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Election wishlist

Politicians of all stripes are universally famous for overpromising and under delivering (e.g.
opinion_piquent1

Politicians of all stripes are universally famous for overpromising and under delivering (e.g. we still have an appointed senate, deficits, Sea King helicopters, climate change and poor people), but sometimes they do come through in a spectacular way.

All of B.C.'s provincial parties — and there are more than two — are promising various things in the May 14 general provincial election, in between scoring points on their opponents with the usual verbal jabs and bon mots, hyperbolic statements, half truths, false equivalencies, misrepresentations, generalizations, scapegoatings, "straw man" attacks, ad hominem attacks, reductio ad absurdums, non-sequiturs, evasions, red herrings, muck rakings, changes of subject, obfuscations and occasional "Gish Gallopings" (a debate tactic recently made famous by Mitt Romney, whereby a candidate spews so much bullshit in such a short span of time that his or her opponent can't possibly address or counter even a small part of it in the rebuttal).

Usually I'd have a good idea by now what an election is going to be about, but it's hard to get a good read on this one. Will it be a referendum on the Liberal Party's last 12 years in power, or will the NDP's two terms before that still have sway? Will it be about various scandals that tend to build up over any long reign? Is the economy still a core issue for people, or are the masses feeling better about that side of things and ready to look at other pressing issues like the environment, energy policy and child poverty? Or will the outcome hinge on a few hot button issues, like marijuana policy or the Northern Gateway pipeline?

I'm not personally favouring one party over another, but there are three things I'd like to see promised that would influence my vote on May 14:

1. Fair electrical bills — Now that we (mostly) have smart meters, it's time for BC Hydro to scrap their mountain town-killing two-tier rate system and switch to a better system like time-of-use pricing where power rates are lower during low demand periods... and the same for everybody.

The two-tier system charges BC Hydro customers 6.8 cents a kilowatt-hour for the first 1,350 kWh consumed and a higher rate (10.19 cents) for anything over. The 1,350 number was determined by looking at average consumption across the province, but given than the vast majority of people live in relatively temperate areas — Vancouver, Victoria, Kelowna — people who live in areas where it's colder, such as Whistler, are far more likely to go over that 1,350 threshold.

The two-tiered system was designed to be punitive, nudging people to cut down on consumption and to invest in power saving fixtures and appliances. However, heating is still the biggest use of electricity and people who live in colder areas of the province can't really choose to turn their baseboard heaters off. It's actually cheaper for me to heat the middle and top floors of my house using the gas fireplace than the electrical heat, so I'd argue the two-tiered policy is probably increasing emissions as well as screwing over a certain percentage of the population.

2. A Balanced Budget — The problem with election promises is there's usually a price tag attached, and unless a politician is willing to raise taxes or cut funding elsewhere then it's either A) impossible or B) part of the reason why per capita debt in B.C. has increased from $7,582 per person in 1997 to almost $11,000 per person in 2012. I'm not opposed to some small tax increases to improve our collective wellbeing, but I'm less keen when all of it goes to giving people who already make a lot more money than I do a lot more money.

Rising public sector wages are a huge part of our budget problem, there's no denying it, but Liberal Party MLAs under former Premier Gordon Campbell really didn't make it easy to take a tough "austerity" line with public sector unions when they increased their own pay by an average 30 per cent from 2007 to 2009. Meanwhile they kept the minimum wage frozen at $8 for almost a decade, and, if you're wondering, average family incomes only rose four per cent during that period.

The reasons why we need to get a handle on debt are obvious, from the impact on our credit rating to all the billions of taxpayer dollars that are diverted from things like health care and education to pay interest.

3. Fact-based government — My dream is a government that is free from spin, that doesn't use public resources to boost the image of the ruling party and that doesn't play fast and loose with real numbers. We need empowered, independent auditors for everything, and a framework that specifies exactly how numbers can be presented.

The recent NDP claim that the deficit is $800 million higher this year than reported because the budget included unproven revenues is one good example of a financial debate we should not be having. The actual accounting for the Olympics is another, given that provincial figures omitted a lot of significant projects like the Sea to Sky Highway Improvement Project from the total. Come to think of it, the public-private partnership that rebuilt the highway for $600 million is yet another good example because the price tag didn't include the total value of the built-in 25-year maintenance contract.

I'm not holding my breath on any of these things, but it would be nice. I'm looking forward to the campaign and yes, even to the odd Gish Gallop.