The Honourable Iona Campagnolo, suffering from what sounded like a cold, took almost an hour to rapidly read the speech prepared in the Premier's Office, the last Speech from the Throne before the May 17th election. Few of over 4 million British Columbians will hear or read the Throne Speech. A few invited guests and several dozen reporters assigned to the task had to endure the lengthy revision of history in which the government pretended that it accomplished much and hurt few.

Much to the disappointment of those who worked to increase the accountability of government, it is unlikely that next week's budget speech and corresponding release of documents will mirror the Speech from the Throne. The Budget Transparency and Accountability Act, adopted in 2000, requires government to produce a "strategic plan" for overall government operations and "service plans" for each ministry at the same time it tables its budget. The February 8th Throne Speech "set out a five-point plan called Great Goals For A Golden Decade". Education, health, social services, the environment and job creation were the themes in the five-point plan. Compare that to the Campbell government's strategic plan tabled in February 2004. That plan emphasized "links to the New Era vision".

"New Era" is a term not found in the 2005 Throne Speech, and the New Era Document is no longer found on the BC Liberal website. The 2004 strategic plan consisted of three goals: "A Strong and Vibrant Provincial Economy, A Supportive Social Fabric, and Safe Healthy Communities and a Sustainable Environment." On February 15th we can see whether the government's strategic plan has shifted to reflect the five goals set out in the Throne Speech, or whether it is all meaningless rhetoric in preparation for the May 17th election.

Most of the Throne Speech consisted of recycled promises and imagined accomplishments. The few "new" items were mostly admissions of previous failures. The clearest announcement was a promise to limit tuition increases to the rate of inflation. The Throne Speech said: "We understand that tuition costs are a concern to many B.C. families. To address that concern, we will introduce legislation later this year that will limit future tuition increases to the rate of inflation, effective this September." Post secondary fees rose from $440 million in 2000-01 to $713 million in 2004-05. In the last budget, they were projected to grow to $779 million in 2005-06 (an increase of 9.25%) and to $837 million in 2006-07 (a further increase of 7.45%). It will be interesting to see if the February 15th budget revises those forecasts so as to hold them to increases of 2% or less. Of course a second term Campbell government could revert to the previously planned 7-9% tuition fee increases with the stoke of the legislative pen.

The Throne Speech said: "Over the next three years, funding for adult community living services will be increased by $91 million. There will be new respite support for families caring for children and adults with developmental disabilities. An additional $37 million will be invested over three years in programs related to children in the care of government." There is one major problem with the promise; the Campbell government cut services in the Ministry of Children and Family Development by 11% since they came to power. The budget for Community Living Services went from $677 million in 2001-02 to $609.6 million. The budget for "child and family development" went from $814.8 million in 2002-03 to $661.7 million in 2004-05 (reclassification of service categories makes it difficult to compare to earlier years). The three year promises in the Throne Speech need to be divided by three to get average annual increases. The Campbell government promised to restore a fraction of what it cut over the previous three years; that appears to be consistent with many recent funding announcements.

The Speech promised to provide "$9 million over the next three years to establish a B.C. Conservation Corps. The Corps will provide new employment opportunities for B.C.'s students and graduates to work in our parks and wilderness as a new generation of conservationists." Who can forget that one of the first acts of the Campbell government was to eliminate a similar program for employing youth to work on environmental projects? That seems to be a consistent theme with pre-election announcements; they throw back a few crumbs after devouring programs to pay for the foolish policies they implemented when they came to power.

The Throne Speech was made 98 days before the next election. It appeared to assume that British Columbians will forget and forgive what happened during the 1,364 days since the last election.