The Prince George
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SATURDAY, OCTOBER 19,1991
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I BELIEVE IN A MIXED ECONOMY - HARCOURT
Socialist hordes image rejected
VANCOUVER (CP) — Mike Harcourt made it clear Friday he’s not the leader of the socialist hordes Socreds have warned British Columbians about during the last four decades.
The beaming and relaxed 48-year-old premier-designate appeared taken aback when asked whether he was a socialist at a news conference the day after his New Democratic Party won an overwhelming victory at the polls.
‘‘Hey, that’s the first time I’ve been asked that,” he said. “I’m a social democrat. I believe in a mixed economy, that there’s a role for public and private enterprise.
“The mainstream, moderate social democrat that I am has re-
jected nationalizations, has said we have to create wealth. That’s how you have the resources required to bring about the quality education and health care our citizens want.” Social Credit, which governed for all but three of the last 40 years, almost always refer to the NDP in judgmental tones as “the socialists.”
During the election campaign, the warning has been about the “socialist hordes at the gate.” They’re now inside the gate. But Harcourt insists the stereotype of a spendthrift socialist picking taxpayers pockets doesn’t fit the new NDP government.
The NDP captured 51 seats in Thursday’s election. The upstart
Recall option obtains support
VANCOUVER (CP) — British Columbians have voted decisively to have the opportunity to recall members of the legislative assembly, first returns in a referendum show.
The referendum moves voters one step closer to the right to dismiss their provincially elected member and force a byelection in their riding.
Another measure to give voters thc power to propose their own policy initiatives through referen-dums also had heavy support in first returns.
The early returns represented about two-thirds of referendum votes cast in 29 of the 75 ridings in conjunction with Thursday’s B.C. election that saw the NDP end 16 years of Social Credit administration.
The recall measure was approved by 79.33 per cent of those whose ballots were counted and the initiative proposal was approved by 81.97 per cent.
Voting on both measures resulted in a high percentage of rejected ballots. The recall measure saw nine per cent of the ballots rejected while the initiative question resulted in 11 per cent of the ballots not being counted.
A 50 per cent majority is sufficient for the referendums to pass.
Final results won’t be known until Monday at least, said a spokesman for the elections branch of the Ministry of Provincial Secretary.
The NDP isn’t bound by the vote, but Leader Mike Harcourt, who said throughout the election campaign that he supports more open government, has said he’ll honor voters’ wishes.
If the Social Credit government of Premier Rita Johnston had been re-elected it would have been required to abide by the results.
When Johnston first announced Thursday’s referendum, she said it would give B.C. voters more control over their elected representatives.
“I support the concept of direct democracy and giving power to the voter,” she said at the start of the four-week election campaign.
The Socred government said it would wait for “yes” votes on the referendums before introucing legislation spelling out ground rules for recalling a member of the legislature or submitting initiatives to the electorate.
Wilson fires volley
VANCOUVER (CP) — Less ian 24 hours after New emocrats swept to victory the oom was already off the rose of ritish Columbia politics and the :rbal clashes had begun.
A war of words between vic-rious NDP leader Mike Harcourt id Liberal leader Gordon Wilson, ho will lead the official Opposi->n, started Friday when Harcourt id he does not intend to call the gislature into session until the ring — and will cover the cost running government by special ending warrants.
That angered Wilson. He said iday that while he understands it ill take time before a full legislate agenda can be put together, mething must be done about ovincial spending.
“I think if we are to send a sig-
nal to the people of British Columbia that government is going to return to a more traditional and more orderly form that it is proper to call the legislature together at least to receive authority on spending rather than to continue with spending by warrant.”
Wilson also called on Harcourt to cancel or postpone a planned trade trip to Asia in late November in favor of getting the legislative ball rolling.
“I think it is inappropriate, quite frankly, that the Premier-elect would embark upon a trade mission, off to foreign lands, prior to calling the legislature together and getting an authority to spend, which in my view would be required prior to even going on the junket”
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Bridge.................23
Business 10,11
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'Twenty-eight percent of the rain forest is now furniture."
Liberals won 17 seats and the Socreds won only seven.
At dissolution, the Socreds had 41 seats, the NDP had 25 and three were vacant. Redistribution has added six new seats.
The NDP took 41 per cent of the popular vote this week, the Liberals 33 per cent and the Socreds 24 per cent In 1986, Socreds captured 49 per cent, the NDP about 42 per cent and the Liberals less than seven per cent.
“I’m looking forward to meeting with the great team of MLAs that have been chosen from all over the province,” Harcourt said.
“That’s the part I find particularly satisfying — that we do rep-
resent the heartbeat of British Columbia.”
He expects to name his new cabinet, which will consist of fewer than 20 ministers, in the next two to three weeks.
Harcourt’s staff say attempts are being made to set up a meeting Tuesday with Premier Rita Johnston to discuss transition. Johnston, who lost her seat, has left her future up in the air for a few days.
A Harcourt staff member says the NDP is aware the Socreds have destroyed some documents and that some cabinet ministers who didn’t seek re-election have removed others.
But the staff member added that senior civil servants have been in-
formed they have a responsibility to preserve all public documents. He said he expects the bureaucrats will comply.
Harcourt, meanwhile, won’t waste any time rolling up his sleeves.
He is planning a trade mission to Asia next month and others to follow. He also wants to review the books quickly to see what his new government will inherit.
Harcourt plans to call a session for early spring when he will bring in a package of legislation. The package will include numerous private members bills the NDP introduced while in opposition. It includes conflict-of-interest laws and new environmental standards.
Nature’s handiwork
Mother Nature dumped an early-season snowstorm on Prince George and area earlier this week forcing area residents to turn their thoughts, some reluctantly, from golf to more appropriate seasonal pastimes such as skiing. While the snow may not have been welcome, Mother Nature did provide some special artwork to catch a photographer’s eye in Beaverly.
WOODLAND WINDOWS
Restructuring plan set
The details of an agreement between the IWA and Woodland Windows Ltd. on a company restructuring plan remain unclear after officials on both sides refused to elaborate.
The IWA released a one paragraph statement late Friday afternoon.
The release said, “The IWA Canada and Woodlands have agreed to a restructure plan that wifi ensure the economic well being of
the company and a continuing success story in Prince George.
“We want to assure all suppliers that it is ‘Business as Usual’,” the unsigned release on IWA stationery continued. “The union and company have reached an agreement which has been accepted by the membership. No details will be released.”
“The plant’s going to continue to operate in its present form,” Frank Everitt, president of IWA
Local 1-424 in Prince George, said today. He said there were no details beyond what were provided in the press release.
Peter Byl, Sr., president of Woodland Windows Ltd., refused to offer any comment at all on the agreement.
“No, I don’t think I have anything more to say,” he told The Citizen today when asked for details of the restructuring nlan.
He said he intends to keep his campaign promise of fiscal re-sponsiblity, including balancing the provincial budget over a five-year cycle and basing his programs on taxpayers’ ability to pay.
However, the former mayor of Vancouver doesn’t want any knee-jerk planning as the NDP becomes government in British Columbia for only the second time.
“People shouldn’t expect us to move too quickly,” he said. “There’s some real healing to be dune in this province. There’s some very angry and embittered citizens who are tired of confronting each other in our forests, or in labor-management relations, or in our education system.”
Fraser
alliance
sought
by DIANE BAILEY Citizen Staff
Municipalities should be at the negotiating table with the provincial and federal governments as they hammer out how they will work together to administer the $ 100-million Fraser River Basin Action Plan.
“I hope we will be partners and signatories to a tripartite agreement,” said Mayor John Backhouse at a news conference Friday.
Backhouse is on a 13-member committee appointed by the federal government to assist negotiators in developing the agreement.
“A committee members are u-nanimous the municipalities must be players, not simply observers. Municipal government and municipal issues are very significant to the Fraser,” said Glen Sinclair, a communications consultant working with the committee.
There is support in federal and provincial circles for its position, said Backhouse.
“There is a great deal of support from the bureacratic level, and I have not heard any indication at the political level that there is resistance to municipalities being there,” said Backhouse.
But before municipalities can pull up a chair to the negotiating table, said Backhouse, there are some issues they have to work out.
There are 21 municipalities in the Fraser River basin, all with different concerns and interests.
“We don’t know who is going to represent us, how we are going to make that decision,” Backhouse said.
“I can’t make decision on behalf of McBride and Quesnel, but we also can’t have 21 people at the negotiating table.”
Local governments are also going to have decide what kind of financial commitment they want to make and where the money will come from.
The advisory committee, made up of government officials and representatives of the native community, industry and environmental groups, is also looking for ways to make sure the public is actively involved throughout the six years the cleanup plan will be implemented.
“We have to make sure the process reflects and incorporates the concerns of the people of this province,” said Sinclair.
The committee is holding an informal public reception today between 6 p.m. and 9 p.m. at the Yellowhead Inn. It wUl probably do the same in other major communities before its December meeting, said Sinclair, when it will put together its final recommendations for the negotiators.
Backhouse said he and other northern mayors were “skeptical” when Vancouver Mayor Gordon Campbell first called a meeting to discuss cleaning up the Fraser, thinking the focus would be on the heavily-polluted rivermouth.
But, he found a “genuine interest” in the whole river that extends to federal and provincial officials working on the action plan.
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