Dear Ms. James
Leader of the Provincial  NDP and Opposition in the B C legislature.
 
I received this email and immediately thought that there must be a reason that you and the NDP  our BC opposition in the legislature and therefore the watchdogs of government have been silent on this issue.  
Or is it that you and the NDP do not have the ear of the MSM in a province so thoroughly disgusted with its government, and so you decided no action at all is best for your party and the people of BC. 
Does this mean you agree with the Liberals actions?
Does this mean it is OK with you for the Liberals to control Elections BC which is supposed to be impartial?

Subject: Re: Elections BC

Rafe here – 
I received this in the mail and while I can’t vouch for its accuracy, it raises very serious concerns that must be answered and dealt with.
>I have worked at Elections B.C. on and off for many years…since the 1980’s…retired now. I am friends with a number of people who still work there. Elections is a (was a) non-partisan office…it says so on the door. And I know from experience that the measures taken to live up to that were total at every level particularly during the tenure of Harry Neufeld (CEO) and Linda Johnson (the Deputy Chief Electoral Officer). Linda knows the Elections Act inside and out…an extremely knowledgeable and competent person who has been with Elections for 28 years..the last 19 of them as Deputy CEO. The appointment of Craig James to replace Harry was a mystery. He has no experience with Elections or the Election Act yet here he is…the CEO. (It is now clear he was hired to “clean house”). James called a staff meeting at EBC and said that he had come from the Legislature and a meeting with officials there and Vaughn Palmer (why him?)….he announced that it was Linda’s last day. The staff was stunned. Could this have anything to do with the fact that the Liberals spent $780,000 on brochures to sell the HST and then weren’t allowed to send them out because they hadn’t followed the rules in the Election Act and Linda told them so? This is obviously a revenge firing. The time line is revealing. What is truly amazing is that there is was no reporting of this in mainstream media. This is outrageous. This Liberal government is corrupt and ruthless…if I didn’t know this before I sure do now. It is a mystery to me why the NDP have not picked up on this abuse of power by the Liberals and demanded an investigation and let the public know how despicable this is. This is BC’s democratic process being dismantled to suit the governing Liberal Party. The silence in the mainstream media is deafening. Craig James is “restructuring” Elections BC at the behest of the Liberals…so much for being non-partisan. The Legislative Committee asked Elections BC for advice on the HST mess. The Liberals didn’t want the Deputy Chief Electoral Office answering questions about a referendum..like how much would it cost..who decides on the wording etc. Linda J got fired before she could answer this…James conveniently went to Africa the next day after the Committee met and wanted to ask this. He doesn’t know anyway.
>

 
Ms. James, ordinary people are fed up and want to know what they can do to get our politicians at all levels to listen to us.  They do not believe you are interested in what we have to say, and so far you are proving that to be true.
 
Campbell sits there with his stupid little drunk’s smile and manipulates you, the legislative process and the courts, selling off or destroying the commons set up so carefully over the years, and what do you do for the people to stop that?
 
He has absolutely no interest in what the people want, never has and never will.  His contempt of all the people of BC is astounding and yet we hear nothing of value from you.
 
Are you just waiting for Bill Vander Zalm and the people of BC to do your work for you?
 
How is that a private person who is no longer in politics can do so much for the people of BC whilst you who are there in the thick of things can do so little?
 
You are part of the scene.
You have the power to do things. 
Yes you do damn it.
Do you not have the will?
 
Anyway, I believe that because of your lack of action on so many issues you will face stiffer opposition from the BC Refed party than the so called Fiberal party in the next election, and I for one am very seriously thinking of running in this next provincial election for them or as an independent. The Refeds are for the people to control the provincial, and eventually federal governments, not the corporations, unions and special interest groups that run things now.
 
I may be old but my grand children deserve better than the shambolic mess we have in our governments today. If you younger people who are already there will not deal with it, then old foggies like me must re-gird our loins and step in again.
 
 
Jeremy Arney 

Sent by email to all Canadian MPs 18th Sept 2010

Ladies and Gentlemen,

We have reached a state here in Canada which has passed all logic into a realm even beyond the dysfunctional.

