out to GCPE and had been informed that the records were not retained,” Hodge wrote. “I enquired further and OOP acknowledged its oversight in failing to inform you at the time of your request that GCPE may have had responsive records.”

Hodge wrote that the Premier’s office should have transferred the request to GCPE.

”At the very least, it should have advised you that another public body may have had records responsive to your request. In failing to do so I find that OOP failed to comply with its duty under [section 6] of FIPPA at the time of your request in December 2014.”

Section 6, also known as Duty to Assist, was the same part of the FOI law that officials in Clark’s office and Transport Minister Todd Stone’s office broke multiple times, according to Commissioner Elizabeth Denham’s landmark October 2015 report, “Access Denied.” They tripled deleted documents that should have been released to FOI requesters.

A B.C. Provincial Court judge fined ex-Stone aide George Gretes $2,500 in July 2016 after Gretes pleaded guilty to lying under oath to Denham. Denham investigated after a complaint by whistleblower Tim Duncan, who worked under Gretes. 

In a phone interview, Duncan told theBreaker that the deletion or destruction of the Grey Cup guest list and catering invoices corresponded with how the BC Liberal government operated while he was there. Duncan said “anything bad” was deleted. He regretted that the law is so weak, that Gretes and others weren’t prosecuted for deleting records. 

“Coming from a different province, coming from a different background, accounting, you do that at any company in Canada, you’re out the door the next day. Not even: you’re out the door same day,” Duncan said.

Duncan, who describes himself as a card-carrying Conservative, had this to say to British Columbians voting in the May 9 election.

“I would take a hard look at the Liberal party. This election should be about whether they have enough integrity to govern,” he said.

Ducking the duty

In the BC Liberals’ 2001 New Era platform, they promised to become Canada’s most open, democratic and accountable government. Clark reiterated the open government promise when she took over from Gordon Campbell in 2011. But Denham caught the Clark administration triple deleting records and running an oral government to avoid public disclosure. 

Additionally, BC Liberal campaign director Laura Miller awaits a September breach of trust and mischief trial in Ontario for mass-deleting records while she worked in Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty’s office.

Prentice and Clark at 2014 Grey Cup (Twitter)

Before she left last summer to become the United Kingdom information and privacy commissioner, Denham urged the Liberal government to enact a duty to document law. But the one the Liberals passed in March got immediate thumbs down from the B.C. Freedom of Information and Privacy Association because it is a “law that is entirely discretionary and does not create any duty whatsoever.”

By contrast, the NDP’s proposed Public Records Accountability Act included strict requirements for creating and maintaining full and accurate government records. Anyone caught hiding or destroying government information under the NDP bill would be fined up to $50,000. 

Without the list of who Clark and Coleman treated, citizens are left to wonder which friends and insiders they were bending elbows with and how much it cost taxpayers. 

Citizens are also left to wonder why Clark’s administration deleted the 2014 guest list only three years after it properly released the one from the 2011 Grey Cup.

Clark took her son Hamish and brother John to see the B.C. Lions win the 2011 championship over the Edmonton Eskimos. She also hosted 25 other guests, including Alberta Premier Alison Redford and her aide Ryan Barbeiro, Manitoba Premier Greg Selinger and Northwest Territories Premier Bob McLeod, federal NDP leader Nicole Turmel, and Abbotsford Conservative MP Ed Fast.

Other suite-goers included Clark’s principal secretary Dimitri Pantazopoulos, outreach directors Pamela Martin and Lorne Mayencourt, sport minister Ida Chong and her aide Matt Stickney. Clark also hosted 10 executives of charities, including the Canadian Cancer Society, Variety Club and United Way, as well as Canadian rugby great Gareth Rees and hotel and spa owner Wendy Lisogar-Cocchia. Clark named Liberal donor Lisogar-Cocchia to the B.C. Lottery Corporation board of directors in late 2013. 

B.C. Place hosted the 2014 game after Clark gave Lions’ owner David Braley a $2.7 million taxpayer subsidy before the 2013 election to buy hosting rights from the Canadian Football League. Stadium construction delays made it impossible for Winnipeg to host the game until 2015. 

