Western Standard - BC Leaders Debate

00:00:00.640 i am a publisher of the western standard um we've just been watching the bc leaders debate

00:00:09.200 and sean you need to put a headphone in your ear you at least one of you but i think it's sean uh

00:00:14.880 you've been watching the bc leaders debate and uh we're here tonight uh i'm here tonight with

00:00:20.400 alex mccall uh columnist for the western standard and uh sean elaine uh one of our digital uh online

00:00:30.000 uh experts for the western standard uh he hails from uh he'll correct me if i'm wrong but

00:00:37.040 from vancouver british columbia he is uh one of the leading british columbians in the western

00:00:43.440 standard right now of course i'm here from calgary and uh so is alex mccall so uh guys uh uh welcome

00:00:51.760 tonight uh you've been watching a lot uh maybe just first introduce yourself make sure we can

00:00:58.000 everybody can hear everybody first well i guess i'm in the middle so i'll go first i'm alex mccall

00:01:04.240 i'm in calgary as derek mentioned and i'm the defense columnist with the western standard

00:01:09.440 i i hope my uh sound is okay on this i did turn my volume down hopefully that helps

00:01:15.120 my name is sean elaine i grew up uh about an hour outside of vancouver i lived in alberta for about

00:01:23.600 10 years and but now i'm back uh in bc again been here for over a year now and i do the uh digital

00:01:34.000 social media uh and some digital marketing uh for the western standard very good all right guys well

00:01:40.640 we've been uh listening to uh the debate uh for the last hour and a half uh from between what i think

00:01:49.040 seems like four candidates uh without stealing alex's thunder it seems like uh four liberal

00:01:54.960 candidates but uh why don't i open it up for you guys for your initial thoughts uh before we dive

00:02:01.680 down into any of the details about specifics they said uh maybe just uh let's uh just give me your

00:02:08.400 very highlights about uh the evening uh who won who lost uh if there is any of that

00:02:14.080 you first alex oh sure uh so yeah i remember halfway through the the debate i think i texted

00:02:23.040 derrick uh it's like there are three liberals on stage playing no true scotsman and arguing

00:02:28.880 who's the the real liberal in the room and who's the real leftist that you should all trust and vote

00:02:33.280 for uh so there wasn't that great of a diversity of ideas although on the overall winner uh i think they

00:02:40.720 all did a fairly good job but uh premier horgan was clearly appealing to uh the green party supporters

00:02:48.800 and saying you know vote for me i agree with a lot of the things the green party is doing and that way

00:02:54.800 we can keep out the big scary capitalist liberals who are going to destroy the province uh and based

00:03:00.960 on where the polls are today and the success of the conservative party in british sorry in new

00:03:06.000 brunswick in their recent snap election i think horgan probably did a good job and probably won

00:03:13.360 yeah you know i agree with that actually i wrote that exactly and here in my notes is

00:03:17.120 horgan seemed to be going after the greens uh the most and looking for that green vote uh in fact

00:03:23.200 i thought wilkinson didn't get that much uh time or time at all and speaking time i'm sure the they'll

00:03:29.360 come out with the speaking of the amount of time spoken uh between the but i i i didn't think wilkinson

00:03:36.560 fared that that well just because he i don't think he asserted himself much and really got his in front

00:03:42.160 of there as much but maybe that's because horgan i found him mostly going after greens to get those

00:03:46.320 green votes yeah uh yeah alex i didn't mean to steal your point it was a very good point but my only

00:03:52.640 disagreement with there being three liberals on stage i'd say there was four liberals on stage

00:03:56.800 uh the moderator i think uh what's her name um satchi curl if i'm not mispronouncing that she 0.84

00:04:05.520 i think she did a good job in terms of keeping order of the debate it was certainly a lot less 0.72

00:04:10.960 chaotic than said the u.s presidential debate with uh one angry man and one senile man but

00:04:18.560 she did a good job keeping order but she was wildly involved in the debate the questions i found

00:04:24.320 were particularly ideologically slanted to the far even radical left she she even went so far as to