The House of Commons in the Canadian Parliament is no longer even interested in the views of the people of Canada, nor is it responding to its duties.

It needs not be pointed out that our Prime Minister, even though he dictates from a minority Reform / Alliance coalition government masquerading as a Conservative party to be acceptable to some 33% of the more wealthy Canadians who bother to vote, has totally sold out to the corporations of the world.

The sad part is that there are none of you willing to tell him or your party leaders that enough is enough. Maybe you don’t see it or don’t want to see it .

A small country called Bolivia showed us that it is possible to recover control of our Parliament from a corporate dictatorship, and that all we need to do is to nationalise you as if you were an asset which heaven knows you are not.

If and when that happens and we start to regain control of our resources by nationalisation instead of them being owned by foreign companies which strip us of all monies made from those resources, and we start to use the Bank of Canada instead of multi national ‘compounding interest only’ commercial bankes; when we cancel all the terrible trade deals and retake our country for the people; provide education, health care and old folks security and aid to starving and sick people around the world, in a totally affordable way, then we will be re-inventing our forefathers’ dreams for this country.

Can any one of you honestly look yourselves in the mirror and tell yourselves that you are working for the best interests of your constituents unfettered by absolute party dictates?

If you can, please identify yourself as you may be the backbone of the future government we the people seek.

Your leaders have surrender their souls to the “money men” and must be caste aside like worn out shoes and replaced with leaders who have all the peoples of Canada in the forefront of their hearts and minds and deeds, and to be willing to share what we in this incredible country have with those who have not.

It is possible to have a peaceful freedom loving country with plenty for everyone and some to spare for those who have not once we do away with rule by the bottom line mantra of the corporate world. There is plenty of room for profit, but no need for unfettered greed.

Mother earth, all the species who dwell on her, including humans are looking to governments to start the rescue process.

Canada is not part of that process but it should be and can be.

Will you be part of the renewal of Canada or are you too enmeshed in the dysfunctionality?

There is a new session starting soon, please stand up and be counted as a supporter of Canada and all the Canadian People or step down and let someone who can be counted upon take your place.

Jeremy Arney

To Gordon Campbell.

I have been a BC resident on and off since 1967. I have seen many changes since then, most of which were designed to be of benefit to the people of BC. I have seen BC grow from being a place of real beauty, with friendly people and generous help being the normal.

But now in the last few years I have watched in horror and disgust as you have dismantled our social services, have reduced business taxes to the point where there is not enough money coming in to provide what few services we have left. Soon there will not be enough profit for the companies that now run our health and that soon will have control of BC

You have openly permitted the land itself to be destroyed by mining, drilling for oil and gas, pipe lines and hydro transmission lines to service these ventures, and the destruction of lakes and rivers being a part of your plan, not as you claim preservation of the same.

Lakes are to be converted to tailing ponds, rivers are being destroyed under the guise of clean energy production and how you can claim that as being green is beyond me.

Our forestry section is destroyed thank you, along with the satellite processing mills. Raw logs leave our shores at no profit to BC and we have to buy them back after they have been used in a manufacturing process which could so easily have been here not overseas. For instance presto logs come from Washington State or Saskatchewan.

Our wild fish are being destroyed by your Norwegian friends, and you are planning to drill for oil and gas off our most beautiful and dangerous coast line with no thought to the first nations people or the wild life which will be contaminated when the inevitable super tanker or drilling rig oil spill takes place…oh yes, what will you say to your Norwegian buddies then as their farms and fish turn black?

BC is now the place to be for the corporate friends you have, not for the people who are the brunt of your contempt and dismissive arrogance.

Even this latest undemocratic HST nonsense has been defended by your ministers in the legislature as being of benefit to endless lists of corporate or business organisations but none of them mention how the people will benefit and that is because they will not. This is further proof to me that you do not care about the people of BC. Your claim that trickle down employment will take place is as ridiculous as the theory was when Regan tried it – it simply does not work.

