Orders of the Day

Hon. L. Beare: In this chamber, I call second reading of Bill 31, Emergency and Disaster Management Act.

In the Douglas Fir Committee Room, starting at two o’clock and ending at 4 p.m., I call Committee of the Whole on Bill 27, Money Judgment Enforcement Act.

[J. Tegart in the chair.]

Second Reading of Bills

BILL 31 — EMERGENCY AND DISASTER
MANAGEMENT ACT

(continued)

T. Stone: I’m pleased to rise this afternoon to conclude my remarks on Bill 31. Before lunch today, I just mapped out at a high level what I intended to address. I will proceed in doing so now.

I had said that the frequency and the severity of natural disasters and events like wildfires, floods and drought are becoming much more frequent and severe. We have to therefore change in a significant way and modernize, frankly, how we prepare for them, deal with them when they’re happening and help people recover from them after these natural disasters happen.

[1:35 p.m.]

I believe my last comment before lunch today was to basically put out there that the test for me, with the bill in front of us, this Bill 31, is: does it actually get the job done? Does it make substantive improvements in how we manage emergencies in British Columbia?

I am going to talk a bit, in my time here this afternoon, about the types of concerns and questions that we in the official opposition have with respect to Bill 31. We do think that there will be a tremendous amount of additional pressure put on communities, local governments in particular, and property owners as well, through this bill.

There are a number of areas, we believe, where while the legislation attempts to address a challenge, it frankly misses the mark. There are other areas that have been completely missed by this bill — areas that we think that the bill fails to address altogether. I’m going to kind of walk through some of these concerns. Of course, we will address all of this in a lot more detail during committee stage, when we move to that stage of the legislation.

The bill has a required review built into it within five years, but interestingly, there’s no timeline for completing that review. We’ve got concerns over the undue burden that this bill may place on critical infrastructure workers, as it would apply to both publicly and privately owned systems, networks, facilities and assets. It’s unclear, frankly, how this legislation defines critical infrastructure and which owners will actually be affected.

For example, what would the impact be on ranchers with dams on their properties or logging companies with forest service roads? They have, as I said a moment ago, concerns about what appears to be an enhanced burden on local authorities in this legislation.

Frankly, one of the most significant concerns that has been brought forward to us in the opposition has come from regional districts and locally elected officials who have said that it’s not entirely clear in this legislation who would actually be responsible for overseeing and managing a natural disaster, an emergency in the province.

It’s all good and well and important to weave Indigenous peoples and First Nations more into a central role in managing emergencies. It’s great to talk a good game about an enhanced role for local governments and so forth. What’s not clear in this legislation is: at the end of the day, who’s going to be in charge when a wildfire is bearing down on a community? Who’s going to be in charge when roads wash out from floods?

There has to be someone in charge. You can’t manage your way through emergencies by committee. You need to have a deciding authority. That’s not entirely clear. We’re very concerned about the fact that so much of this bill, Bill 31, is going to be brought into life via regulation — in fact, the vast majority of it. For most of the critical components of this bill, we don’t actually have any idea what the government’s thinking is and what the government’s intentions are.

There are a tremendous number of important areas in this bill that are to be determined upon further engagement and consultation. I’m certainly fine with continuing to engage, but the details are not spelled out in this legislation.

As an aside, in relation to that, it has become far too common a practice of this government to bring in legislation that really, increasingly, just represents a framework but doesn’t provide the specific policy prescriptions and the intentions of government spelled out in the legislation. Rather, those details tend to be increasingly coming via order-in-council or regulations of cabinet.

I know how that works. I’ve been there; I’ve done that. But you would think that on something as critically important as emergency management and modernizing how we address all of these natural disasters, there would be more of these details actually baked into the legislation. That is simply not the case.

[1:40 p.m.]

I did find it quite amusing that in announcing this bill, in the government communications wrapped around it, the government says: “Well, this is three years in the making. This was a process that was launched in 2020. This Bill 31 is the government’s best efforts to reflect work, engagement and consultation over the last three years.”

The detail that the government misses out is that the former government had a bill quite a bit more substantive than this one, with far fewer provisions that would provide for orders-in-council and regulations, to modernize emergency management and encompassing areas that this bill doesn’t even address, like disaster financial assistance, for example. We had a bill ready to go, not in 2020 but in 2017. In fact, it was the intention of the government that I was part of at the time.

I was the line minister. I was the minister responsible for emergency management, who had overseen a process to develop that legislation and have it ready to introduce in this place. Obviously, there was a minor detail called an election. There was a change in government at the end of that process. What I find most astounding is that we see the severity and the prevalence of these wildfires, these droughts, these flooding events and heat domes and so forth.

This is a government that has been in power for 6½ years. It’s a government that actually had a substantive bill — more substantive than this one that we’re debating here today, Bill 31, I would argue. We had a bill, with a whole bunch of modernizations in it, 6½ years ago. Why did the government not bring forward that legislation, and make some tangible strides towards modernization of how we manage our way through natural disasters and emergencies, 6½ years ago, five years ago or three years ago?

It has been one engagement and one consultation after the other with this government. We’ve had some of the worst wildfire seasons in 2017, 2018, 2021 and now 2023. We know about all the flood events. Members from different sides of this place have profiled the significant impacts that flooding, drought and, obviously, the wildfires have had in their respective communities. This has all been happening over a good number of years now.

Is this a government that has actually embraced lessons learned from a bad wildfire season? The answer is a resounding no. What we’ve seen is a continuous string of reviews and task forces and pulling together of experts to assess the situation that was a bad wildfire, a bad flooding event or whatever, and to bring forward the lessons learned.

Often it’s reflected in very specific reports and reviews that have been done, with all kinds of tangible recommendations, very few of which have actually been implemented by this government over the years. The Abbott-Chapman report in 2018 — all kinds of recommendations in there, a lot of which haven’t seen the light of day. EMBC’s interim provincial disaster recovery framework in 2019 — again, lots of great ideas in there, based on lessons learned, not brought forward and incorporated into the government’s decisions around how they’re going to do things differently.

Speaking of the heat dome — I’ll talk about this more in a moment — the coroner’s report in June 2022 was a very damning summary of the heat dome that took place in that summer, where we had a huge number of heat-related deaths in British Columbia. Very specific recommendations came out of that report. Very little of that has seen the light of day under this government.

Earlier this month, the Ombudsman issued a report that looked into financial support programs for people displaced by extreme weather emergencies. Again, there are all kinds of recommendations in there. You could almost see the copy-and-paste of those recommendations from previous reviews and task forces that have been done.

It’s not to cast aspersions upon the Ombudsman’s office in and of itself. They did their work. They felt there was a compelling reason to actually do their review, but at the end of the day, in the recommendations, there was nothing significantly new that hadn’t already been determined as a worthy priority that would improve how we prepare for fight and respond to wildfires, droughts, floods or heat domes.

It’s time to get on with actually taking tangible action. The opportunity is in front of us. That’s why we will reserve judgment on this bill, overall, until we have had the opportunity to ask focused questions in the committee stage, which will be coming up.

[1:45 p.m.]

It’s darn well time to get on with taking tangible action. I’ll tell you that people up in Monte Lake and the Paxton Valley…. I know that in the Cache Creek area and in West Kelowna, places have been impacted not once but multiple times by wildfire events in recent years.

Their eyes rolled into the back of their heads when they heard the Premier announce not that long ago: “Guess what we’re going to do, the action we’re taking. We’re going to strike another task force. We’re going to have another task force of experts come forward and actually make recommendations on the types of im­prove­ments that we need.”

No, we don’t need another task force. We need political will from a government to actually implement changes and solutions. Speaking of which, on Bill 31, I’ve got a lot of questions. We’ll ask them in committee. Where is the significant modernization of disaster financial recovery? I don’t see it in this bill. I don’t see an attempt in this bill to improve how disaster financial assistance works, which is a critical financial support program for people impacted during and after wildfire events.

We recognized that this was a problem. As a caucus, as an official opposition, we brought forward a solution to this, some very commonsense improvements that we rolled into a private member’s bill. I was the sponsor of that bill, but it was work that was done on behalf of a wildfire committee of our caucus. We brought that forward. I’ve brought that forward several times in this Legislature, and it sits dying on the order paper. I’d be happy if the government took the ideas and just made them their own and rolled them into their own legislation.