00:04:31.600 accuse all three candidates of having white privilege now that is possible uh because the theory you know

00:04:39.600 intersectional ideology doesn't judge people as individuals it judges them on a on a on a hierarchy or a

00:04:45.760 pyramid of grievances and victimhood uh so if you subscribe to intersectionality all three do have

00:04:53.680 white privilege regardless of how woke either of them any of them might be but um but maybe give

00:05:00.880 some thoughts on the the moderator and uh and the role she played let's start with you sean well uh

00:05:09.520 yeah i i did find a lot of the questions in particular were for uh environmental or climate change

00:05:18.240 and uh i know that there is definitely a lot of people that care about that but i'm thinking right now

00:05:23.120 uh severely normal people they're most worried about jobs and economy i mean who just said the

00:05:29.520 other the world health organization just said the other day in the last seven months the poverty rate

00:05:33.360 has doubled and uh you know i i think when you start losing your home and you start losing your car

00:05:41.440 because of what's going on then the environmental your environmental uh priorities they start to go down

00:05:48.160 the list and and uh when you're looking for uh you know get enough money for when you're going to eat

00:05:53.520 next that becomes a little more of a priority uh alex your thoughts on the moderator uh well there was

00:06:02.960 one question which was basically almost a minute of insults towards the liberal leader and followed by

00:06:10.640 don't you think you're a terrible paternalistic white man or something along those lines and i i i just

00:06:18.160 was shocked i was i've never thought i would ever see a debate moderator uh take such a personal 0.60

00:06:24.800 attack against a sitting politician i understand from a little research that there have been some

00:06:31.680 there were some legitimate critiques uh of the opposition leader uh but to see them kind of

00:06:37.840 summarize so aggressively and then phrased in a don't you think you're terrible for having done this

00:06:44.080 kind of way was a little bit of a shock uh and clearly i'm not an unbiased moderated question

00:06:50.560 yeah uh it was it was quite something um i think if we're going to come up with a headline for the

00:06:57.760 debate we're going to call it two and a half white men

00:07:02.880 uh yeah i i i think you both have a point uh i i think uh andrew wilkinson so kind of coming back to

00:07:10.480 the overall your overall impressions andrew wilkinson i i mean uh from my own perspective and i think yours

00:07:18.800 seemed like the least crazy in the uh in the cuckoo's nest but it's still pretty pretty wild a real

00:07:28.160 shocking well should be shocking but isn't to those of us who follow this but a real shocking lack of

00:07:33.920 any ideological or philosophical diversity you know you had labor left you had green left and social

00:07:41.600 left uh all three varieties of the virtually the same thing with the same root ideologies um just

00:07:49.360 andrew wilkinson being a little more different than the other two because he he knows that uh browbeaten

00:07:55.600 conservatives and libertarians in bc theoretically have no other choice but to vote for him so he has to

00:08:01.680 not openly antagonize them that much um but john horgan i think came across as by far the most

00:08:09.600 confident he came across uh certainly as the most premier like i found i found it interesting none of

00:08:15.920 them smiled at any point like they were all very dour and sure these are serious times but uh it was

00:08:22.400 interesting normally in leaders debate you want to come across as friendly a little at least a little bit

00:08:25.840 from time to time crack a smile at one point uh green leader sonya uh sesta now uh had a positive

00:08:35.200 scowl the whole time i i really noticed her not smiling she had a scowl the whole time but even the

00:08:39.920 other two um actually i should say there was an exception with horgan horgan uh horgan smiled uh for a bit

00:08:49.360 uh as andrew wilkinson was speaking when was that i'm just looking at my notes here i think it was

00:08:55.920 when andrew wilkinson uh committed the cardinal sin and admitted to being a graduate of the university

00:09:01.360 of alberta that's uh that's a very good point yeah i you know it's hard to say there was a clear winner

00:09:12.880 of claire loser um but i i i think the one who was the most confident at least was uh ndp leader