I have heard that you talk about your grandchildren and what you will be leaving for them. If you really had them in mind to live here you would be more careful of this incredible piece of the world.
I have this constant nightmare in which all the people of BC will be servants of General Electric, Monsanto and Merk, lining up at the end of the work shift to collect their meal slips for their families for the day. No work -no food. This is what you appear to want to happen, and I feel sure that you have already made arrangements not to have your family living here when it does.

Perhaps Hawaii with a constant supply of Mai Tais to be sipped as you reel in the money from your directorships eh?

I actually feel sorry for you because your legacy is one of total destruction, not building one damn thing for the people of BC who employ you.

Some sort of luck to you

Jeremy Arney

Omar Khadr is now on trial for war crimes.

Killing is the main purpose of war. One side tries to kill the other. It has been this way for ever. The purpose of the war is not important to soldiers, but killing the enemy is as a means of surviving.
So what is so surprising about Omar Khadr ?
Well, he was a boy of 15 – maybe the case could be made for him being almost a man- but classified by the conventions of war as a child soldier. Even though he was shot in the back (twice we are told by a brave opponent no doubt), and blinded in one eye, and buried in rubble he, just like so many Canadian soldiers before him, managed to take out an opponent. That is war is it not and therefore fair.
No it is not because first it was not really war but an occupation by foreign armies, and the soldier he took out was an American and that is not allowed.
I know nothing about the American who died, how many civilians he might have killed or even if one or both of the bullets fired into Omar’s back were his.
He was a soldier and therefore immune to prosecution from killing innocents, but Omar is charged with a war crime because he had the ability to kill an American soldier who was attacking him.
Something about this picture stinks so highly I have trouble in staying calm when I think about it.
Well over a million civilians are reported to have been killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to the best of my knowledge not one single soldier, airman, or navy man from the invading armies has been charged with murder, never mind war crimes.
I do agree that some contractors got their wrists slapped in Iraq once but they are hired assassins anyway and not real soldiers.
So please tell me why when those responsible for this whole mess can come and go as they please here in Canada, or just sit in Texas drinking and counting their oil money, our Reform / Alliance coalition government allows one Canadian child to be made into a war criminal.
What are you frightened of Harper et al?
Omar Khadr was frightened too but he fought and now the USA military system is going to crucify him and you sit there in Ottawa not even wringing your hands.
When I came here 43 years ago to make a new life and raise a family of proud Canadians I had no idea I would be so ashamed of a Canadian government who do not and will not answer to the Canadian people. Those same people who are served by a complacently pathetic media and therefore are themselves indifferent through lack of knowledge.
But that is how I feel now.
As a foot note I see that Judge Patrick Parrish is of the opinion that Omar was not tortured. Well Patrick how would you feel if you were told in your country club locker room that there were some big black men in the showers who were going to rape you because you had made a bad decision and lied on the bench even if you had not?
Maybe you are gay and would think that would be very exciting. Who knows? Most people would consider that mental torture.
By the way I object to the concept that only big black men rape other men. In my view it is more likely to be some ignorant homophobic hillbilly from the religious south eastern states of America.
Jeremy Arney

Dear Barbara Yaffe,
Vancouver Sun.
I read your piece called “Harper must not dilute sovereignty message” with some curiosity, and then searched for and found a 39 page (not 13) paper called Statement on Canada’s Arctic Foreign Policy which must be fairly recent as it mentioned the Gulf of Mexico and most of the other things you mentioned in your article too.
Actually it mentioned sovereignty 27 times in 39 pages which includes 3 opening cover pages.
This I found this VERY interesting as Harper has announced his intent to trade Canada’s sovereignty off for some trade deals in order to become part of the global economy.
He actually said it was vital for our survival to do so.
Interesting oxymoron even for him.
Re America being “premier partner in the arctic and our goal is a more strategic engagement of Arctic issues”, might I suggest a look at the softwood lumber agreements, FTA, NAFTA, and the recent deal which gave our Canadian companies 5 days to bid on USA stimulus contracts and gave US companies 2 years to rape our provinces, municipalities and even our school boards. Done of course during the proroguing of parliament so there was no oversight.
By the way it may not have mentioned in the piece you read that there will be no drilling in the Beaufort Sea until 2104, then I assume BP will get the green light on their leases.
Sovereignty? I think that is right up there with democracy, freedom of speech and the right to protest, a thing of the past with this Reform / Alliance coalition government masquerading under the Conservative name.
Regards
Jeremy Arney