They don’t have to call our bill, but in that bill, we basically provided significant measures that would streamline and simplify the DFA claims process. We would set and define an affordability metric for the DFA’s “reasonably and readily available” insurance criteria. A lot of people can’t actually get DFA assistance because the need isn’t able to be established, based on the current criteria.

We expanded the scope of DFA to address issues pertaining to micropockets of the province where no insurance coverage is available. I can’t underscore this enough. There are a growing number of places in rural British Columbia, frankly, most prevalent in the Cariboo than anywhere else, but it’s popping up in my backyard, too.

In Monte Lake, Paxton Valley and the Westwold area, the ability to access wildfire insurance is actually not just inhibited because the premiums are expensive, so that there’s an affordability challenge, but in many cases, people don’t even have the option of accessing insurance because insurance companies won’t provide the insurance. These insurance companies draw a big black circle around an area. Sometimes it’s a 50-kilometre radius; sometimes it’s a 200-kilometre radius. Frankly, it’s totally subjective. They draw this big circle around it and say: “If you live inside that zone, we’re no longer going to underwrite your wildfire insurance for you.”

What are people supposed to do in that situation? We suggested, as part of our solutions in our private member’s bill, to actually create a mechanism for disaster financial assistance to be made available for people in areas where, legitimately, there is no insurance made available to those individuals. That’s a practical solution.

If it isn’t to be delivered through DFA, then find some other mechanism, but recognize that there’s a heck of a lot of ranchers, farmers and families, often multigenerational, in rural areas of the province who are now having to stare down the reality of maybe not being able to continue to live where they live because they cannot get wildfire insurance. It’s just not available.

That’s where government is supposed to step in, lift people up and help people out. By the way, these ranchers and farmers are not looking for a handout. This isn’t about saying to government: “We want you to do all this stuff for us.” This is about saying: “This is, fundamentally, often going to be the difference between whether we can continue to make a go of it here or not.” There’s a gap here that, through no fault of their own, these people are falling through.

We suggested in this legislation to extend the application deadline to 120 days, extending the appeal process, removing some exclusions and modernizing overall.

[1:50 p.m.]

We even suggested that perhaps…. In light of the fact that wildfire insurance is getting more and more expensive, why don’t we look at building in an incentive for peo­ple, to make sure that where insurance is available, even if it’s expensive…? Why doesn’t it seem like a good idea for government to help offset the cost of that expensive insurance?

You could do that through some kind of grant program. It could be part of the homeowner grant process, frankly. Where you live in a particular area, and you have a certain postal code, the insurance rates are what they are, and the government will help offset the cost of insurance. You have to purchase the insurance, right? You get an offset against that purchase.

Again, these are tangible solutions that we have suggested with respect to making disaster financial assistance, as it sounds, actually work for people who need it. Nobody starts off a summer season or late spring season — it’s getting earlier and earlier in the year — thinking: “You know, there’s going to be a big wildfire ripping through my neighbourhood or my backyard. I best look at all the support programs and this and that that are there.” But people do expect that government is going to be there for them when disasters actually do strike. Those are some tangible examples.

I’m very disappointed that this Bill 31 doesn’t, in any tangible way, address the very obvious need to dramatically restructure the B.C. Wildfire Service.

I have tremendous respect for all the men and women in the B.C. Wildfire Service, particularly those on the front lines that are out there risking their lives. We tragically saw several lose their lives this season. But holy cow, is it time for the B.C. Wildfire Service to be completely and totally remade. Massive, massive challenges in terms of the strategic focus. I’m talking at the upper end of the management in B.C. Wildfire Service. You look at where Spain is, where Mexico is, where Australia is, changes that they’ve made in California in terms of the strategic focus of their B.C. Wildfire Service equivalents.

They have moved to a model, these other jurisdictions, of hitting fires hard and fast with the goal of putting them out as quickly as possible when that fire is a mere dozen hectares, not when it’s 8,000 hectares a day or two later, and you attack it. You have all this red tape and all these rules and regulations and things that have to take place first. You actually get in there, and you attack it hard and fast.

This government made a big deal about a year-round B.C. Wildfire Service. Where the heck are all these year-round people? If they’re not management here in Victoria somewhere, they sure as heck aren’t year-round out across the province.

Yeah, I do know we have winter, and I know there are no fires in the winter. We could build out that wildfire service, the firefighting capacity — including the aerial assets, including the men and women on the ground — and have more to offer other jurisdictions in the off months in other jurisdictions around the world. Just like we welcome others from around the world to come and help us out when we’ve got the big fires, we can send more people to help these allies of ours in other parts of the world. But you’ve got to make those investments.

Part of hitting the fires hard and fast, by the way, is relying more heavily, in a real and tangible way, on local contractors. There are some good Indigenous components to this bill. There is an attempt, as I said earlier, to weave First Nations more into the decision-making and management piece. That’s all very worthy, and we support that.

Let’s talk about contractors for a minute. People in Kamloops, and certainly in the smaller communities, are sick and tired of government saying every fire season: “We’re using every available resource out there.” That’s not true. It doesn’t happen. Every single wildfire season, our offices in the official opposition….

I know members opposite who represent rural areas get the same emails, the same phone calls from contractors here in British Columbia that have assets that are not often deployed, or they’re only deployed for a portion of the year, or you can’t be deployed because your tax verification form has been lost inside the ministry somewhere. It’s ridiculous red tape. We’ve got all kinds of assets. Let’s put these contractors to work. British Columbia contractors, first and foremost — let’s get them actually working.

[1:55 p.m.]

Related to that is relying on local knowledge. There are two very important communities when you talk about local knowledge. One is Indigenous communities. Absolutely. For a long, long time, Indigenous peoples who live on the land and are most intimately connected with the land know the wildfire activity historically in their valleys and where they live. They know the wind patterns. They know how to manage fire. We’ve got to rely on them more. There are just some baby steps that have been made towards that. We’ve got to accelerate that.

As importantly, there are, as I mentioned earlier, a heck of a lot of long-standing, multigenerational ranching and farming families living in all these small communities and that have been there for 100, 120 or 140 years. They know how to fell a tree, know how to buck a log and know how to put a fire out. They often have excavators; they have basic equipment.

Many of them have a basic level of training, and many of them are members of volunteer fire departments, yet season after season they’re often made out to be villains, instead of being embraced as additional assets and added capacity. The B.C. Wildfire Service goes into a community and then decides, for strategic reasons — usually it’s because they don’t have enough resources to manage the increasing escalation and severity of fires in a particular region — to pull out. And the locals are looking around, going: “Where did everybody go?”

I tell you, like that farmer and that rancher, that in the absence of government being there, the B.C. Wildfire Service being there, these people are going to say: “You know what? I’m going to stay and look after my property and my home. I’m going to fight to protect my dwelling and our homestead.”

We should be supporting those people. You support them, as Australia does, as one example. You build out an infrastructure of training and certifications. You stop requiring them to fundraise through bake sales, meat auctions and whatnot. You support them with direct assistance, so that they have the latest technology, the latest equipment and gear, and you put them through their training paces and whatnot. They want to do this.

Guess who will be the first on scene when that lightning strikes. It’ll be a First Nations person, or it’ll be a farmer or a rancher who lives in the area. Because government had their back up front and government has their back, these people are going to spot these fires. In many cases, they’re going to be able to put them out before they become a raging concern. That local knowledge is critical.

The last piece is on the challenges around emergency support services. Again, the Ombudsman’s report was scathing. I implore the government to please expedite the consideration and implementation of recommendations in the Ombudsman’s report, which is still hot off the press. It was only a couple of weeks ago. Take those recommendations and incorporate them into meaningful changes, so that people don’t have to wait in hours-long lines, only to be told that they’re not getting a voucher that day, and so that people are going to get the support they need.

From a recovery and rebuild perspective, we just have to do so much better, and expedite so much, so that when people do lose their homes or they do lose their businesses, they know that they’ve got a government that has their back and that’s going to help expedite the rebuild process.

The member for Fraser-Nicola today, very passionately, once again, spoke of the 869 days, or whatever the number is, that nobody in the village of Lytton has moved home. Nobody has rebuilt in the village from the fire that razed their community to the ground two years ago. That is completely and totally unacceptable, but there’s an opportunity inherent in this. That is to draw the lessons learned and make the changes needed, so that there are actions reflective of doing things differently, putting people at the centre of this equation.