00:09:20.480 and premier john horgan he seemed uh you know he's a big guy his shoulders looked like he was you

00:09:26.560 know the shots are bouncing off of him uh i i you know there was certainly very far from a knockout

00:09:33.120 tonight no one lost badly no one won badly uh but i'd say if there if there was a winner uh in relative

00:09:39.920 terms it was probably john horgan uh what are your guys thoughts yeah i agree with that uh

00:09:48.880 oregon came out uh as the clear winner uh and i mean in love respect too i mean he was the one to

00:09:55.200 beat he's the one to be i mean they're they're looking at the last poll i seen was something like

00:10:00.240 a 98 chance of majority so um i mean yeah he's confident uh wilkinson didn't he didn't uh get as

00:10:08.240 as much air time and um and uh and it just seemed like the green one was the one that well horgan was

00:10:15.200 going after anyway so i would definitely say horgan won that uh yeah there was a part in the debate

00:10:21.520 where i noticed a a pattern and it was basically uh everything that's been good over the past couple

00:10:27.360 of years was the result of the ndp government and everything bad was something that they inherited from

00:10:33.040 the previous liberal government and no incumbent government has ever blamed any problem on the

00:10:38.400 previous government and taking credit for everything good alex you're clearly this is clearly

00:10:43.920 a new electoral innovation right yeah of course yeah uh john who would take credit for the sun rising

00:10:52.000 and blame his predecessors for the sun setting yeah and when it comes to the site c dam i mean anything

00:10:57.760 that goes wrong on that well you know he just blames the bc liberals you know well no it was their

00:11:02.880 project it doesn't matter if it was if that was completely and he can get away with it so anything

00:11:10.080 that goes wrong with bcm go over budget you just blame that on the liberals yeah the ndp sorry sorry the

00:11:16.320 greens in bc really come across to me as if they were the ndp but not thinking they could win government

00:11:23.360 uh it's uh they really are just uh a slightly less pragmatic version of the ndp uh i mean none of us

00:11:35.120 follow on the social uh the green left so it's hard for us to maybe empathize enough with how the green

00:11:41.680 voter thinks in bc um just as when i you know read uh you know leftist call columnists talking about how

00:11:50.320 how can anybody possibly be to the right of jason kenny in alberta he's already practically a nazi

00:11:55.440 there is nothing to his right they clearly don't understand the way the way many of us think uh

00:12:01.920 here in wild rose country so i i i admit that uh maybe we might not have the best perspective in

00:12:08.160 thinking of the mentality of the green voter in british columbia but it really seems to me there was

00:12:13.680 very little area of disagreement between the greens and the ndp uh just that the ndp are a bit more uh

00:12:23.920 pregnant they're a little bit more captured by the deep state or the state and that uh you know once a 0.97

00:12:30.320 decision is made and the bureaucracy has set on something that it's done i saw a little other

00:12:35.280 difference what are your let's start with uh you alex on what are your thoughts on if if you're a

00:12:42.240 a left uh green voter a small g green voter in bc uh really what what is the impetus for you to

00:12:52.320 continue to support the greens or to con or to consider supporting the greens in bc as opposed to

00:12:58.160 the ndp well that's a great question derek uh in any first pass of the post system it's good there's a

00:13:04.880 natural uh encouraging aspect that uh forces you to support one of the two big parties or you risk

00:13:10.720 splitting your side of the political spectrum and helping the other guy win uh and it's clear that

00:13:15.440 john horgan was appealing to those green voters who might be in a place to split the vote and help

00:13:21.440 the liberals win so he's trying to get that vote that green vote to go for him and the greens are

00:13:26.400 currently sitting at around like two seats in the polls right now so it's very likely that if you

00:13:32.880 believe in the green message if you want to elect someone who agrees with 80 of what you believe

00:13:38.240 you're gonna have to vote ndp otherwise you could get a liberal candidate and i know i we in alberta

00:13:43.200 hate this talk about vote splitting but in the realities of first past the posts that's what

00:13:48.000 happens and there was a topic of questioning during the debate about pipelines and it seemed like they