Findings OIPC April 11 by BobMackin on Scribd

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Bob Mackin Did Christy Clark and Rich Coleman

News

Bob Mackin

The BC Liberal backroomer who was caught charging bottles of scotch to taxpayers while he chaired Kwantlen Polytechnic University is the financial agent for Mary Polak’s re-election campaign in Langley. 

Gord Schoberg is also a local government lobbyist with FortisBC, the natural gas company that donates to the BC Liberals and received environment minister Polak’s green light last August to build the $520 million pipeline to the controversial Woodfibre LNG plant near Squamish. Schoberg was listed on Fortis’s provincial lobbying registration in 2010 and 2011. The only municipality in B.C. with a lobbyist registry is Surrey, but that is limited to land development.

Gord Schoberg (LinkedIn)

A Tweeted photograph of a Preston GM-sponsored Polak campaign vehicle shows Schoberg’s name as the campaign’s financial agent. theBreaker revealed on April 3 that another GM dealer, Dueck, donated the use of four vehicles to three Liberal candidates and also supplies Premier Christy Clark with a party-leased Buick Enclave SUV. 

Schoberg’s formal title with FortisBC is senior manager, municipal and aboriginal relations. He is a veteran BC Liberal and Surrey First operative. Schoberg, who chaired KPU from 2012 to 2014, was named to the KPU board in 2008 while he was president of then-Transport minister Kevin Falcon’s Surrey-Cloverdale BC Liberal riding association. In 2013, Schoberg was the financial agent for Polak and Peter Fassbender and listed his fortisbc.com email address on the official financing report submitted to Elections BC.

“FortisBC does not second staff for political campaigns,” Fortis spokeswoman Amy Bunton wrote in an email to theBreaker. “FortisBC staff are free to participate as they see fit for any political campaign on their own time.”

Bunton did not respond to clarify whether Schoberg’s work on Polak’s campaign is being treated as a donation of services to the Liberals. 

Elections BC’s database shows that Fortis donated $186,024 to the Liberals through 2016 and $69,340 to the NDP.

Schoberg did not return theBreaker’s calls to his Fortis office or his mobile phone. Nobody answered the phone at Polak’s campaign office and nobody responded to theBreaker’s voice mail message. 

In 2015, Schoberg pledged to pay back $4,000 in expenses, including $180 for the two Glenfiddich scotch bottles, after an internal review by the Advanced Education ministry. Surrey Liberal MLA Amrik Virk was KPU vice-chair under Schoberg and shuffled out of the Advanced Education Ministry and into Citizen Services, the ministry that handles government procurement, among other duties. 

Polak’s Preston vehicle (@takesthelane)

The Fortis Eagle Mountain-Woodfibre Gas Pipeline would feed the planned liquefaction plant near Squamish. Woodfibre LNG is vital for the BC Liberals’ face-saving LNG spin. It is the only export terminal that may be built in B.C. before 2020. Clark campaigned in 2013 on three plants built by 2020, despite Russia, Qatar and Australia dominating the global market. Since then, the global oil and gas glut has delayed B.C.’s ambitions.

Last October, Natural Gas Minister Rich Coleman visited Woodfibre LNG owner Sukanto Tanoto in Singapore to sign a letter of understanding that the government has refused to publish. 

The $520 million FortisBC pipeline project would generate 832 person years of employment in construction, but would employ only 10 workers once it is operating.

Despite Clark’s unabashed optimism, there remain major global headwinds for a made-in-B.C. LNG industry.

The Fortis plan to ship 800,000 tonnes of LNG a year from its Tilbury plant in Delta to Hawaii fell through last summer when the Aloha state nixed a public utility’s takeover by Florida’s NextEra. The proposal conflicted with the Hawaii government’s long-term goal to shift from fossil fuels to wind and rooftop solar.

In March, Japan’s Resources Energy Inc. consortium cited depressed gas prices for scrapping its plan to build an LNG terminal in Cook Inlet, Alaska. It would have exported 1 million tonnes of LNG a year to Japan, half the amount contemplated by Woodfibre LNG.

 

3 Comments

Bob Mackin The BC Liberal backroomer who was

Opinion

Bob Mackin

Ladies and gentlemen, Pamela Martin and Steve Darling. 

Just two folks who used to make their living in the news business. They were best-known for sitting on chairs in front of TV cameras and lights, smiling while they read the headlines written by someone else, before letting other people tell the stories. 

