The Fraser Institute is warning that BC must stop social investment before it even starts

Feb 15, 2018
In a “bulletin” released yesterday, the Fraser Institute points out that public investment in BC has been extremely low since 2001, with real per capita program spending growth of only 0.9% annually—the lowest in the country. On this much, we agree. But the Fraser Institute’s odd conclusion is that, because public investment has been low… View Article

T’Sou-ke First Nation: Building a network of clean energy systems

Feb 14, 2018
A First Nation cannot survive without a healthy environment. If we take care of the environment, the environment will take care of us. Offsetting fossil fuels or the destruction of [the] planet in any way is something that all First Nations can grasp because we have a deep connection to the land, the animals, and… View Article

Raising the minimum wage is good for public health

Feb 5, 2018
Soon we expect the Fair Wages Commission to advise the BC government on a path towards a $15 minimum wage and a plan for regular increases. This will be very good news for our province. Increasing the minimum wage is an important step in reducing poverty and income inequalities that cause poor health. In charting… View Article

BC needs bold, transformative change. Will Budget 2018 bring it?

Feb 1, 2018
BC is a beautiful place to call home—and an extraordinarily wealthy one. Yet, despite this wealth, our province is facing crises of affordability, inequality, poverty and environmental degradation. Next month’s provincial Budget is an opportunity to face up to and truly tackle these crises—something that would require the new BC government to think big and… View Article

As UK Auditor disparages P3s, BC continues to use them

Jan 25, 2018
The public private partnership (P3) model to provide public infrastructure and services is an expensive mess, and new international evidence confirms this. The question now becomes, when is that mess going to wash up on BC’s shore? Despite increasing evidence that P3s are a bad idea, BC’s government is going ahead with this flawed procurement model,… View Article

It’s time for forestry to benefit British Columbians not multinational companies

Jan 22, 2018
There was a time when securing a good-paying forestry job in British Columbia was not just an option but an expectation for many. This was a time when the provincial government took an active role in managing our public forests and overseeing the activities of private companies whose workers cut trees, milled wood and made… View Article

Site C’s economic justifications unconvincing: It’s time we made decisions differently

Jan 16, 2018
There is no question that the new BC government’s decision to proceed with the Site C dam was a very difficult one. The previous government left them with a poison pill. With $2 billion already spent, the Horgan government faced a no-win choice, with substantial political and economic costs for either terminating or proceeding with… View Article

Small steps on affordable housing: A look at the new federal and Vancouver plans

Jan 10, 2018
In November 2017 two important new efforts to address the crisis of affordable housing were delivered a day apart: a National Housing Strategy (NHS) tabled by the federal government; and the City of Vancouver’s Housing Vancouver Strategy (HVS). This piece reviews the details of these plans. Both represent forward progress, but also leave key ingredients… View Article

Glacial pace of governments out of sync with fentanyl crisis

Dec 20, 2017
British Columbia is experiencing the worst opioid overdose crisis in its history. By October 31st, the BC Coroners Service reported that 1208 people had died from overdose: higher than the next three causes of unnatural deaths combined—suicides, motor vehicle incidents and homicides. The numbers for November and December will be released early next year and… View Article

Numerous unlicensed dams found structurally unsound; remediation orders issued

Dec 18, 2017
More than half of nearly 50 dams that fossil fuel companies built in recent years without first obtaining the proper permits had serious structural problems that could have caused many of them to fail. And now, BC’s Oil and Gas Commission (OGC), which appeared to be asleep at the switch in allowing the unlicensed dams… View Article

7 recommendations to shape electoral reform in BC

Dec 15, 2017
The CCPA-BC sent the following submission to the BC Government’s How We Vote consultation, which requests feedback on key elements of the upcoming referendum on electoral reform. Written submissions are being accepted from now until February 28, 2018. You can feel free to quote or cite any of the following if you choose to submit comments… View Article

Study confirms what parents suspect: BC is one of Canada’s most expensive provinces for child care

Dec 13, 2017
A report released by our National Office this week confirms what many parents already know: BC is one of Canada’s most expensive provinces for child care, especially for younger age groups (infants and toddlers). Cities in the Greater Toronto and Metro Vancouver stand out as the most expensive places in the country to access child… View Article

Newly disclosed data shows need for inquiry into fracking

Dec 11, 2017
In May 2014, British Columbia’s then Minister of Natural Gas Development, Rich Coleman, came out swinging when a team of Canadian and American scientists issued a report saying that fossil fuel industry fracking operations could contaminate surface waters and groundwater sources. “The reality is we’ve been doing this for over 50 years, we’ve never had… View Article

Canada is still a rogue state on climate change

Dec 11, 2017
It has now been two years since world leaders created the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. At those meetings, the Canadian delegation joined a broad coalition aiming to keep “the increase in the global average temperature to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above… View Article

Inclusive growth and the future of work: A recap of our 2017 Rosenbluth Lecture with Armine Yalnizyan

Dec 5, 2017
This year, the CCPA-BC’s annual Gideon Rosenbluth Memorial lecture featured one of Canada’s leading progressive economists, Armine Yalnizyan, who shared some insights on the changing world of work and the importance of achieving inclusive growth. Making growth inclusive has become a global policy priority backed, at least on paper, by international organizations like the OECD,… View Article

Housing crisis worse: Former UN special rapporteur Miloon Kothari revisits Vancouver

Dec 1, 2017
As the United Nations’ Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing from 2000 to 2008, Miloon Kothari observed the failure of market-based approaches to addressing housing crises. His 2007 report on Canada called for “a national strategy [for the] large scale building of social housing, and much better tenant protection laws, coordinated strategy on… View Article

Where is BC headed on climate action?

Nov 30, 2017
Canadian politicians have a long-standing tradition of proclaiming targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, then failing to meet them. After a wake-up call in the form of a record fire season this past summer, what are the prospects for climate leadership from BC’s new government? First, a look back November 29 marked ten years since… View Article

Rising housing costs in Vancouver: New evidence from the Census

Nov 27, 2017
Vancouver’s housing affordability crisis is full of jaw-dropping anecdotes about home prices and rents. But with almost a million households in Metro Vancouver, there are both winners and losers from the boom. A recent Statistics Canada release on housing affordability from the 2016 Census allows us to put some numbers to the crisis. Almost two-thirds… View Article

Sticker Shock: The impending cost of BC Hydro’s shift to private power developers – Ten years on

Nov 24, 2017
In April 2007, the BC government’s energy policy was rapidly transforming the province’s electricity system from publicly owned to one operated in the interests of private energy developers and multinational energy corporations. Sticker Shock was written to expose the enormous costs of the BC government’s private power agenda. It documented the fact that the BC… View Article

BC needs an opioid action plan: An open letter to the government of BC

Nov 21, 2017
CCPA-BC Director Seth Klein is a signatory to this open letter to the BC government calling for a provincial opioid action plan. The letter was coordinated by the Public Health Association of BC, a voluntary, non-profit, non-government, member-driven organization that provides leadership to promote health. Since April, 2016 when the epidemic of opioid overdose deaths… View Article