When I was a little boy, many more years ago now than I care to remember, I was taught that there were certain people of the community who could always be relied upon to help in a time of need. Who were there to protect the innocent and lost or hurt  and to stop the wrongdoers.

They wore funny hats back in those days with rounded high tops and peaks back and front, they carried only a whistle, and a truncheon and maybe some hand cuffs.

Some walked their beat, some rode bicycles if they were country based, and some drove around in black Wolsley cars. All were known and respected.

They were the bobbies in the 40s and 50s of the last century in England, and their purpose was to serve and protect the citizens of the country.

I did respect them and listened to them when they asked me questions or answered mine to them. They were people just like I was and I always felt protected when they were around. I believe being a bobby back then was a calling, and a very respected profession.

It has changed.

Now I have grandchildren of my own and the very last people to whom I would recommend they turn to for help are the present day police.  Yes there are probably some with the old concept of being a policeman, but I would not like to trust my luck in finding one when I needed him (or her).

 All it takes is to see what todays policeman has become to see what has happened. I mean today, even if you surrender to their yells and screams to “get out of the car now”, “get down on your face”, “shut t.. …. up”, “put your hands behind your back”, “don’t talk unless I ask you a question” ,  you are still likely to be roughed up.

 We have all seen videos of police beating up on unarmed protestors peacefully demonstrating or singing the national anthem, of young men who have had too much to drink surrendering to the cops and being repeatedly kneed in the back and kicked even though they were obeying the commands and not resisting at all. We have seen tear gas and mace and tasering without real provocation, just because it can be done. We have read stories of young girls under the influence and scared being hand and foot cuffed and left in a cold cell all night.  We have heard of young and old, beaten in jails and left to die. Or a new arrival to the country being tasered to death by four of our bravest and best.

 The stories go on.

 So what’s it all about you might ask?

 I can only guess but I am pretty sure I have it right.  The police of today are semi military units with noise and water cannons, tear gas, plastic hand ties to be pulled too tight, dogs and horses. Their major concern is crowd control. It doesn’t matter if that crowd is one person or hundreds, they must be controlled and not allowed to speak their mind.  Personal freedom means nothing to this new policeman, unless it is their freedom to do the maximum damage they can and get away with it.

 What is the purpose of this? 

 I think we are being prepared for martial law, not just here in Canada and the USA but worldwide. 

Oh yeah now we get to the conspiracy theory stupidity I hear you say. 

Well maybe. 

But perhaps you have a different explanation.

Perhaps you can explain the anger and hate all over the faces of some of the so called “plain clothes” police at the G20 fiasco.

Perhaps you can even explain why plain clothes police were mixed in with the riot police.  Seems as if that would be a perfect mix for provocation to me. In the videos I saw they appeared from the crowd of protestors or on lookers, not from the police ranks and they had a free pass through the bicycle barricades and permission to use their batons on whomever they chose.

In my little town of Victoria BC, the police are as violent as I have mentioned above, in fact several of the examples are from here. This is a small city of old people, government workers, students, tourists and young families. We have enough problems with unemployment, under employment, sick and homeless people and we do not need a hostile police force that when they act as above, are held blameless and allowed back out again to repeat.

What is the answer?  

Well I think that lies with the rag tag collection of puppet politicians we keep electing time and again who encourage this lack of respect for the people because they share that lack of respect.  As long as we do not hold them accountable, as long as we do not hold our courts, and particularly our judges, accountable to the law,  then we are totally responsible for what we get.

 So I will not tell my grandchildren to rely on and trust the police until such time as the courts, politicians and police show they have earned that trust again.

 Too bad as the old system worked well for all of us who called ourselves human beings.