Pamela Martin

They are now trying to make it big in what Frank Zappa called the showbiz wing of industry: politics. Martin as the BC Liberal Party’s liaison to leader Christy Clark. Darling as the rookie candidate in Burnaby-Lougheed. He was recruited as the star candidate after his unceremonious disposal last fall from Global TV after an 18-year run. Darling’s campaign is managed by George Psefteas, a federal Conservative protege of BC Liberal power broker Patrick Kinsella. Psefteas most-recently worked as Surrey Mayor Linda Hepner’s chief of staff. 

On April 2, they tried to make reading from talking points sound like a real, live conversation in what was billed as a phone call for BC Liberal volunteers. It was not a phone call with volunteers, because it was a listen-only event. It was not clear whether it was really live or just pre-taped. Listen to the excerpt. 

For a party that thrives on selfies, there aren’t any on Martin or Darling’s Twitter accounts about this event. There is a photo from moderator Dylan Kruger’s account showing a microphone in a studio. 

The call lasted 24 minutes and 30 seconds and it test-marketed several Liberal messages. One that you’ll see and hear often during this campaign is that “(insert candidate name here) is listening.” 

Martin and Darling only listened to themselves. They didn’t give volunteers a chance to be heard on the listen-only call.

Steve Darling

It included riveting exchanges like this: 

Pamela: “Do you have any advice for the volunteers who are on the line who are starting out volunteering and maybe they don’t such a nice reception possibly?”

Steve: “You run into people all the time that don’t want to be part of our party or not voting for us or are not fans of whatever it is. Everyone has an opinion. I’ve run into fans of ours and not fans of ours.

“The one most important thing I can say to everyone is something that I learned a very long time ago when I first got into broadcasting. And Pamela you know this as well. The number one thing is be a good listener and say ‘I understand you have concerns, so tell me what those concerns are’ and listen to them and understand why they have those concerns. Trust me, you’re not on the doorstep to solve everybody’s problems, but you’re there to say ‘here’s what we’re about, here’s what we think, tell me what you think.’ If they don’t agree with you that’s fine, but listen to them, take their feedback, write it down, and move on.”

To do their job, TV news readers must listen… to the directors that direct them, via a small earplug. It is not an easy thing to do while reading the teleprompter and looking into the camera. But it is vastly different from listening to citizens, the true bosses of a politician.

Darling claimed that he was “as hard on the government as when you were a journalist as well.”

He gave no examples. 

“Nobody’s perfect,” Darling said. “We’re safe to say nobody is perfect and as long as you get up in the morning, you listen to people, work hard and try to do your best, that’s all people can ask.” 

Not everyone loves us

The duo did concede that there is not unanimous support for the BC Liberals across the province. 

Pamela: “After four terms, there is bound to be some people that aren’t going to like some things that our, the BC Liberal Party government, have done. But it’s still our job to listen to know what the public is thinking and to respond to them the best way that we can.

Steve: “There’s been some good things as well, some positive things. You look at the economy alone and how well it’s doing.” 

Darling knows that is not entirely true. The news he read to Global viewers included headlines about foreign cash causing an overheated real estate market and construction industry, displacement of people with lower incomes and increasing homelessness across the province. The perceived prosperity train is not stopping for all British Columbians. 

As the campaign progresses toward May 9, you are bound to hear more of the above from Pamela, Steve and the rest of the Team B.C. 2017 Laura Miller Campaign College graduates.

Millar (right), Clark and Robertson’s spin doctor.

You might even hear an apology. Yes, you read that correctly. 

In Vancouver’s 2014 civic election, Mayor Gregor Robertson was staring defeat in the face. Two days before the Nov. 15 vote, he issued a surprise, yet vague, apology to Vancouverites on a CBC debate and pledged to do better to listen to their concerns. He also made an appeal to voters supporting the left-wing COPE party to vote Vision Vancouver, rather than splitting the vote. It worked. Robertson won a third term and Vision kept its majority on city council. 

Robertson’s key campaign advisor, Don Millar, is also a longtime Clark spin doctor.

So, when the going gets tough, watch for Clark or — more likely — a proxy, to play the sorry card. Something like this: Mistakes were made, but don’t let them overshadow the good work done. We’ll do better to earn your trust in the next four years. We’ll listen. We promise. Vote for us.

Why it’s more likely to be a proxy is obvious. Clark’s recent apologies for falsely accusing the NDP of hacking the BC Liberals website and the wrongful firing of eight health researchers were reluctant, feeble and insincere. She’s known widely as a master campaigner, but nobody has ever accused her of being genuinely contrite. 

Claiming to have a plan for a “bright future” while bashing the NDP for its 90s misdeeds can only take the Liberals so far in an era of change. Informed voters know that the contemporary Liberals have a long, dark past past since 2001. The NDP’s platform contains a handy guide to the scandals since 2001. Privately, the Liberals are worried a portion of their base might not vote or hold its nose and vote NDP or Green. 

The Liberals have what the NDP didn’t have: the stigma of the suicide of a wrongly fired Ministry of Health researcher, who was bullied to death under a government whose premier wears a pink shirt once a year for an anti-bullying flash mob photo op. 

When that Clark proxy apologizes, will voters tell the Liberals, in George Costanza fashion, to stuff their sorries in a sack? 

 

 

 

0 Comments

Bob Mackin Ladies and gentlemen, Pamela Martin and

Miscellany

Bob Mackin

More about how the sausage is made. 

This time, the BC Housing edition. 

That’s the Crown corporation controlled by Deputy Premier Rich Coleman. Its mandate is to house the poor, but it is under fire for apparently enriching BC Liberal donors. 

Coleman (Mackin)

Two downtown Vancouver projects involving $80 million of public money are under the microscope. The RCMP is investigating one of them.

On March 9, NDP critic David Eby tabled a leaked report in Question Period about BC Housing’s non-tendered, private-public partnership in Chinatown with Wall Financial Corp. theBreaker found BC Housing paid almost $7 million to buy the land, only days after Bruno and Peter Wall donated $400,000 to the BC Liberals in February 2016. 

On April 5, Postmedia’s Sam Cooper reported the RCMP is investigating the Brenhill land swap after a complaint by South Vancouver Parks Society’s Glen Chernen. Liberal bagman Bob Rennie was on the BC Housing board when the deal was made and his company later marketed the luxury tower component of the land swap.

A March 28, not-for-attribution technical briefing by BC Housing chief financial officer Dan Maxwell at Burnaby headquarters left reporters with more questions than answers about both the Brenhill and Wall deals. 

Coleman was not in attendance, nor was he made available over the phone.  

theBreaker noticed timing inconsistencies in the minutes of a Nov. 23, 2015 board meeting that were provided to reporters. The board rubber-stamped a recommendation to spend $7 million to buy the Wall land, loan Wall $36 million to build 172 units and then pay Wall $15.4 million to buy 104 units for social housing rentals. 

Ramsay (BC Housing)

The minutes say that BC Housing CEO Shayne Ramsay “left the room at 3:56 p.m. due to a conflict.” Ramsay is married to Atira CEO Janice Abbott and the report on the Wall proposal said Atira was the preferred operator of the building. 

The minutes also say Ramsay returned to the meeting four minutes later at 4 p.m.

But, on the first page of the minutes, it says the meeting was called to order at 4 p.m.

The board also gave provisional approval to loan Townline Ventures $23.2 million for its 84-unit, mixed use project at 2513 Clarke Street, the Strand. Townline owner Rick Ilich donated $100,000 to the Liberals on the same February 2016 day as the Walls gave $400,000.

theBreaker asked BC Housing for clarification of the timing discrepancy in the minutes and details and documents about the Townline project. 

BC Housing dawdled and dawdled for almost two weeks until the day the election writ was issued. It used that as an excuse to shut the door on theBreaker. 

Questions remain unanswered about dubious board minutes and another non-tendered, P3 deal between a Coleman Crown corporation and a big Liberal donor. 

Coleman refused to comment after he was approached by theBreaker, on-camera, outside the April 10 BC Liberal Leader’s Dinner fundraiser. 

The BC Liberals doubled BC Housing’s budget to $1.33 billion for the election year. 

BC Housing’s lack of responsiveness to routine media questions in 2017 recalls similar secretive behaviour by B.C. Pavilion Corporation and Liquor Distribution Branch when those taxpayer-owned companies were controlled by career politician and ex-Mountie Coleman before the 2013 provincial election. 