00:13:55.120 had very similar but slightly different answers if you'll remember the liberal leader said kept referring

00:14:01.040 to protests have to be respectful and you have to fight the the issues in the courts you can't be

00:14:06.720 blockading railways or pipelines that are under construction so that was one key difference

00:14:12.080 whereas the greens on the opposite end of the spectrum were encouraging people it sounded like

00:14:18.160 to blockade uh railways and pipeline projects and then the ndp in the middle were saying you know

00:14:25.200 they kind of encouraged you to blockade alberta oil but please don't interfere with uh bc natural gas

00:14:31.600 so they kind of tried to split the issue in some magical way sean uh if you're uh kind of a green

00:14:38.400 left voter in bc uh you know we're trying to put our our hipster hat on here uh if you're a green

00:14:46.880 left voter in bc uh what reason would you see to consider voting green as opposed to ndp at this point

00:14:54.480 well you know that is an extremely tough question and and this one i'm about to say may not answer

00:15:00.640 that question but but when when you look at the ndp and it's provincially and federally on how it used

00:15:06.960 to be i mean their brand was uh we're a party for the working man and now whether or not that's true

00:15:12.000 and i was different story but that was their brand and i believe that uh and over the past uh 10 years

00:15:18.560 maybe even the last five years it's been taken over by green radicals and now i mean why would

00:15:24.240 you try to i mean if you're i mean especially them being a a party that's been created by the unions

00:15:30.080 it's in their constitution they have a non-voting seat right at the table that why would you try and

00:15:34.960 block a pipeline that you're going to have so many of your union members you have jobs off of you know

00:15:41.360 that just it doesn't make sense and actually i'm going actually a little bit more into that topic i

00:15:46.720 think for the saskatchewan and alberta viewers the kind of impression i actually did get off of

00:15:51.840 horgan though was uh when he answered that question was well we did everything we could we we brought

00:15:57.680 it draw it all the way to the sec we gave it the old college try uh but in the end the ends the feds

00:16:02.640 bought it and so that's it that's and i don't kind of got the impression that he's not going to be

00:16:07.920 fighting it anymore um which is great news i hope and and well and then also i mean one of the

00:16:14.560 reasons also because we believe it was funny it was because it was a minority government the green

00:16:18.560 was holding them hostage and that was one of their big things that uh in fact holding all of

00:16:22.720 canada hostage by a couple seats uh and that was one of their big things they were pushing so but why

00:16:28.160 why would a green uh why would a green voter or why would someone vote green instead of ndp

00:16:35.120 that's a different question because especially when you think like you mentioned about vote splitting so

00:16:38.640 i'm sorry i just can't get into the mind of a green party uh green party other than maybe

00:16:46.000 maybe the more votes they get even if they know they're not going to win it may give them that

00:16:50.240 confidence boost for the next election and maybe uh eventually they'll get there but

00:16:57.520 i just can't get the mind of a green voter i think it's a protest vote at the end of the day

00:17:01.760 yeah that could be it yeah you could be disgusted with both uh with uh ndp and liberals and just

00:17:10.560 decide to vote green if you want more establishment than either of the two establishment parties you

00:17:16.720 vote green yeah okay so i can also see environmentalists saying uh we didn't want this vote this election

00:17:26.480 election during the covid crisis so as a protest to the guy who called an early election just vote

00:17:33.280 green or stay home i i would think that would be a legitimate you know sonia uh uh first and i'll

00:17:42.480 did talk about that fairly often uh andrew wilkinson a little bit less but he he was at it too

00:17:48.560 uh that this is breaking the fixed election uh date law that this is just a power grab by john

00:17:55.200 borgen uh my gut tells me this is not going to be quite the issue that it was when jim prentice

00:18:00.160 broke the fixed election date 2015 because that was so nakedly a a power grab while he had swallowed

00:18:08.320 uh two-thirds of the official opposition and appeared invincible but i um you know it it's hard to tell