July 2010
Dear Editor,
National Post Thursday March 11th.

I found a back issue of your publication and it was fascinating to read the various articles published on this day about the Bank of Canada.

There was a series about the list of governors, a suggestion that perhaps R P Bennett was not all that bad after all, and another libertarian biased piece called “75 years of funny money”.

Interesting to note that nowhere in those musings was it mentioned what the Bank of Canada was responsible for and did for the country between 1935 and 1974. During this period the cost of WW11 was paid for and the social network of Canada was established and paid for by the Bank of Canada at virtually no expense to the people of Canada. Because all the money required for the establishment of such things that we used to enjoy such as the public medical system, pensions, road systems across Canada, to mention but a few of those social networks created with money from the Bank of Canada at very low rates of interest. That interest was paid to the shareholder of the Bank of Canada, which is the Minister of Finance on behalf of all Canadians.

Unlike all other Central Banks the BOC was and is not yet a private corporate affair, and was not (and yet is not) operated as such as inferred in your articles. It is possible that this dysfunctional government might try to sell it, we don’t know. It was not mentioned either that the reason for the change from using the Bank of Canada to finance the country and to create money for Canadians was because the Bank of International Settlements told us that this was not a fair business practice to shut out commercial banks from this potentially highly profitable process of loan and money creation. Regretfully our politicians of the time didn’t have the balls to tell the BIS where to go and instead started using the commercial banks to finance the operation of Canada, and allowed them to create money that did not and still does not exist.
Thus we went from a national debt of some $80 million owed to ourselves to what we have to day which is about $520 billion owed to commercial banks at a compounding interest rate. Those banks are paying their CEOs in the many billions in bonuses alone each year. And even a simple man like me can see why.

I wonder if anyone knows how or has the ability to calculate just how much interest has been paid since 1975 to those commercial banks which are sucking the very life blood out of Canada. How much good could that money (even if fake) have done for the country instead of taking us into an every increasing debt.?

This may be an oversimplification of the facts, but it is a lot closer to the real truth of the fall of the Bank of Canada into an international “yes sir Mr. President” bank so much so that it is considered by your writers to be just another central bank instead of a Canadian jewel.

So happy 75th indeed Bank of Canada, and how I wish we were using you for the reason you were created. To Finance Canada and pay us back as we paid you back.

Jeremy Arney

Is this the Canada we want?

As I read some of the newspapers, watch the TV and listen to the talk radio stations, from here in Canada and from the USA, I am struck by a common trend:

People no longer matter.

I know there are those who will say – where have you been?  But I have been here watching and fuming but I have also realized that especially our present Federal Government and the BC legislature have openly lost interest in the people in favour of big business. At least in the past there has been some pretense, but now they do not care that we know it, they thumb their collective snouts at us.

 The word contempt comes to mind

 It is not a new and sudden thing for sure, but in the last few months it seems to have been ramped up that the people do not matter, that the Canadian Parliament can be made dysfunctional by stupidity and that it is quite alright for “officials” to lie to us, pretend we are not here, or even herd us like cattle as was shown in Toronto a few weeks ago.

 Actually cattle probably get treated much better than those who simply wanted to make a peaceful statement, and were not allowed to do so. My daughter, who was in Seattle (unknown to me at the time) for the WTO demonstration a few years ago, knows well the smell of tear gas and that allowed her to escape the evil clutches of the Toronto security thugs (both those overdressed in riot gear and those with their shirt tails hanging out) who were supposed to protect everyone against terrorists and chose instead to attack peaceful demonstrators singing “Oh Canada”.  Did anyone else notice the ugliness and hate on the face of that plain clothes straw haired woman cop as she swung her baton? After allowing mayhem to be done by what we now believe to be their brothers in arms the previous day, to attack the citizenry in such a fashion can only be called stupid and cowardly, and any loss of faith in the police agencies in Canada was well earned that day.

 We are told that these men and women were just doing what they were told, and that makes it even worse as they knew what they were doing was wrong. Let’s not even get into how much they were paid to assist in the suspension of any civil liberties Canadians think they might have.

 But these events are really only the surface that the media glom onto rather than tell us the real story.

 Our federal government is comprised of a rag tag bunch of Alliance/Reform coalition politicians, who it seems are bound to follow like lemmings as their senior idiot sells Canada to who ever wants to buy us. It is bad enough that many years ago Mulroney sold us out to the Americans and then Chrétien made it worse, now Harper wants what is left to be purchased by EU countries, Colombia and if there are any pickings left I am sure he has another buyer in mind. 

Remember the throne speech : “Canada is open for business” translation means open for investment, means open for buyouts.

Since Mulroney’s original FTA deal we have steadily lost our ability to control our companies and production of anything as manufacturing leaves our homeland for cheaper countries. This of course looses us jobs of any value, and this government is happy to replace them with part time jobs at such places as Wendy’s or Wal-Mart.  Benefits, once part of a job package, are now almost unheard of except in upper management or civil service positions.

 All governing parties are making the claim that they are reducing taxes and what they really mean is that they are infinitesimally reducing the personal income tax of lower income earners.  At the same time other taxes are rocketing up and corporate taxes are due to come down again. The argument is that keeping corporate taxes high will stop prices from coming down for goods and services, and will stop future expansion of businesses. That argument is about as sound as me holding a full gown elephant over my head with one arm.

How can anyone justify reducing taxes for a company which has just made record profits and paid huge bonuses to the senior directors?  They need help?

If one follows the money, which is generally good advice, it takes us, or I anyway, to assume some very ugly things about our politicians and their personal financial healths.

 Over the last 70 years a social network was put in place so that there would not be people without the means of living a meaningful life. These services have been so eroded since Reagan and Mulroney got together that we now have a homeless and sick population in Canada which is totally unacceptable to anyone but the heartless corporate morons who run our governments.

 This headlong rush into trade deals with all other countries does not benefit you and I one bit.  Yes it benefits the bigger companies, which will be purchased, gutted and then abandoned along with anyone who worked there. How exactly does that benefit the person on the street? How does it for instance benefit the Colombian peon? Be sure that the CEOs and their friends in government will make out very well.

We already know that the NAFTA ruined the Mexican corn farmers because Yankee corn flooded the market down there at a deliberate knock down price designed to destroy the Mexican farmers…thus the price of Yankee corn could go up again…strangely benefiting  companies such as Goldman Sachs with their futures games, but not the American corn farmer.

 In spite of all this Harper wants to bash on with the great Canadian Giveaway on the backs of what he considers to be great Canadian accomplishments recently; namely the disruption of the Copenhagen Climate Control summit in order to protect the Alberta tar sands; the  winter Olympic financial fiasco  which was a great success thanks to the athletes not him, and the non-meetings of the G8 and G20 which as far as I can tell accomplished nothing inside the meetings thanks to him, but established the future of the Canadian Police reaction to any peaceful public action by Canadians. Peaceful demonstrations are not to be tolerated but of course the police and their cohorts can do what they want. Just a few days ago the Liberal government of Ontario arranged  the  arrest of people peacefully demonstrating in a government building about the cuts in funding for the physically handicapped…  Imagine, riot police charging wheelchair inhabitants with batons raised and then arresting them for being in a public building to present an invoice for lost funding.!…that’s the modern Canadian policeman?

 Is this the Canada we want?

Not for me.

Who will take it back for us?

Liberals and NDP are struggling with realising that they are useless as long as they vote the party line because I suspect their leaders are bought and paid for and will not look after the people ;  the Bloc are interested in rescuing Quebec from the demise of Canada, so who do we have in our corner?

I really think that the answer is to eliminate all political parties, including those on the fringe such as the Green Party and Canadian Action Party, the latter of which has some absolutely great ideas that cannot be put into place as long as corporation controlled parties run our lives.

Maybe it’s the time for the elimination of all parties and to have 308 independents in Ottawa.

Now that would be something and yes I have some ideas about that I will get to later.