As the member for Fraser-Nicola said so eloquently, this is all about restoring trust with British Columbians. That starts by people seeing, feeling and knowing that there’s a government here in Victoria that actually has their backs when it comes to natural disasters.

Madam Speaker, thank you very much for the time to weigh in on Bill 31.

Deputy Speaker: Seeing no further speakers. I’m going to invite the Minister of Emergency Management and Climate Readiness to close debate.

Hon. B. Ma: I want to thank all of the speakers for their contribution to this debate. In addition to their important role, the work that they do in their communities during emergencies, they also come here, to the Legislature in Victoria, to use their voices.

[2:00 p.m.]

I am so grateful to them for sharing their stories, for articulating the various elements of the legislation and their importance and for highlighting some of the areas that would benefit from more discussion, which I look forward to through committee stage debate.

I do want to acknowledge at this second reading closing statement a few of the themes I’ve heard throughout the debate.

Firstly, there were a few comments that said this bill felt incomplete because there’s so much that will be addressed through regulations. However, this comment is often also accompanied by an emphasis that we must be agile and able to evolve with the rapidly changing circumstances we face. So I want to note that the latter is largely the reason why we do use regulations rather than building too many specifics and details and becoming too prescriptive in the legislation.

The legislation provides a much-needed framework, but as most members of the House know, changing legislation is not a simple or quick process, as evidenced by the fact that this legislation was developed over multiple years and will take weeks and weeks to pass through the House. Legislation, if too prescriptive, will not be as agile as we need, whereas regulations, policies and operational guide­lines can be adjusted on the fly.

That being said, I do acknowledge the desire for MLAs in this House to have more of a line of sight into the development of those regulations given their importance. That’s important and valid feedback that I’ll be taking back to my team.

I do also want to clarify that we are not currently consulting on the act. That was mentioned a few times during debate as well. The current debate on the act is right here in this House.

We have been working throughout the summer to educate on the act, but the public engagements currently open until the end of the calendar year are on two discreet regulatory pieces that are enabled by but separate from the act.

These are the Local Authority Emergency Management Regulation and a new regulation on post-emergency financial assistance, the latter of which is work that is directly relevant to a lot of the comments raised by members around how the current disaster financial assistance program does or does not work well for people and communities given the kinds of circumstances that B.C. now faces on a regular basis as a result of climate change.

Similarly, I heard a lot of really important comments, stories, criticisms, feedback from the on-the-ground wildfire response this year as well as the recovery process from previous hazard seasons, and I want to assure members that we will be collecting that feedback and plugging it into the task force and the ministries responsible for the delivery of those operational responses and services, namely Emergency Management and Climate Readiness but also the Ministry of Forests, as well as some other ministries, like the Ministry of Agriculture and so forth, so that we can learn the lessons being offered by MLAs as they’ve observed them in their communities.

Finally, I do want to acknowledge the feedback I have heard from members, that some members have provided, around the five-year review. I want to emphasize that the five-year review requirement is not intended to lock down the legislation for a minimum of five years but rather to ensure that five years is the maximum amount of time this province goes without a fulsome review of the framework so we don’t end up with another 30-year-old legislation, like the current Emergency Program Act that we are working to repeal and replace.

The five-year review requirement gives us enough time to implement the act, establish those negotiated agreements with First Nations that it enables and see how it functions in real life, but it also does not preclude the opportunity to make targeted changes to legislation if or when they’re identified before that five-year timeline.

I know that there were a lot of other questions and a lot of other comments. Overall, an excellent second reading debate. Lots of valuable feedback. Again, I want to express my gratitude to all the members who participated.

With that, I move second reading.

Motion approved.

[2:05 p.m.]

Hon. B. Ma: I move that the bill be referred to a Committee of the Whole House to be considered at the next sitting of the House after today.

Bill 31, Emergency and Disaster Management Act, read a second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole House for consideration at the next sitting of the House after today.

Hon. D. Coulter: I call second reading of Bill 36.

BILL 36 — POLICE AMENDMENT ACT, 2023

Hon. M. Farnworth: I call second reading of Bill 36, entitled the Police Amendment Act, 2023.

I move that the bill now be read a second time.

It’s my pleasure to rise today to speak about Bill 36, the Police Amendment Act, 2023. The bill amends the Police Act to clarify the process for police model transi­tions. These amendments are responsive to issues that were identified during Surrey’s police model transition.

Under the Police Act, the Solicitor General has a statutory duty to ensure that an adequate and effective level of policing is maintained in the province. Large-scale police of jurisdiction transitions, such as what is occurring with Surrey, have the potential to negatively impact the maintenance of adequate and effective policing within applicable municipalities across the province.

Despite the statutory obligation, the Police Act does not provide a clear approval process for police model proposals. The director of police services has a statutory obligation to superintend policing, and the Police Act also provides specific functions that the director is to fulfil. The Police Act does not currently list overseeing police of jurisdiction transitions as a specific function of the director, and these amendments will change that.

The bill is aimed at addressing the lack of clarity in the legislation related to police of jurisdiction transitions by clarifying the process municipalities must follow when they wish to change their police of jurisdiction. It will ensure that the process is transparent and ensures that municipalities, police organizations and the minister have clear responsibilities in any transition. It provides the Solicitor General with the authority to require impacted municipalities and police agencies to provide information needed to support a decision on a police of jurisdiction transition proposal.

Requiring that information is provided to the Solicitor General is needed as the lack of clarity in the act resulted in delays and the ministry needing to sign confidentiality, non-disclosure agreements to receive information from Surrey this summer.

The bill also provides the Solicitor General with the power to determine how a municipality that has just crossed the 5,000-person threshold will provide police services in exceptional circumstances.

This amendment is needed to prevent a lack of clarity about what would happen if a municipality who has just become subject to the obligation to providing policing does not submit a police service proposal for approval. The bill also establishes a legal obligation for a municipality to implement an approved police of jurisdiction.

The lack of clarity in the legislation about the municipality’s obligation to implement their approved police of jurisdiction has negatively impacted the public’s confidence in policing in Surrey, and this is something that cannot happen again.

The bill provides that one of the functions of the director of police services is to oversee police of jurisdiction transitions. The amendments also give the director clear authority to issue directions to the parties involved in a transition. Providing the director with this authority is necessary to avoid adverse impacts to policing that could arise during a police of jurisdiction transition as the director will be considering impacts to policing across the province.

These amendments also provide the Solicitor General with the authority to take action if a municipality does not implement their approved police model or follow directives issued by the director. If this occurs, the existing process that is set out in the Police Act when a municipality fails to maintain law and order will apply. This would allow the Solicitor General to appoint persons as constables to police the municipality, use the RCMP to police the municipality or take other necessary steps.

The legislation also contains transitional provisions to specifically address Surrey’s current police model transition. The amendments require Surrey to provide policing services by implementing the transition to the Surrey police service.

[2:10 p.m.]

This will provide clarity and finality to the people of Surrey regarding their ongoing transition.

Transitional provisions also enable the Solicitor General to terminate the existing agreement between the province and the city of Surrey for the RCMP service. This is a technical change that will allow the transition to the Surrey police service to be advanced without being subject to the timelines for cancelling RCMP services in the existing agreement.

Finally, the transitional amendments authorize the Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council to appoint an administrator to act in place of the Surrey police board during the transition, if necessary. The ability to appoint an administrator is a tool that may be used to advance the transition and to address more effectively some of the challenges the Surrey police board is facing.

Elements of this legislation are similar to existing legislation in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, New Bruns­wick, Nova Scotia and Ontario.

I am pleased to open up debate on this important piece of legislation.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you, Member.

Before we continue debate, I would remind members in the House that they should have their telephones on silent.

M. Morris: This has been a fiasco right from the beginning. I guess I’d go back to…. I was sitting in the chair as the previous Solicitor General. I understand the complexities of the Police Act and the requirements of municipalities and my role and the role of the Solicitor General in exercising the legislative requirements under the Police Act in British Columbia.

Transitions from one police force to another, although not common, are not unexpected. It’s something that has been explored by many detachments and police agencies in the province over the years.

The one that comes to mind, when I was sitting in that chair back in, I believe it was, 2016, is Richmond, which explored changing from the RCMP to their own independent force.

I recall having meetings with the mayor of Richmond and the exercise that they went through, as a municipality, in speaking to the public and informing the public on what the plans were, gathering all the information in a very transparent way and sharing it with the people of Richmond until they finally arrived at the consensus that going in that direction was not economical. It wasn’t feasible under the conditions. The RCMP were providing a very good service to the folks in Richmond.

I look at this. I’m sure the minister has looked at this, as well, and understands this. All police agencies in British Columbia have to follow the law. The standard operating procedures between….

Whether it be the Vancouver police department or the Surrey detachment or the RCMP in Prince George or in Masset, all follow the same rules for collecting evidence and for investigative procedures. The training and the accreditation that are required for criminal investigators; for detachment investigators; for the run-of-the-mill, general duty police officers or uniformed police officers in our communities, who are serving the public on a day-to-day basis, are pretty much the same.

I sat down with the Justice Institute when I was the Solicitor General, and I looked at a lot of the training programs that they had. I’m familiar with the training programs that the RCMP have at the academy in Regina. I’m familiar with the ongoing training programs that the RCMP hold in the Pacific Region Training Centre, the old CFB Chilliwack, where they provide ongoing training and expertise to police officers through that facility.

I have also worked, over the years, as an investigator. I recall, back in the ’70s, working with a member of the Vancouver police department on a file where we shared similar fact evidence. We were looking at the same accused, and we worked collectively together to ensure that we were able to successfully prosecute that individual. The training that the officer from Vancouver had was…. I never once suspected that there was any difference between our abilities to investigate an offence.

[2:15 p.m.]

As a supervisor within the RCMP, oftentimes we would share resources with other police departments and other agencies, not only in British Columbia but across Canada. We used to say that if we needed somebody that was able to leap tall buildings, we could find one within the police universe somewhere in Canada.

We used to say if we needed somebody that was able to leap tall buildings, we could find one within the police universe somewhere in Canada. We were able to get that individual to assist us in the investigations that we had.

I’m the designated speaker, Madam Speaker.

The concept that one police department is better than another police department is not the focus. It should not be the focus of this. The concept that one police agency can do a better job than another police agency should not be the focus and the impetus behind a transition that we see taking place right now in Surrey. The ability of a police force to do things differently does not change from one police force to the other.

In all my experience as an on-the-road police investigator or a supervisor or a police manager…. The last ten years I was in the RCMP — I was in charge of the northern 80 percent of the province for all the policing, the municipal contracts, provincial policing and federal policing throughout northern B.C.

Trying to get the resources to get the job done was always an issue and always something that we were mindful of in our HR departments and whatnot, but it was something that we looked upon to get the job done. Try and keep the crime rate down. Address the crime rates in the communities. Those are the kinds of concepts and those things that I looked at as a police manager and as a Solicitor General.

The only difference that I found over my many years in policing, my 32 years in policing and my time as the Solicitor General and sitting in this House and listening, often, to the debates dealing with public safety, has been the resourcing level of the individual police departments or police detachments.

We see that in the police statistics. These are documents I used to refer to on a regular basis when I was the Solicitor General and a police manager in maintaining some kind of monitoring of the effectiveness of our police agencies across the province. We have police agencies that had caseloads here in British Columbia as few as 18 or 20 criminal cases per police officer per year. Pretty low. We also had detachments in British Columbia where we had caseloads around 400 and 500 criminal caseloads per officer per year. Insurmountable odds that those individuals had to face in order to get those investigations done.

When I look at municipalities like Surrey, and we have 31 municipalities in British Columbia that are policed by the RCMP and that are over 15,000 people, I look at how the average caseload per officer in British Columbia is 63. Pretty good. In my estimation and in my experience, I would say that once you start getting close to that 50 range, I think that’s the optimum level. Workload for a police officer is around 50 to 60 criminal files per year to investigate, so they can do that eloquently correct investigation, so we don’t see any cases tossed out.

So 63 isn’t bad for an average for those 31 detachments. Surrey falls in there at 47, so Surrey is below the average for caseload per RCMP member in British Columbia. The crime rate in Surrey is 65 crimes committed per 1,000 population. Pretty low. The average for those 31 detachments is 83, so Surrey is way under the average, again, but we have crime rates in some communities over 200. Several over 100, 150 crimes committed per 1,000 population. Those put significant stressors on the detachment and on the police officers that work in there.

I know there’ve been discussions about recruiting and the inability of police departments, not only the RCMP but police departments in British Columbia and across Canada, to attract resources. But I have to say this — that up until a couple of years ago, the RCMP was probably the worst-paid police agency in Canada. It lagged behind on an average of about $20,000 per year for a constable in the RCMP versus constables working in the independent police departments outside of the RCMP.

[2:20 p.m.]

That’s significant. We saw a mass exodus of RCMP members leaving the RCMP to go and join those other police forces to take advantage of that $20,000 bump in salary. That affected the ability of those detachments in order to function and carry on the workload that they were supposed to have. It also discouraged a lot of people from applying to join the RCMP at that particular time.

Thanks to the National Police Federation, the union for the RCMP…. They lobbied on behalf of the RCMP. They talked to Treasury Board, and they were able to gain those significant salary increases for the RCMP at all rank levels so that they are now as competitive as any other police agency in British Columbia.

That has changed the dial on the people that are looking at policing as a career choice in B.C. and across the country. I think that puts the RCMP in pretty good stead now, for the last year and a half or two years, on that.

The other problem that we see with policing — and the independents face the same thing as the Justice Institute — is trying to…. The people that look after the Justice Institute in British Columbia are trying to predict how many more cadets British Columbia is going to need to train, basic training, in order to fulfil the obligations under the municipal contracts with the independent forces. They try to do that.

Everything was skewed when all these other police officers were leaving the RCMP to go and join the independent forces here. It significantly reduced the number of cadets going through the Justice Institute and skewed their results as well. It takes them time to gear up and start training the new cadets coming in.

The RCMP is no different. When people quit applying for the force or contracts right across Canada decide “I don’t think we’re going to take those extra 50 or 100 or 200 cadets this year because our municipal contracts can’t afford it” or the province can’t afford it or a number of reasons why, then the RCMP academy in Regina dials down.

They will ship their seasoned instructors back off into the field, and they will resume their duties in the field. Then, all of a sudden, we have turnarounds, where police forces are asking for more contract resources, and we have to turn the dial up on the academy in Regina. We do that.

This has been going on now for decades. It goes in cycles. Depot does have the capacity to train well over 1,000 cadets per year and fulfil their obligations, not only in Surrey or Burnaby or anywhere else in British Columbia but right across Canada.

I recall, when I was the Solicitor General…. The city of Surrey asked for 100 new RCMP members for Surrey. It was just dropped on the RCMP. “We need 100 more members.” They got 100 more members. There was no question. It took a while to get those members on, but I think within a year, they were fully functioning. They had all the 100 members there, without impacting the operations of the detachments around the province or across the country.

The shoulder patches and the uniforms that the men and women wear are all guided by the same jurisprudence, the same evidence-gathering techniques, the same interviewing techniques. The same laws apply when it comes to surveillance techniques and recording conversations. All of those things are guided by law.

I just go back and say…. The only difference between a police force with a low caseload per member and a police force that is struggling to maintain 75 to 100 cases per member is the resources that are made available to them by the community or by the respective government that is looking after them.

That was one of the things that we had to monitor. The minister is in the same position that I was when I was the Solicitor General. You have to monitor that and try and find that balance between the ability of a community to pay and what an acceptable or an adequate and effective level of resourcing is under section 2 of the Police Act.

There are no metrics for that. That was one of the things that I looked at. If I was ever to pop the hood open on the Police Act, perhaps, maybe, we could put some metrics around section 2 and say: “If your crime rate falls before such and such….” Then, perhaps, we should look at ensuring that that municipality or that contract adds the necessary resources to address those.

[2:25 p.m.]

Again, when I look at the statistical data for the Surrey detachment, with a caseload of 47…. That is extremely good. There are 24 detachments within that 31-detachment group that are higher, and some significantly higher, than Surrey.

Bill 36 has me concerned. When I see the sledgehammer approach this government is taking to deal with a municipal government that does currently have the authority, under the Police Act, to determine how they’re going to be police…. They’re going to take a sledgehammer, and they’re going to smash this ant of a problem and force Surrey to do their bidding.

Under section 15 of the Police Act, Surrey is responsible for paying all the costs. Section 15 of the Police Act is the one that I’m sure that the mayor and the council in Surrey have concern about, as all municipalities do.

It says that “a municipality with a population of more than 5 000 persons must bear the expenses necessary to generally maintain law and order in the municipality and must provide, in accordance with this Act, the regulations and the director’s standards, (a) policing and law enforcement in the municipality with a police force or police department of sufficient numbers (i) to adequately enforce municipal bylaws, the criminal law and the laws of British Columbia, and (ii) to maintain law and order in the municipality” and provide adequate accommodation, equipment, supplies, etc.

Municipalities like Surrey, which has an RCMP contract, are encumbered with 90 percent of those costs. The RCMP, federally, pay 10 percent of those costs. The province has no skin in the game with this.

Looking at the statistical data, which shows that Surrey is actually operating as one of the safer communities in the province, with a low crime rate overall in respect of all the other communities that we have in the province and a low caseload, I can’t see a reason why the minister and government would be going in the direction that they’re going right now. I can’t see the data that indicates that Surrey is not a safe community. Surrey is a very safe community.

The undue pressure that the men and women in both police services, the RCMP and Surrey police service, have been under in Surrey since this whole fiasco started in 2018…. They need to be commended. They have continually done an outstanding job to ensure that the citizens of Surrey are living and playing and working in a very safe community.

In addition to the RCMP municipal forces that we have in Surrey…. Surrey also has the RCMP divisional head­quarters in Surrey, employing hundreds of people living and working in the community of Surrey. There are integrated policing units in Surrey. This goes, again, to my argument in support of…. It doesn’t matter what shoulder patch you wear.

We have integrated policing units in Surrey, operating in Surrey and throughout British Columbia, the Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit, that look at and deal with the organized crime and the drugs and the whatnot that we have right across the province here. That unit is comprised of members of just about every independent force and RCMP force in British Columbia. They work very well together, and they do some very good work in bringing a lot of these folks to justice.

We also have the traffic units. We have forensic identification units that are integrated, where everybody works side by side.

We have the platform that the B.C. Liberal government brought in back in the early 2000s, when Rich Coleman was the Solicitor General, PRIME. What it did is…. It brought all police agencies in British Columbia together under one platform of operational file maintenance so that everything was recorded on the same platform. Police agencies had access to information from one agency to another. We could track individual criminals going from point A to point B throughout the province.

Those were the things that established police working collectively together right across the province for the good of people in the province.

[2:30 p.m.]

There have been situations in the province in the past where agencies haven’t worked together. PRIME addressed that and other….

The travelling criminal in British Columbia doesn’t care what shoulder patch a police officer wears. They don’t care about the boundaries of municipalities. They don’t care whether it’s federal jurisdiction or provincial jurisdiction or municipal jurisdiction. All they care about is taking advantage of the weak and vulnerable people we have in all of our communities and selling drugs and doing whatever they need to establish their lifestyle in the province here.

[S. Chandra Herbert in the chair.]

Relying on one police force in a transition, like this has been presented to us, to me is not the issue here. I think that what we see and what we’ve seen take place since 2018 has been more politics than it has been focused on the safety of our communities, of Surrey. Politics should not come into play when it comes to public safety.

I look at the initial intent of the mayor at the time, in 2018. I looked at that initial report that was written. I went through it in detail, and I was flabbergasted at the lack of detail I saw in that report and the false assumptions that were made in that particular report. It was void of anything that I — and I’m sure the minister felt it, as well — could have made to support it from a Solicitor General perspective. I’m sure that’s why he had another look at that and designated another individual to take another look and provide another report.

When I looked at that initial report, it was my estimation based on…. I’d only been out of that chair for a matter of months when that took place, but it was my estimation that the estimates in that report were about $200 million short of reality for that change. The metrics never got any better throughout that whole process.

This is, I’m sure, the concern of the municipality of Surrey. What is it going to cost the municipality of Surrey to implement a brand-new police service who have to look at bringing on their own equipment, all the information management systems, the training? There are a number of issues that they have to look at there. It will be the responsibility of Surrey to pay those costs. And none of that was articulated in a form that I saw that I could have any confidence in and make a decision saying: “Yeah, this is the way we’re going to go.”

The other factor that indicates to me that this is political is that the current mayor of Surrey ran on a platform that they would retain the RCMP. This was a significant factor for that whole community. The election results came in, and that mayor won her election.

This Bill 36 to me is an indication…. It’s the government taking a sledgehammer, like I said, to kill an ant. It has disallowed the mayor, duly-elected mayor, to retain the RCMP, which was her legislative choice under section 3 of the current act. She was exercising that choice, and she was exercising that choice because, as I read into the record earlier, section 15 says that the municipality of Surrey is wholly responsible for all the costs incurred for policing within that community, wholly responsible for providing a detachment and a lockup and all the necessary infrastructure for a police operation to work in that particular community.

Those are big dollars when you’re looking at a police department with 850 members, let alone the support staff a lot of these police agencies have working within the building as well — hundreds of people employed in the infrastructure that supports that. So this is a big ticket item.

[2:35 p.m.]

In my experience, policing generally accounted for 25 to 40 percent of a municipality’s budget — large municipalities, small municipalities. That’s a significant amount of change when you look at all the pressures that a municipality has in order to provide the services for the people that live within the boundaries of their area and to maintain the infrastructure that they have.

When the minister this morning in question period reiterated several times that his focus was on public safety — I’m looking at the reports that initiated the transition — and then, unfortunately…. I would have liked to have seen the report that the minister relied upon, with the 500 pages of redacted information on there, to find out what was in there that compromised public safety to such a degree that he would take this sledgehammer approach to the city of Surrey and try and cut them off at the knees so they have no choice in how their community is policed.

I looked at the crime resources and the crime data that we have in B.C. I looked at Surrey. As I’ve mentioned, low caseload, low crime rate in comparison to many others — a crime rate of 65 crimes per 1,000 when two detachments in B.C. are over 200. That has a significant impact on the resourcing level of those particular detachments.

If the minister was citing that there are public safety issues in Surrey and he’s going to bring the sledgehammer approach and going to take all options away from municipalities to determine how they’re going to be policed, what about these other police departments and detachments in British Columbia with crime rates at 208 and caseloads of 120 or 165 cases per officer per year? Will he be knocking on their door as well and saying: “Listen. You guys are not doing a very good job here, so step aside. We’re going to come in, and we’re going to ensure that plan B takes place without any input from your local government.” That’s not right.

We’ve got 64 RCMP municipal contracts in B.C. in the large — 15,000 and above — municipalities in B.C. or the 5,000 to 15,000 municipalities in B.C. When I was a district officer in northern B.C., I think there were 12 municipal contracts that I had under my area of jurisdiction. On a regular basis, I would present before council and I’d say: “I’m looking at the crime rate. I’m looking at the caseload per member. I’m looking at the effects that the high, heavy workloads have on the members of this detachment. I think you need to add more resources to that.” But it was anecdotal. I could only provide the anecdotal information based on my own experience.

Oftentimes I would have 100 or 150 criminal investigations in my file cabinet at the different detachments I worked at. I solely was responsible for the conduct of those criminal investigations, to try and get them to a point where I could prosecute or recommend prosecution for the various offences. Some of them were very serious offences.

That’s when you start making mistakes, like I mentioned earlier. That’s when you don’t take a statement properly, following the jurisprudence and the protocol set out by the court. That’s when you forget to provide a warning for somebody. That’s when you overlook a certain judicial authorization or process and getting that authorization.

At the end of the day, you throw a serious investigation, the prospects of charge and prosecution, out the window because you don’t have the time and resources necessary to spend on that. That’s what I looked at as a Solicitor General and a police manager: is public safety being compromised by these excessive workloads?

In the early 2000s, maybe late 1990s, I was concerned enough about the anecdotal presentations that I was making to the various municipal councils that I went to my boss. Bev Busson at the time was the commanding officer for British Columbia.

I said: “There’s something wrong here, and I would like to study this. I’d like to get some money and get a group of people to look at this and find out how the complexities of policing have changed since the Charter came out in 1982, but even before that, and how it has affected the cost of policing right across the country.”