00:18:16.640 uh but but she she tried to make an issue of it but let's bring this back to uh something that's maybe a

00:18:22.160 a little easier for uh at least our alberta brains to understand here although sean you're uh i'm not

00:18:31.120 sure what you identify as can you half and half pardon me can you be uh bi-provincial i would say

00:18:39.840 yeah that's probably a you're you're trans mountain okay we got it yep 0.63

00:18:52.160 oh i'm gonna get cancelled

00:18:55.280 get cancelled me i own this

00:18:59.440 so um uh so we'll bring it back to something a little maybe easier to understand on this side of

00:19:05.360 the rockies here um you know the bc liberals are a very funny and unique party in canada uh bc has

00:19:15.280 traditionally had the ndp from uh or ccf for most of its history and then the other party the not

00:19:25.760 hard socialist party and that's normally been a coalition of conservatives populist western reform

00:19:33.360 kinds uh and what you might call moderate business liberals um you know gordon campbell in when i think

00:19:42.800 it was 2001 that he was first elected he's someone that i i probably would have been pretty comfortable

00:19:48.720 with uh maybe not great but by bc standards you'd say good enough you know he privatized the number of

00:19:53.760 things or partially privatized some things he cut taxes he balanced the budget he was um after ralph

00:20:00.560 cline and mike harris uh certainly the most conservative premier in canada or libertarian

00:20:05.520 however you want to slice that um but the bc liberal party uh by the end of uh gordon campbell's

00:20:12.480 tenure was back to being almost uh what you would consider a federal a moderate federal liberal it was

00:20:20.160 it was definitively liberal it was just more more moderate than you'd get with the social justice

00:20:26.640 hard left liberal with say a justin trudeau or stephan um so uh saw tonight was um you know we talked

00:20:38.560 from this earlier that he's spit in the face of his conservatives or libertarians or western populists

00:20:44.640 that are apparently a part of that coalition but uh you know we had four four liberals on stage or or two

00:20:51.200 socialists and two liberals depending on how you consider the moderator um you know we had uh you

00:20:57.600 know he was committed to not just the carbon tax but he was committed to obeying without question uh

00:21:03.600 federal uh orders to increase provincial carbon taxes he didn't even bat an eye about that he had he

00:21:09.760 showed no interest in joining the uh court challenge uh against the federal carbon tax he endorses the idea

00:21:15.280 of carbon taxes uh and it says it'll be fine to go up because ottawa says so uh he committed he said

00:21:21.600 repeatedly that money is cheap to borrow right now so the government should borrow money and continuing

00:21:26.240 deficits uh these are things that would um not earn you the support of conservatives if he was say

00:21:34.080 uh leader of the ucp or anything further right in alberta um maybe uh we'll start with you sean and then

00:21:40.800 we'll go to alex about you know what are your thoughts on wilkinson's performance in terms of

00:21:47.440 trying to keep that the anti-socialist coalition together uh for british columbia keeping together

00:21:55.040 western populists uh conservatives and liberals and how do you think he performed in that task tonight

00:22:01.120 well i don't think that uh there isn't really other any other choice for um libertarians and conservatives

00:22:09.120 to vote for uh i mean there is a bc i don't know i think there's still a bc conservative party i know

00:22:15.040 last election there was and but they were actually uh very anti-conservative uh there's i seen there

00:22:21.920 was some of them that were posting um on their own personal facebook feeds like anti-harper stuff and so

00:22:28.160 as far as i'm concerned i kind of wish that whole party would implode and just start over from scratch

00:22:34.080 and to become a real conservative party uh the bc liberals do have uh a bit of an identity crisis

00:22:40.960 i hear this a lot that people are that people are associating the bc liberals with the federal

00:22:47.600 liberals and they're actually two very separate parties and in fact uh you know when i uh growing up

00:22:54.320 out here i i i knew that all i knew is i was a someone who my one of the biggest issues was to be

00:23:01.520 fiscally fiscally uh conservative issues fiscally responsible keep deficits down keep the economy

