Powell River-Sunshine Coast has been getting province-wide attention heading into the final week of the election campaign thanks to a local woman’s brush with Liberal leader Christy Clark, and a comment from Green leader Andrew Weaver during the TV debate. Strategic voting also emerged as a local issue and a union representing workers at Shorncliffe and Totem Lodge is challenging claims in a Liberal campaign ad.
Controversy over Wilson ads on seniors care
Throughout the campaign, NDP incumbent Nicholas Simons and Liberal Mathew Wilson have traded blows on the contentious issue of Vancouver Coastal Health’s (VCH) plan to purchase long-term beds in a private, for-profit facility while closing the beds at Shorncliffe and Totem Lodge.
Wilson contends Simons hasn’t done enough on the file. In a release critical of Simons’ record, Wilson said a petition opposing the deal tabled in the Legislature by Simons just before the election was ineffective. “It was disqualified. A lot of people think their voice was heard in the Legislature, but in fact it wasn’t.”
Simons has called Wilson a “perfect Christy candidate” for saying in a campaign ad that he negotiated an arrangement with VCH to repurpose Shorncliffe and Totem Lodge when VCH had already said that publicly, including at the Sept. 15, 2016 meeting of the Regional Hospital District (see Coast Reporter, Sept. 23, 2016).
Wilson told Coast Reporter at the time that he stood by the statement, saying, “When it was clear that our MLA was not prepared to pick up the phone, I decided to help find a solution, which I have.”
Now, claims made by Wilson in a more recent ad are being questioned by the Hospital Employees Union (HEU), which represents workers at Shorn-cliffe and Totem and several private facilities in the province.
Part of the ad reads, “Workers should not be worried. Wage rates will be the same as they are for Shorncliffe and Totem Lodge. Any other information being circulated is untrue.”
In a May 3 press release, HEU secretary-business manager Jennifer Whiteside called the statement “irresponsible.” The union says a fact sheet given to Shorncliffe and Totem staff by Trellis Seniors Services revealed care aides will see wage cuts and inferior benefits. “Care aides currently earn $23.48 an hour at the two publicly-run facilities,” the release said. “According to Trellis’s fact sheet, those same care aides will earn between $18 and $19 an hour – that’s if they’re rehired by the company.”
Whiteside said, “Wilson supports the BC Liberals’ privatization agenda but seems unwilling to own up to its consequences for seniors and health care workers.”
Green leader says Simons skipped a vote to avoid going against his party
Following the April 26 televised leaders’ debate, Wilson took a shot at Simons, using ammunition handed to him by Green leader Andrew Weaver.
In an exchange with NDP leader John Horgan, Weaver criticized NDP MLAs for voting in lockstep. “To see some of your NDP MLAs standing up and voting for increasing thermal coal expansions out of Vancouver, against what they believe, or to see Nick Simons not show in the room because he couldn’t bear to stand up and vote … it is a bit rich for you to have the audacity to criticize my voting record,” Weaver told Horgan.
Wilson issued a press release demanding an explanation from Simons “on the comment by Green Party leader Andrew Weaver that NDP incumbent Nicholas Simons often leaves the Legislature to avoid voting on issues he feels are controversial,” calling it a question of character.
The Hansard record shows Simons missed several votes during the 51 days MLAs sat in 2016. Simons told Coast Reporter, “Weaver did not say what Wilson alleges. Weaver referred to one vote. It concerned a Green Party amendment to a budget… If I missed other votes last year, it was because I was recovering from major surgery for a very serious ear condition, cholesteatoma. I was away from work and votes in the Legislature for seven weeks.”
Officials with the Green campaign confirmed that Weaver’s comment during the debate was referring to only one vote.
Darwin calls strategic voting talk ‘arrogant, fear based’
Polls released this week from Ipsos and Forum Research suggest the provincial race is getting tighter, and some NDP supporters, as well as Simons himself, have been taking to social media trying to make the case that Green support could split the vote in key ridings and open the door to a Liberal win.
The vote-splitting argument was one of the first things Green candidate Kim Darwin addressed during a recent interview for the Coast Reporter’s podcast.
“I thought with what happened in the [2015] federal election, strategic voting would not ever raise its ugly head again, but that’s raised its head a bit, and it’s highly unfortunate,” Darwin said.
“It’s not based in fact and it’s rather arrogant of the NDP supporters who are spreading that myth. It’s fear based,” she continued. “In fact, when Andrew Weaver won his seat in Oak Bay-Gordon Head he won it from a sitting Liberal cabinet minister that had been in for 17 years, which would lead you to believe he got a boatload of Liberal votes… The last time that we had a real, full campaign here on the Sunshine Coast was in 2005 when Adrian Carr ran. There was 73 per cent voter turnout… Where the Greens run a full campaign we bring out 10 to 15 per cent more voters – people who wouldn’t otherwise show up to vote.”
In what will likely be the only appearance by a party leader in the riding during the campaign, Weaver is scheduled to stop by Darwin’s campaign headquarters May 5 at 3 p.m. for a “mini rally.”
I am Linda
Sunshine Coast resident Linda Higgins found herself at the centre of the campaign, after going up to Clark at a North Vancouver grocery store where the Liberal leader was doing some main-streeting on April 27 and telling Clark she would never vote for her. Before Higgins could say much more, Clark responded with, “You don’t have to. That’s why we live in a democracy,” and moved on. As Clark walked away Higgins can be heard saying, “Thank goodness. Hopefully you won’t get elected in.”
The encounter was captured by TV cameras, and the video quickly spread and spawned the social media hashtag #IamLinda, which people have been using to explain why they aren’t voting Liberal either.
Prominent Liberal supporters, including campaign director Laura Miller, claimed the encounter was set up by the NDP. Higgins has said publicly, several times, that it wasn’t.
Speaking on Vancouver radio station CFOX Monday, Clark said, looking back on the incident, she should have stopped to talk with Higgins, and BC Liberal Party officials told The Globe and Mail they were “happy to stand corrected” on the claims Higgins was an NDP plant.
Advanced voting turnout strong
Voting day is May 9, but there’s already been strong turnout at advance polls. According to Elections BC, 2,380 people in Powell River-Sunshine Coast cast ballots on April 29 and 30. That’s about six per cent of the eligible voters.
Advance polls were also open May 3 in Roberts Creek, and will be open May 4 from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. at the Pender Harbour Community Hall, and May 5 and 6 at the Sechelt Legion.
Visit www.elections.bc.ca for a complete list of polling places, or check the “Where to Vote” card that was sent out to all registered voters last month. Elections BC’s toll free line is 1-800-661-8683.
