The prospect of my so-called Green MLA, Andrew Weaver, speaking on my behalf or that of other Oak Bay-Gordon Head residents at the Kinder Morgan pipeline hearings fills me with dread.
The last time he claimed to be speaking on our behalf, he voted for the recent BC Liberal budget that enabled cuts to BC Ferries services, raising ferry fares, increased BC Hydro rates and Medical Service premiums.
The first time he spoke on our behalf, he voted for the first BC Liberal budget, his excuse being that the Liberal party had been elected government – and the 70 per cent of his constituents who voted against the Liberals were, I assume, chopped liver?
The BC Liberals are not a minority government – they don’t need his vote of confidence – but despite his constituents, he gives it.
MLA Weaver has careened from supporting the natural flushing of sewage in the Strait of Juan de Fuca school of thought, to seeing the David Black refinery in Kitimat – and its associated oil super tanker traffic – as a worthy compromise. Green election promises or the Green book “policies” be damned.
If it’s all the same to Andrew, I’ll count on our NDP MP Murray Rankin to present an informed, incisive intervention in the hearings as he draws upon several decades of expertise in constitutional and environmental law.
The New Democrats – federally and provincially – provide a clear, coherent opposition to northern refineries and associated oil super tankers, while my Green MLA and my Green MP provide incoherent and contradictory views on a Kitimat refinery and related oil super tankers.
My so-called Green MLA supports, and my Green MP opposes – go figure.
The NDP speaks with a single, clear voice in opposition to BC Ferry service cuts and fare increases, vastly increased BC Hydro rates, and Medical Service premium increases, while the Green party is both for and against this unjust BC Liberal action, thanks to our Oak Bay-Gordon Head MLA going against the Green MP and his constituent’s wishes.
Ron Faris
Saanich