Below is theBreaker’s March 30-April 11 email exchange with BC Housing’s communications department.

MARCH 30

From: Bob Mackin [mailto:bob@thebreaker.news]
Sent: March-30-17 9:41 AM
To: Ally Skinner-Reynolds; dfreeman@bchousing.com
Subject: media request – Nov. 23, 2015 minutes and Towline

Hello, 

Regarding the Nov. 23, 2015 BC Housing board minutes, would you be able to confer with John Bell to clarify and correct the timing of the meeting?  

It says the meeting was called to order at 4 p.m.

Under Capital Review Committee, it says Shayne Ramsay left the room at 3:56 p.m. due to a conflict. 

It says on the next page that he returned to the meeting at 4 p.m. (before the Townline Ventures agenda item). 

Could Mr. Bell explain the inconsistency and correct the timing, if he is able? 

On the matter of the BC Housing financing for Townline Ventures’ project at 2513 Clarke St., Port Moody — for $23,228,253 — what is the status of that project and that financing?  

Would you be able to share with me documents about the Townline Ventures matter, similar to those about Brenhill and Wall that were provided at the media briefing? 

Specifically, the board submission, board minutes and agreement with Townline?  

Sincerely,

Bob Mackin

reporter, theBreaker

Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org> Thu, Mar 30, 2017 at 9:49 AM

To: “bob@thebreaker.news” <bob@thebreaker.news>

Hi Bob,

Ally sent your request my way, so I’ll work on getting the answers for you. Can you please tell me your

deadline?

Thanks,

Cindy Kralj

Senior Communications Specialist

Corporate Communications|BC Housing

Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news> Thu, Mar 30, 2017 at 10:06 AM

To: Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org>

5 p.m. today. Thank-you.

Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org> Thu, Mar 30, 2017 at 3:13 PM

To: Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news>

Hi Bob,

Thanks for letting me know your deadline. We’re working on it and I hope to have a response for you by 5 p.m.

If I don’t end up sending you something (I’ll be leaving around 4 p.m.), you’ll get a response from Ally.

Thanks,

Cindy

MARCH 31

Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news> Fri, Mar 31, 2017 at 11:50 AM

To: Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org>

Hi,

Any info yet?

Thank-you,

—bob

Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org> Fri, Mar 31, 2017 at 12:05 PM

To: Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news>

Hi Bob,

I’m sorry I haven’t been able to send you anything yet. We’ve been quite busy. I’ll get you something as soon as I can though.

Thanks,

Cindy

APRIL 5

Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news> Wed, Apr 5, 2017 at 9:31 AM

To: Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org>, mloup@bchousing.org

Any info yet?

Mat Loup <mloup@bchousing.org> Wed, Apr 5, 2017 at 9:55 AM

To: Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news>

Nothing yet, I will follow up.

APRIL 10

Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news> Mon, Apr 10, 2017 at 3:40 PM

To: Mat Loup <mloup@bchousing.org>, dfreeman@bchousing.com, Ally Skinner-Reynolds <asreynolds@bchousing.org>,

Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org>

Hello,

I have not had a reply to my queries about the inconsistency in the November 2015 minutes and the loan to Townline.

It has been almost two weeks. Please see the bottom to refresh your memory.

On a separate matter, in the Statements of Financial Information, there was a $3.4 million payment to Central Park Development Ltd., which is a Bosa company. What was that for?

Sincerely,

Bob Mackin

APRIL 11

Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org> Tue, Apr 11, 2017 at 9:31 AM

To: Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news>

Hi Bob,

I’m sorry for the delay on this one. I’ll work to get you something as soon as I can.

Thanks,

Cindy

Cindy Kralj <ckralj@bchousing.org> Tue, Apr 11, 2017 at 3:58 PM

To: Bob Mackin <bob@thebreaker.news>

Hi Bob,

As background information for you, as you know, the provincial government has entered into a writ period. During this period, we do not provide comment on the campaign promises of any political party, or make comments about government programs, policies and services. Further, as part of our obligation to remain impartial during this time, we will not be offering support beyond pointing you to publicly available data or information.

Thank you,

Cindy Kralj

Senior Communications Specialist

Corporate Communications|BC Housing

 

Nov. 23, 2015 BC Housing by BobMackin on Scribd

0 Comments

Bob Mackin More about how the sausage is

m
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