Enough for now

Jeremy Arney

With the recent airing of “British Columbia Tax Revolt” by Ed Watson on CPAC, and the re-run of Jack Etkin and Steve Poole’s Face to Face with Gwen Barlee of WCWC on our local Shaw community channel, I have realized something temporarily hidden from my consciousness.

Gordon Campbell is continuing his relentless destruction of British Columbia.

Whilst we are all wondering at and rejoicing in the HST rebellion, the reason for which Campbell accepts full responsibility (CPAC interview), his incredibly destructive “B C Green Plan” continues to destroy our environment. This plan is so green that California will not buy hydro from us created under this green plan, because it does not meet their environmental standards

By now everyone is aware of the problems with the open fish farms on our BC coast partly because, a few years too late, The Times Colonist has suddenly awoken to the fact that we and our wild fish are under attack. It seems it almost takes a court order to get information on anything from this BC government, and so they can hide whatever they so choose from the people’s prying and inquisitive eyes. Alexandra Morton aided and abetted by such people as Rafe Mair and The Tyee have been doing their best to make this an issue, and indeed Ms. Morton has succeeded in getting to court about this, in spite of Gordo and Ms. Shea the federal oceans and fisheries minister. I can only assume they both have hidden agendas, which usually means money is at stake.

Highway 37 is to be electrified.

Is that good news or what? On first glance it seems to be good news for to the few homes and communities on the highway, but of course Gordo has something else in mind.

Coal mines, yes that’s right coal mines.

In this time when the whole world is asking for less harmful emissions, and Gordo is claiming “green” he is electrifying h/way #37 to allow coal mines to have subsidized electricity! There is also the Red Chris Mine up there with its toxic tailing pond,( to be built there I am assured instead of using the local lakes) which will depend on “free” hydro to get going and operate. The hydro transmission lines will by themselves have a huge environmental impact even without the emissions of the magnetic fields to harm wildlife and humans too…..Tsawwassen anyone.

Where is the payment of all this extra high usage of hydro coming from? You and I is the answer.

To recap a bit about BC Hydro. A crown corporation which is a jewel in the BC firmament right? A crown corporation which has in the past averaged $300 million a year into the BC bank account, but this year cannot give even one penny because of bad contracts to be mentioned in a moment. Once the asset debt ratio exceeds 80% – 20% by law no money can be paid to the sole shareholder – BC.

Not so much a jewel any more as an opaque piece of coloured glass.

Early in his reign King Campbell decided to sell B C Hydro and indeed he did succeed in getting rid of the accounting side to Venture, an American company, before it was discovered and then, following the outcry, came the Heritage Act which does not allow for the sale of BC Hydro. In other words King Gordo said “if I can’t do it no one can”. But that is not what he trying now. Instead he has issued orders through regulations (the easy and hidden way to get the dirty deeds done now) that will force BC Hydro into bankruptcy thus allowing it to be sold off in a fire sale.

Wait a minute you say, how can he do that? BC Hydro is not allowed to develop Ruin of the River power, but must instead buy power from huge corporations that can, such giants as General Electric (the world’s largest armaments manufacturer) at a price which is about twice what can be expected from selling that power. I am not an economist but even I can see that if you buy for $2 and sell for $1 you will not be in business for very long. We, the gullible people of BC, will be expected to support this.

Really!

Is there no one to object to all this? Yes there is or rather there was. B C Utilities Commission which has the mandate of overseeing such entities as B C Hydro did in fact tell Gordo that the whole R O R concept was not sustainable either on the production or financial side nor the environment side. The result is that the BCUC along with the BC Environment Ministry have been gutted and caste aside and now are virtually non entities.

If you want more information check out the websites below and make sure to watch the Damien Gillis documentaries.

http://rafeonline.com

http://thetye.ca

http://www.ourrivers.ca

http://www.watershed-watch.org

It is also interesting to me that two of the main proponents leading the charge on behalf of the people of BC are Rafe Mair and Bill Vander Zalm, neither of whom wants to do anything but sit back and enjoy their retirement. Come on BC lets do our part and allow them to do that.

Jeremy Arney