00:23:08.320 moving and uh at the time that was the bc liberals and also at the time i mean we had chretchen who

00:23:16.560 uh i mean fiscally he was a fairly uh you know small city conservative kind of government certainly not

00:23:22.000 like the liberals nowadays so i always thought that uh you know i always thought i was a liberal

00:23:27.840 and it wasn't until i went to alberta and and uh i believe i started really paying attention alberta

00:23:32.720 politics with redford and it turns out the conservatives there were the liberals so i

00:23:37.600 had it really backwards there i had to figure out figure out that wow i'm actually a conservative i

00:23:42.880 didn't realize that alex give me your thoughts on uh how you think uh andrew wilkinson did in trying to

00:23:50.640 keep that uh anybody but uh green ndp coalition together tonight uh i think he did a fairly good

00:23:59.120 job uh there were a couple decent proposals that he talked about like uh giving drivers in british

00:24:06.160 columbia a private insurance option and breaking the icbc monopoly i know that's a big complaint for

00:24:13.840 free market minded people in bc how the moderator called that privatization that yes choice is just

00:24:21.360 total i think privatization is great i think it's crazy that the government owns anything uh period

00:24:28.480 it's actually the government owns an insurance company and then it's positively marxist that it's 0.53

00:24:33.520 a monopoly so they're going from marxist to crazy uh so sorry to interrupt but yeah people out here

00:24:40.560 people in bc hate icbc uh icbc uh choice issue uh god what an awful uh moderator to call that

00:24:50.160 privatization no privatization is what i would do if uh if i somehow you know killed someone and became 0.79

00:24:57.360 the leader of a bc political party you know and pigs were flying and hell froze over um you know that

00:25:03.600 that that would be the you know that's something i would talk about but uh yeah yeah back to your point

00:25:08.960 icbc was you know yeah so they're talking about was there anything beyond icbc that can appeal to

00:25:17.280 someone left sorry right of trudeau uh with andrew wilkinson uh in many ways it was the most right-wing

00:25:26.960 option but it was still a kind of a classical liberal so there were things like uh the others were offering

00:25:33.440 like free day care whereas the liberal plan was i think ten dollars a day day care so it was like

00:25:39.520 the mo like there'd be a small copay and that's the most right-wing option uh on the table and bc

00:25:48.160 liberals skinniest kid at fat camp yeah basically and on the icbc front i'd like to add that the ones

00:25:56.640 on the extreme left they like to have it try to have it both ways because giving a private insurance

00:26:02.800 option to regular folk is bad but they also have mused about forcing wealthy people into buying

00:26:10.720 private insurance for ferraris and lamborghinis so having private insurance for rich people is good

00:26:17.120 because it gets them off icbc uh and it's just it's just nonsense everyone should have access to uh to

00:26:25.280 competition in the insurance market yeah all right well they talked about a lot of issues uh you know

00:26:32.320 they got a lot a lot of environment in the real extreme end of things uh you know i already mentioned

00:26:40.320 that the the moderator felt uh comfortable without uh questioning her uh her own presumptions that

00:26:47.760 everyone there has white privilege uh i mean i suppose you can debate if white privilege is a thing

00:26:53.920 uh but to accuse them all of having it regardless of their own backgrounds uh certainly it was a lot 0.72

00:27:01.120 of balls i i'd say but uh you know there was a lot of stuff a lot of race a lot of indigenous issues a lot

00:27:07.760 of um environment uh certainly one issue that's i think pretty unique to bc is money laundering uh and 0.95

00:27:16.640 its connection with the housing market uh that's a long-standing issue i lived in british columbia i lived in

00:27:22.720 victoria for the better part of the year uh after i finished university uh housing prices are are just

00:27:30.320 wild in bc this this is an issue there they all talk about it and like to talk about how concerned

00:27:35.440 they are but they don't seem to really have any any to do anything about it because frankly i'm not sure

00:27:41.360 there is anything anyone can do about it unless your goal is to uh well i'm probably unconstitutionally

00:27:48.240 banned foreigners from buying any property in british columbia uh sean maybe we'll just go to