[2:40 p.m.]

I did get a sum of money for that, and we were able to hire a local university here in British Columbia to do the study. It was a 30-year analysis of complexities of policing. I can’t remember the exact title that they gave it at the end of the day. It came out, and it did indicate that in 1973, when I joined the RCMP…. That was the start of the study area, and it went for 35 years.

We looked at all the different laws that had changed during that period of time, and impaired driving comes to mind because impaired driving is a common file that our police officers face, unfortunately, in many of our communities across the province. The amount of resources that it took to investigate an impaired driving offence and take it to court had increased something like 600 or 800 percent between 1973 and 2002, I believe it was.

That’s significant, and that’s an impact on these detachments. I was looking at the detachment numbers, where a detachment had an establishment of 30 members in 1980, and in 2002 they still had 30 members. Yet the law had changed. The constitution came in and changed. Then the Charter of Rights and Freedoms came in and changed, and the Bail Reform Act came in.

We looked at all the different case law that impacted the complexities of all these investigations, and we found that domestic violence offences took 1,500 percent more resources to investigate and get to the point where we could prosecute if necessary or find alternate means, yet that was hardly looked at by the governing bodies and municipal governments. Even the provincial governments, to a significant degree, ignored that information and still piled all the work on the police officers out there to get the job done.

And they did. The police officers worked tirelessly to get the job done. They worked under extreme circumstances. They worked under extreme threats of violence, in many cases. They worked hours without their families, because they just have to work, particularly in theses small communities. They’re on call all the time.

There are a number of things that impacted the lives of the police officers to the point where it caused a lot of separations. It caused a lot of anxiety, and then when you mix that with the pay scales and the differences with the RCMP and municipal forces, there was no question why we couldn’t attract recruits to the RCMP. It wasn’t because of anything more than the money.

The ability…. The career that an individual has within a police service of any kind — it doesn’t matter what shoulder patch you have — is far-reaching. It’s not just a career as a police officer. You have individual careers in the marine section, running boats, flying airplanes, becoming a forensic expert in certain fields, becoming an expert in a multitude of different disciplines within the policing milieu that is required, that every service requires.

There are a lot of people that are attracted to that kind of a lifestyle — the ability to transfer around the province. A lot of people just want to settle in one community, particularly when they’ve got a family. They want to settle in a nice, friendly little community or a large community that has a neighbourhood where they can raise their families and carry on without any worry, and they’ve got their job every day.

There are a lot of folks out there that join the force to travel, to experience life in the Arctic, to experience life in the mountains, to experience life in the small First Nations communities, to taste that culture and to look at how life is in another part of the world. They gain their expertise in those areas, and they transfer from one detachment to another.

That cross-pollination is what helps the RCMP and any police force that does that to develop the expertise and the experience that we need in today’s world of policing. Today’s world of policing is not reliant upon going out and doing something. It’s relying upon somebody with a breadth of experience to deal with a multitude of personal issues that we see in our communities.

[2:45 p.m.]

You become a counsellor. You become a negotiator. There are a number of things that you do in order to talk somebody out of a situation or to convince somebody that the direction they’re going is the wrong direction.

It’s a fulfilling role, and at the end of a 32-year career, I counted the number of lives that I know I had saved, and I know that the same thing happens with the members in Surrey and Burnaby. It doesn’t matter where they are. Vancouver police department, New Westminster police department, Victoria police department — all these men and women who are working relentlessly and tirelessly every day to make their communities safe.

I look at the situation that Bill 36 addresses here, Surrey transition. I wonder how it feels to be a police officer working in Surrey when you know that the provincial government is trying to kick them to the curb and has voiced their opposition to the RCMP as the police force of jurisdiction in Surrey. Conversely, the members that have…. A lot of them are RCMP members that have quit the RCMP to go and join the Surrey police service, probably because it’s new. It’s exciting. “There’s a brand-new police force in town. Let’s go and try it out for size.”

They’ll find out that it’s the same old, same old once they get into the car. The badge on the car is a little different. The badge on the shoulder is a little different. But the work is going to be the same. It was something new.

They’ve been working in this era of uncertainty now since 2018, and that uncertainty was getting worse and worse and worse. The mayor was trying to make her point with respect to: “We’re the ones that pay the bills.” People in Surrey are the ones that are paying the bills. They’re the ones that are going to be forced to pay these exorbitant prices for a police force that the majority of people in Surrey voted not to have.

It put her in a bit of a predicament. I can’t blame her for pushing back and fighting to try and maintain her ability to follow the legislative process, to abide by section 3, their choice to retain the RCMP as their police force of jurisdiction. At the same time, the province was working against that. That’s why I say it was political. It was motivated politically more than it was on the basis of public safety. Public safety has not been compromised in Surrey, according to the statistical data I’ve seen here.

Now, if there’s something different in this report with the 500 redacted pages that has caused the minister to be so concerned about public safety in Surrey that he has chosen to bring this sledgehammer approach in there, I think it’s time that all of us have the ability to see it.

All of us here in the opposition ranks and the people of Surrey need to see: “My goodness. What is compromising the safety in our community that is so significant that the minister and this government have taken a sledgehammer to the ability of municipalities to choose their own police force?” I think that’s the crux of the issue here. We need to find out what that information was.

Now, the minister has alluded a couple of times to the fact that it relates to the RCMP’s inability to staff, to their concern as the province of jurisdiction in B.C. here, where we will see RCMP members coming from outside of Surrey to join the Surrey detachment. It will impact the ability of these other detachments to provide that level of service.

But that won’t happen. As a detachment commander…. I was a detachment commander at one time. I oversaw 40-odd detachments during the latter part of my service. It’s incumbent upon the detachment commander to make sure…. There’s an operational requirement to make sure that we have proper staffing levels, to ensure that there’s an effective and efficient level of policing in all of our communities.

I’ve seen it many times. I’ve signed off on the paperwork for many situations like that, where I’ll say, “Yes, Constable So-and-so or Corporal So-and-so. I know you would love to get down to Armstrong or Vernon or wherever you might be,” or Surrey, in this case. “But unfortunately, because of the resources that we have” — we’ve got a member on sick leave; we’ve got another member disabled or whatever the situation is — “we need to retain you for at least another six months to a year. Can you live with that?” You negotiate those kinds of things at the end of the day.

[2:50 p.m.]

Then you, at the same time, go back to our HR office. You say: “HR folks, I’ve got a member that really wants to transfer down to such-and-such a detachment. It’s going to leave a vacancy here. He’s one of our senior members, so I’m hoping that you can find another senior member somewhere in the thousands of police officers that we have here in B.C. that would come and replace that member when he decides to go.”

We also need to make sure that we have a cadre of cadets that are coming in that we can rely on to fill in the blanks and to start the training. These smaller detachments…. The big detachments gobble up a lot of cadets on a regular, routine basis as well. The ability to go and work in a small detachment where you experience firsthand…. You know, you’re the first person on the scene for a homicide. You investigate the serious sexual offences because there’s no other policeman around. You’re the one.

I recall, many times, driving by the window of a store in some small community when I was a police officer. I’d look in the window, and there’s little me sitting in this police car with the white doors and the crest on it and people looking at me as one of the resources in town that was going to help them. And I’d think: “Oh, my goodness. Okay.”

That’s a heavy responsibility when you’re in a commun­ity, and I’m one of three, one of six or one of ten police constables. You get to know a lot of…. You learn the ability to deal with people in a very tactful and diplomatic way, particularly when the nearest help is two days away or three days away. That gives you different skills as well.

When those folks end up going to a larger detachment, they bring those skills with them. They can de-escalate situations to a significant degree, and they’re a real asset. The cross-pollination we get, the training the RCMP members get throughout the province here and across the country is second to none because of that. That’s one of the reasons why.

Now, the opportunity is available, and I’ve seen many members from municipal forces join the RCMP in order to get that kind of experience and then go back to another municipal force a few years later with those skills in their pocket, and they become a much better resource for that particular community at the end of the day.

There are just so many factors that lead to good policing — other than shoulder patches, other than inventing a brand-new police department in British Columbia. We have got 12 independent forces in British Columbia as it is. I guess 13 wouldn’t make much of a difference. But is it necessary at the end of the day? I don’t think it is. It’s not going to provide any different level of service to Surrey unless they add the resources — very similar to, perhaps, what Vancouver police department has.

At the Vancouver police department, they’re running probably about 400 more police officers than Surrey is for about 90,000 more people and a much smaller geographical area. Their caseload per member in Vancouver…. I’m just going off the top of my head here. I think it’s somewhere around 32 criminal files per officer in the city of Vancouver. That’s because Vancouver has chosen — that’s their right as a municipality — to resource their police department the way they want to see that resourced. Surrey is doing the same thing, but they’re using the RCMP.

What’s also happening with this political battle that has been going on in Surrey since 2018…. No new resources have gone into Surrey to increase the number of police officers looking after Surrey, yet I think it is the fastest-growing municipality in British Columbia. It adds thousands of people to the community every year.

Where are the subsequent resource increases in policing to augment the increases that we see in population in Surrey? I think that has been overlooked, and Surrey is going to be under the gun again very quickly, if it isn’t already, in under-resourced policing because of the increase in the population that we see in Surrey. That needs to be addressed.

I’m sure the mayor has that on her radar screen as well, but for her to plan how they’re going to move forward under those kinds of pressures is impossible in today’s world because of this situation, this political battle that the province or the government has gotten into with the municipal government in Surrey.

That needs to be straightened out. We don’t need the sledgehammer approach. We don’t need a new police de­partment and people thinking that a new police department is going to change how Surrey is being policed.

[2:55 p.m.]

Surrey is well served. It’s a very safe community in re­spect to many, many other communities in the province here. It has got an adequate level of resources to address the crime rate that we see in Surrey right now. The crime statistics that I’m reading from are from 2021. Things have changed slightly since then, I’m sure, but not to the point where it would raise the spectre of public safety to the point where the minister is going to bring in a sledgehammer approach to deal with this particular situation.

I’m looking forward to the committee stage on this. We’ll have a lot of questions to examine all the different issues that we see here. We will try and get to the bottom of whatever this disastrous public safety issue is that the minister has been referring to. Hopefully, the public will be able to make their own decision as to what that looks like.

So until the committee stage, I appreciate the opportunity to speak on this.

P. Milobar: I rise to take my space on Bill 36 to make a few comments and observations around the bill and maybe bring another perspective to concerns around the situation that’s unfolding that we see with Bill 36.

So there are a few aspects to this. At its core, I think, it speaks to an underlying theme that’s been developing under this Premier’s watch.

Municipalities are free to do what they would like — under the laws that they operate under, under the province of British Columbia — as long as those municipalities are doing what the Premier wants them to do. But if they try using the powers afforded to them under the Community Charter and other pieces of legislation that goes contrary to what the Premier might like, legislation gets brought in, in this place, to override that.

It can be as singularly focused as a single piece of property in Vancouver, as we saw back in April on Bill 26, when the government said it doesn’t even matter what a judicial review might find in terms of due process being followed or not. The government wants a certain project to move forward. Therefore, they will override any community concerns, any judicial reviews, and change the laws to suit their liking.

We see the same with Bill 36. I think it’s important to look back on policing in British Columbia and realize that for decades upon decades upon decades, municipalities have exercised the ability to figure out what policing model works best for them, as long as it’s meeting the threshold of public safety.

Now, you know, there are a lot of people that feel that fire services are mandatory, and they’re not. You need a fire inspector, and that’s about it. Municipalities choose to have fire services because it lowers their insurance rates.

Police is a different matter though. Policing does need to be done to a standard that will ensure public safety.

The reason there seems to be a lot of confusion as to what’s happening in Surrey and what’s happening with Bill 36 is the government seems to be, on the one hand, saying they don’t feel that the RCMP can provide proper public safety measures in Surrey — even though they policed Surrey up until recently, as the police jurisdiction of record — but they’re a fine public safety police force for the rest of the province that relies on them for municipal forces.

That type of contradictory thinking from the province makes one wonder why Bill 36 is needed when there hasn’t been proper transparency around why it is necessary to go against the wishes of the mayor and the council on something like this.

Again, as the speaker before me pointed out, this really isn’t about what badge or patch any police force is wearing. We would be having these same conversations had the decision of the government been the reverse, potentially, and they were bringing in this type of legislation.

[3:00 p.m.]

It’s really, at its core, the legislation and the sledgehammering that is being taken to the process that municipalities have to decide what type of police force they would like.

The fact that the government has lacked so much transparency on this creates problems across the board. If there’s not going to be a substantive cost increase to the taxpayers of Surrey, why is the province offering $150 million? Every time the minister gets pressed on this, he seems to indicate that there might even be more money available for Surrey.

At the same time, the minister refuses to acknowledge that there’s a financial impact to every other municipality that has an RCMP detachment in this province based on his decision. There are shared administrative costs that come into play. Surrey, being a very large detachment, will, of course, change the formulation of everyone else’s share of those costs. Where’s the money to offset and to help those municipalities — Kamloops, Kelowna, Richmond, Port Coquitlam, Prince George, to name but a few? No discussion from the government.

Bill 36 gets brought in as a sledgehammer to say: “We don’t care what a particular municipality wants to do, even though they are, up to this point, in their legal right to be doing it. We’re going to change the law.” That seems like a pretty heavy hand of government to come down.

We see it play out time and time again. We see it play out on housing with this government. We see it play out on a wide range of issues with a municipality.

Now, I can tell you that municipalities…. Again, we’ve not seen this problem. We’ve not seen this trying to go back and forth from police forces, within a municipality, regularly happen.

The fact that we need to bring in a piece of legislation, that the government feels it needs to bring in a sledgehammer piece of legislation to override municipalities would indicate the province has handled this very poorly to this point. It hasn’t been a problem up until this point. The only common denominator in this problem so far has been this government.

I can tell you that when the RCMP contract was re­newed for 20 years, there was a lot of discussion at the time about going another 20-year term or not. There was a lot of discussion at the time about the fact that municipalities could opt out, at any time, of that 20-year contract.

I know. I was the mayor of Kamloops at the time. I wound up on the RCMP contract management committee set up by the province and UBCM to manage that contract on behalf of all municipalities around this province.

There was discussion in Kamloops at the time about whether we should continue on with the RCMP or not. There are regularly conversations in municipalities on this topic, because they have the flexibility to do that. Even then, there was a very clear and open acknowledgment that if a municipality wanted to transition in this new 20-​year agreement, it would likely take at least two years to properly transition. Well, here we are, year 5.

This government has failed miserably in trying to facilitate the transition, if they wanted that to happen, over the last five years. We are where we are today, with Bill 36, because of the failures of this government. Now they need to, once again, try to point the finger of blame at anyone but themselves.

As we have heard, police agencies post-Pickton share information now. It’s called PRIME. That’s the bigger piece of this. Police agencies do all operate with the same set of laws, with the same operating procedures. With PRIME, they actually take information in very similarly now.

Again, I know this because I was on the board of PRIMECorp, which actually managed that information software. When there were heads of the various police agencies…. New West was there. VPD was there. The RCMP were there. There were municipal forces.

[3:05 p.m.]

Their highest ranks were there. You’d have conversation after conversation around how to make sure that the information gathered from one force to the other would fit into that information-sharing software.

Did one police agency have to change how their form was structured to match up with other police agencies or not? It was that granular of conversations between all these police agencies to make sure that the public was well protected in British Columbia and lessons were learned from the Pickton case around gaps in policing in British Columbia. Then it evolves, and it evolves.

Municipalities don’t shy away from these types of conversations. The difference over the last few years is, again…. This is a government that seems to think that municipalities, subject after subject, and with Bill 36 highlighted once again…. You’re allowed independence. You’re allowed to have your own decision-making as long as it’s a decision that the Premier agrees with. Otherwise, the legislation will change.

That is fundamentally wrong, and it’s a problem. When you look at Bill 36, what this really is trying to do is, once again, circumvent legal processes that people reasonably expect.

Now, I obviously didn’t have a vote in Surrey. To me, this isn’t really about that. But people did vote, and there are arguments back and forth. Low voter turnout. Was this strictly how you voted or you didn’t vote? We go through those exercises in this chamber all the time, at a provincial level, at a federal level, at a municipal level. You’re trying to interpret the will of the people based on a vote.

The bottom line is municipalities do have that ability to make changes, election after election. It’s rare that it would happen on policing. Has the government’s response been to fully show the public and all British Columbians…?

Now with the $150 million, and climbing, offer on the table, this is impacting all the taxpayers in British Columbia. With the administrative costs that are going to be downloaded to every other jurisdiction in the province that has the RCMP as their municipal police force, this is going to impact all of those municipalities, as well, with no conversation from this government yet.

Is the government response, with that as a backdrop, to provide the information and the detail and the costing to the public, not just in Surrey but for the whole province, so people can have an understanding of why certain decisions are being made? No.

The solution by this province, by this Premier, is to bring in a piece of sledgehammer legislation to, once again, override the decision-making authority and autonomy of municipalities and just say, “Trust us. We know best. Trust us. One badge is safer than the other,” even though the other one had policed that jurisdiction for decades and continues to police the vast majority of the rest of the province — at least, the geography.

Communities have always had that freedom and that flexibility to make that decision, recognizing it might cost more or it might cost less depending on the badge and the level of policing within the realm of safe communities. They get to make that choice whether or not they would rather spend more money on policing or not as local taxpayers.

It’s not just big cities that make that choice. Nelson made that choice. I don’t know how long ago. They have their own municipal police force. They were fully within their right to make that decision. It might cost them less today, might cost them more today. It doesn’t really matter. They had the ability as a community. I’m hard-pressed to say they haven’t been policed. Public safety is taken care of in Nelson, New Westminster. Abbotsford has a long history of how that evolved.

[3:10 p.m.]

With Bill 36, you might as well just tell municipalities that whatever the Premier wants is what you’re going to get for public safety in your community. That’s fundamentally the problem I have with Bill 36. It’s based on years and years of my own personal experience at the municipal level, dealing with RCMP contracts, dealing with policing contracts, dealing with policing information software that spans more than just the RCMP.

This really isn’t about what Surrey is choosing to do or not do. This is about the reactions of this province, of this government and of this Premier, time and again, whenever a municipality decides to invoke the powers that they have to determine what they would like to see done in their own community, and that’s fundamentally wrong.

If the government and the Premier is willing to bring in a sledgehammer like Bill 36 on this, just as they did on housing on Bill 26 and just as he did with Penticton, where he made sure they knew he had 1,000 tents that he could have shipped up to Penticton if they didn’t like a shelter he was going to put into their community, what’s next? What’s next on this government agenda to look at a municipality and say it doesn’t matter?

We’ve seen the so-called naughty list with housing that’s come out. Questionable targets, a questionable way to calculate it. But again, take that out of the equation, and it’s the mindset. It’s the mindset of not only are we the government and we know best, but we’re the provincial government, and when things we’re doing are messed up and are being fumbled along and not being implemented well, we’ll find someone else to blame. If that person or agency is not willing to just accept the blame, we’ll change the legislation around to make sure the public thinks it’s really that they’re to blame.

I’ve not seen this government take any, any semblance of responsibility for things going on in housing, for things going on with affordability, for things going on with policing and for catch and release. It’s always someone else’s fault. It’s always something that happened 20 years ago, or it’s something Ottawa did or didn’t do, or, in this case of Bill 36, municipalities daring to actually, I don’t know, follow the rules that have been laid out for them and decide what they want for their community.

That’s not a way that you build cohesion in a province when issue after issue keeps having a downloading effect on municipalities. It does make one wonder when municipalities, privately, when you talk with them — I still have quite a few relationships and connections in municipalities across this province — when you have private conversations, how unhappy they are about things like this happening, but publicly, how they don’t really raise up.

We’ve heard the same from agencies. It makes you wonder what’s being said to them behind the closed door about access to future infrastructure money or other programs. Because if the very public legislative agenda by this government, as witnessed in Bill 36 or Bill 26 or other pieces of legislation, is any indication, you do as they say or else. You do as the Premier wants or else.

[3:15 p.m.]

Municipalities are duly elected. They go through a very rigorous process, just as everyone in this chamber does, to get themselves elected. I’ve never met a mayor and council that doesn’t take their job seriously. Some perform a little bit better than others, admittedly, across this province at various times. But that’s the ebb and the flow.

To their core, they all are doing what they feel is right for their community. All you have to do is watch a city council meeting in any community in our province and watch how much they wring their hands over if they have to add $10 to your recycling bill for your blue bin pickup in a year and what that does, and the worry they have about the cost pressure that might have on a home.

So ask yourself why Surrey might be pushing back as hard as they are about a policing transition where the province won’t release any information around what the true cost impacts to the taxpayers of the residents of Surrey is going to be, while still dangling $150 million out for a limited time only, and then, when there’s the slightest bit of pushback, saying there might even be more money on the table and not wanting to acknowledge that all the other municipalities with RCMP detachments are going to see an increase in their administrative costs when Surrey is no longer represented by the RCMP.

Just put that lens on it. Just think of your own local councils who take what your overall property tax bill is seriously. I know people always think that they just spend at will, but they really don’t. They’re very constricted. Unlike the provincial government, they can’t run a deficit. Local governments aren’t allowed to have a budget that is in deficit. They don’t get to just have $7 billion in deficit, as our current Finance Minister has, and shrug and say: “Well, inflation is good news.”

That’s not how municipalities operate, because they’re bound by laws by this provincial government and all provincial governments, and they accept that. So then when you see Bill 36, which is going to change the laws and their flexibility and their autonomy to make decisions, it’s problematic for municipalities.

Now, most municipalities…. Surrey has a much larger scale than Kamloops, roughly ten times the size, roughly ten times the size of the detachment as well, just to use round numbers, to make things a little bit easier. It’s not quite ten, but it makes this analogy much simpler.

So if there’s a $10 million cost impact to the residents of Surrey, it’s very similar to a $1 million cost impact to the residents of Kamloops. Why that’s important is that most municipalities all operate the same way. They have limited resources for revenue. Property taxes collect about 8 percent of all the taxes you pay federally, provincially, municipally. Municipalities only receive about 8 percent of that. So they have fees-for-service, things like swimming pool and skating rink fees and stuff like that, and then property taxes. That’s it.

Policing and fire account for 40 to 45 percent of the taxation budget of every municipality in B.C., especially if you have the RCMP. It might actually be higher in Vancouver and those, but I’m going to speak, because that’s my reference point, of RCMP, 40 to 45 percent of your taxation budget.

Why that’s important is because there is no fee-for-service for the police. There’s no revenue offset that the municipality can charge to offset that cost of the police. The police is about 50 percent. It’s about the same cost as most fire departments are in most cities, which means 20 to 25 percent of the overall taxation budget — your property tax bill — is policing.

So if you hear a mayor and council pushing back as hard as they are and a provincial government refusing to talk about costs, just ask yourself: why would a municipality push back that hard on something? It’s because it’s a major budgetary line item.

[3:20 p.m.]

People go to a mayor and council and say: “You need to bring our taxes down.” You’d say: “Okay. Well, police and fire are about 40 or 45 percent of the budget, so now I’ve got 55 percent of the money to work with. I haven’t hired one person to clean a park, one person to do any roadwork.” None of the services that you expect in a city have been even paid for at that point, and they only have 55 percent of your property tax bill left to work with.

The cost impacts and pressure of policing are…. Policing is 100 percent needed in a community. No one is remotely trying to say that is not the case. But to try to pretend it’s not a massive cost pressure to every single municipality simply isn’t accurate. It is.

When I read Bill 36, which is the Premier saying, “You shalt do what I want now because you’re not doing what I wanted to this point” and “Oh, by the way, here’s $150 million plus to offset the costs of the decision this government made,” knowing that that’s still going to be an extra cost added on after the fact, that’s all I need to know.

It’s not about the badge. It’s not even about the topic at that point. It’s about a government trying to change a law to run roughshod over any mayor or council without providing open and transparent views into why that is needed and what the true cost to that municipality will be.

The precedent it sets just continues on with this government. Time after time after time, you’re going to see this continue to happen. It’s happened in Penticton. It’s happened in Vancouver. It’s happened with the naughty list on housing, the so-called naughty list. It will continue. And it shows a mindset of a government and a Premier that knows best, that will only accept what a municipality is doing if it is 100 percent in line with what that government is doing.

They don’t even want the courts to weigh in on this, with Bill 36. Why are they worried? