BC NDP candidate Kathy Kendall was campaigning in Clearwater on April 15, meeting with people and knocking on doors.
“I think it’s going well,” she said. “Obviously, some days are tougher than others, but there’s lots of positive feedback out there. Most people are respectful and appreciative on the doorstep, even if they don’t agree with my position.”
The number one issue in Clearwater and the North Thompson seems to be skills training, she felt, particularly in the forest sector.
Jobs in that sector are becoming more and more high tech and requiring higher and higher qualifications.
Skills training is one of the main planks in the NDP’s recently released policy for the forest industry, Kendall noted.
Other points in the policy include improving forest health through such things as more silviculture, expanding foreign markets for B.C. lumber while at the same time restricting raw log exports, and reinstating a jobs protection commissioner to help communities hit by stresses such as the mountain pine beetle.
Premier Christy Clark, in her televised address to the province, said forestry is doing better than ever, according to Kendall.
“That is just not true,” said the NDP hopeful. “The forestry sector has been decimated over the last 14 years and Clearwater knows that.”
There is a mythology that the Liberals are better money managers than the New Democrats, Kendall said.
In fact, the Liberals have had eight deficit budgets during their 13 years in office.
Their tax cuts have simply not translated into a better economy, she said.
The reason is the middle class and lower class have ended up paying more of their incomes in user fees, such things as Medicare and BC Hydro.
The public power utility is a glaring example of BC Liberal mismanagement, Kendall said.
“BC Hydro is being required to buy power for five times the cost of what it sells it for,” she said.
The Auditor General’s recent report that slammed the Pacific Carbon Trust highlights the Liberal government’s poor record on the environment, Kendall felt.