00:27:54.960 you for this one um because i i'm sure alex is probably just as stumped as i am you know really

00:28:00.720 what is the how are british columbians viewing the uh the rental and property um actually this isn't

00:28:08.640 just a bc issue this is probably just mostly a lower mainland issue no lesser extent victoria uh could

00:28:14.720 maybe you want to just kind of flesh this out a little bit and uh tell us how are british columbians

00:28:19.760 perceiving the issue and do they think any one of the three parties we saw tonight have any more

00:28:24.320 credibility than the others are yeah well this is a bit a long-standing issue um well and i don't think

00:28:34.640 any party can solve it the beast liberals had their chance the ndp has had their chance

00:28:39.840 uh in fact the ndp they did bring in uh some of the some restrictions but like they were actually

00:28:47.360 punishing a lot of albertans for their holiday home uh in bc but uh uh you're right i'm well i'm no

00:28:56.160 expert on real estate but i think if there was a way to fix it it probably would would have been fixed

00:29:02.560 and it hasn't no party's done it yeah go ahead there's there's a very important thing that no

00:29:10.400 one mentioned in the debate which is supply and demand uh there's certainly a lot of nimbyism in

00:29:17.520 in the british columbia that prevents development uh we almost heard andrew wilkinson say it but he

00:29:23.760 only talked about supply he didn't want to talk about supply and demand and there was actually a

00:29:28.240 point in the debate where they were arguing about what developers were doing and in one

00:29:32.320 point uh john horgan said that they should stop developers from making like 500 square foot

00:29:38.400 a shoebox condominiums uh because the developers are taking advantage of young people on as a young

00:29:44.720 person who lives in downtown calgary in a 650 square foot condo uh young people want to live there build

00:29:53.680 them build more of them it'll make the price go down and i know that personally because i own my small

00:29:58.880 condo in calgary and the reason it's worth less than i paid for it other than the economic collapse

00:30:03.840 in alberta has also been that there have been other condos springing up left right and center when

00:30:08.960 there's a lot of supply the price stays stable or it goes down but nimbyism in vancouver is rampant

00:30:15.440 and none of the leaders on stage wanted to pick a fight with vancouver city hall over it

00:30:20.880 but you know those those 500 square foot apartments that's the only way young people can get into the

00:30:24.720 the housing market these days i mean i live like my front hallway yeah i mean i live uh and in fact

00:30:31.840 actually my place maybe even a little more than an hour outside of vancouver and the developer across

00:30:38.320 the street five acres developed a million dollars an acre and tearing everything down and just building

00:30:43.840 there right but i mean that's the price for um teardown million bucks an acre uh over an hour from

00:30:50.640 vancouver so the only way the young people can get in is those 500 square foot places i don't disagree 0.98

00:30:57.200 with anything the two of you have said i think a lot of this certainly is government policy uh but

00:31:01.920 there is also the elephant in the room that no one seems to talk about is that vancouver is a delta

00:31:07.280 butting up against the mountain there is a very physical limitation of space which is one reason

00:31:13.200 vancouver is such a vertical city uh calgary uh well i don't know we can build probably about 200 kilometers

00:31:22.800 in that direction uh 3 000 that direction well montana's that way so i don't know 500 that way yeah

00:31:34.480 and about 4 000 that way all the way to the lake uh calgary can grow literally forever there

00:31:43.040 is virtually no physical limitation to the growth of calgary uh but uh you know cities like toronto

00:31:50.480 or vancouver or montreal that have very serious geographic restrictions things are going to get

00:31:56.800 more expensive once you become a big city because things are going to both the buildings and the prices

00:32:02.320 are going to go up and uh that's just reality unless they're going they're proposing to start blowing up

00:32:09.680 mountains uh much more space well derek with respect there are plenty of ways you can undo nimbyism in

00:32:16.880 vancouver there's the greater vancouver area itself which includes the the neighboring cities uh which

00:32:22.880 are not very dense at all and could easily increase their population density with uh zoning reforms and

