Making recall less onerous

Recall in Victoria

The following information has been passed on by a usually reliable source.

Anyone who is interested in volunteering, helping out, or getting more information about the Recall Bray Campaign is cordially invited to the next update meeting:

RECALL BRAY CAMPAIGN - COMMUNITY UPDATE MEETING

DATE - SATURDAY, APRIL 13TH 2002
TIME - 1-3PM
LOCATION: GARRY OAK ROOM
FAIRFIELD COMMUNITY CENTRE, 1335 THURLOW ROAD

February 25, 2002

Breaking the Recall Promise

Cold Feet on Recall More broken promises were revealed when Opposition Leader Joy MacPhail pinned Premier Campbell down on what he is doing now compared to what he promised before the election.

Campbell's cherished and now frequently twisted New Era document contains the following promises on page 30:

Establish workable recall legislation, to make it easier for citizens to hold MLAs accountable.
Establish workable initiative legislation, to make it feasible for British Columbians to call for a referendum on issues of province-wide concern that fall within the provincial government's jurisdiction.
Appoint a Citizens' Assembly on Electoral Reform to assess all possible models for electing the MLAs, including preferential ballots, proportional representation, and our current electoral system.
Give the Citizens' Assembly a mandate to hold public hearings throughout BC, and if it recommends changes to the current electoral system, that option will be put to a province-wide referendum.

Readers will note there is no link between a "Citizens' Assembly" and the promises to make recall and initiative easier. On Monday, February 25, Premier Campbell established a connection. Answering Opposition Leader Joy MacPhail's question on why the promise on recall was not mentioned in the Throne Speech, Campbell said that it would be dealt with by his Citizens' Assembly. That would make it impossible to implement his promise before the next election.

It is time for Premier Campbell to say what he means by a "Citizens' Assembly". His appointments to date are overwhelmingly one sided. In fact, judging by his behaviour after eight months, a Campbell appointed "Citizens' Assembly" would probably mean a dozen businessmen sitting behind locked doors in a smoky room with a "no-women" sign on the door.

February 5, 2002

Recall Targets and Tactics

In responding to my recent column on recall several readers have pointed out that the current legislation would permit a recall to begin November 16 rather than in January 2003 as I claimed. While November is legally correct, January is tactically correct. A recall campaign is 60 days long and is subject to many of the same types of reporting requirements and restrictions as are seen in an election campaign. Ending a campaign over Christmas holidays would not be a wise tactic.

Those who went after Paul Ramsey learned that recall can be difficult. The legislation was not designed to be used for re-fighting the last election but to be used to deal with MLAs who have "lost their way". In the case where recall might have succeeded, BC Liberal Paul (alias Warren) Reitsma resigned before he could be recalled. The test for BC Liberals will be whether the public views their current behaviour as constituting such outrageous lies relative to their election campaign that signature gathering becomes easy.

MLAs who during the election campaign said there would be no wholesale layoffs in the public service might be viewed as the legitimate targets of recall campaigns. Similarly, MLAs who have lost court houses, correction facilities, forest offices, welfare offices and in some cases all of the aforementioned might be viewed as less than effective and deserving of recall.

MLAs who won by the lowest margin might also be the most susceptible to recall. In the 77 constituencies they won, the BC Liberal vote ranged from a low of 37% of valid votes cast in Victoria-Beacon Hill to a high of 74.9% in Chilliwack-Kent. (click for the bottom 17 BC Liberal constituencies)

If Mr. Campbell had his way in 1995, signature gathering for recall campaigns could already be underway. In private member's bill M215 (1995), Mr. Campbell proposed that recall petitions be allowed to start six months after a general election. In his bill, Mr. Campbell also proposed to change the number of signatures required to succeed in recalling an MLA: "the petition must be signed by at least the same number of voters as the number of votes the Member received in the last election, plus one."

Hansard recorded first reading of his private member's bill:

G. Campbell: "We all know that one of the most critical issues that faces all of us in public institutions today is the re-establishment of trust and public accountability between elected officials and those who elect them. The current recall and referenda legislation fails on both counts. Therefore I have introduced a bill that will bring true accountability to the Legislature and give us an opportunity to give our constituents the real sense of control that they deserve to have over their elected representatives."

Now the test is on Premier Campbell to determine whether he can re-establish trust and public accountability between elected officials and those who elect them.

February 3 , 2002

Changing Recall Legislation

Under current legislation the actual gathering of signatures for a recall petition cannot begin until January 2003 - the same time the Campbell government will kick tens of thousands of seniors off Pharmacare. With 77 of 79 MLAs the Campbell government may well be arrogant enough to write off many of their members. Those members, however, may resent being written off. They may not want to make Parliamentary history by being the first to be recalled. That pressure may be enough to encourage some MLAs to cross the floor, if not to the NDP, then to form a new party.

On page 30 of the government's election promises you can find the commitment to establish workable recall legislation. In case the government is thinking of playing tricks when it interprets those words, Hansard is full of speeches by Gordon Campbell saying what he would do. On July 22, 1998, he provided a particularly clear exposition:

G. Campbell: "There are a number of things that I think we do need to do to reinvigorate our public institutions, to re-establish trust in our public institutions. Freedom of information is really one of the easier ones. It's direct; it's simple. It says simply: make information available when people request it, as opposed to trying to stop them and sending them large bills to get the simplest information."

"There are a couple of other things, though, that I think we need to do. We have to look at the recall legislation and make it work better for the people that live in this province. We have to make sure that we understand that recall is there for citizens to hold MLAs to account. It seems to me that one of the things we should learn from the recall campaigns is that they are far too onerous. They are far too difficult, and I believe it's critical that we look at improving those."

While Premier Campbell reflects on his promise to make recall campaigns less onerous, he might also cast his mind to his plea to make information available when people request it. He could start by releasing the Phase I and II Core Review reports which include impact studies on his numerous cutbacks. That information could be very useful in a recall campaign.