00:32:29.520 even vancouver proper uh don't ask me to quote all the laws but there are a number of laws that limit

00:32:35.760 development for things like oh you can't cast a shadow onto the ocean you can't interrupt the view

00:32:41.440 of the mountains you can't do this you can't do that you can't do this you have to apply and it takes

00:32:45.840 two years and millions of dollars to get a permit so there are plenty of ways you could build bigger

00:32:52.000 taller and more density even in vancouver no certainly but mountains and an ocean do present serious

00:33:01.280 physical obstacles i'm just putting that out there okay well let's uh we're gonna wrap it up uh we'll

00:33:06.480 leave uh closing i just say there's one more one more point on here i wanted to add sean i'm just

00:33:14.320 gonna say i'm gonna give you each a time for a closing comment okay so sean we will begin with you

00:33:22.800 okay so with the bc liberals like i said they've been known as the party to vote for on the for the one

00:33:31.040 for the best economy and budgets uh and everything else i think this is going to be a tough sell for

00:33:36.400 them this year uh this collection because i mean let's face it the ndp has ran three straight balanced

00:33:42.400 budgets i mean that's more than our conservative government in alberta can say uh and and frankly

00:33:49.040 it's a little shocking for an ndp government but hey hats off for i'd never wish for any government to

00:33:53.280 fail uh including the ones that i didn't vote for um but um and well considering i mean we're independent

00:34:00.080 but the economy is not bad so that's going to be a tough one for them to to run on this year and

00:34:05.840 frankly i think that that is probably one of the biggest issues for the severely normal british

00:34:11.360 colombians is economy and jobs and you know especially when they're getting their house repoed

00:34:17.280 and and their car taken away uh uh in these uncertain economic times so uh i do wish them luck

00:34:25.520 uh but uh i'm it's it's not looking like they're gonna win this election to be honest

00:34:32.880 alex your closing thoughts uh i i think uh one of the points that we talked about earlier was the

00:34:39.360 the liberals trying to maintain a big tent and i'm reminded of how the former liberal energy minister

00:34:46.320 endorsed leslin lewis for the conservative party of canada uh leadership so there is a big tent within the

00:34:54.160 liberal party uh but with these people voting out of protest or out of uh uh principle for the bc

00:35:03.120 conservative party that might hurt the liberals as well and all polling going in seems to say that

00:35:09.440 john horgan is doing a good job of siphoning votes among out from the green party and making the bc

00:35:16.240 legislature uh look like it's a two-party legislature so if john horgan can uh convince all the green voters

00:35:22.720 to just vote for him i think he's uh he's likely going to win this and during the debate the green

00:35:27.920 leader even pointed out you know the a thousand dollar covid relief uh check that was an electoral

00:35:34.400 promise not of a bill he brought to the legislature so you know people who are suffering are going to

00:35:40.640 think you know if i can vote for john horgan and get a thousand dollar check that might influence some

00:35:44.640 people very good all right gentlemen uh alex mccall a defense columnist for the western standard

00:35:53.440 and uh sean allain our social media manager for the western standard uh thank you very much for

00:35:59.520 joining me if you're watching right now and you're not yet a member of the western standard please go to

00:36:04.160 westernstandardonline.com become a member we are one of the very few media outlets in canada do not

00:36:10.480 accept government funding and will refuse to apply for even a government media license uh so if you

00:36:17.520 if you support the work we do if you like what you've seen tonight or even if you didn't like it

00:36:21.760 but you found it mildly entertaining uh please consider supporting our work um if you don't support

00:36:28.240 genuinely free press genuine free media uh then all you're going to be left with is the cbc and the

00:36:33.360 toronto star all reporting to audible but uh thank you very much for your time tonight and thank you to our

00:36:39.040 uh our two contributors joining us this evening uh thank you very much god bless the west all right thank

00:36:46.160 thank you thank you

00:36:58.160 you

00:37:16.160 you

Western Standard - October 14, 2020

BC Leaders Debate

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript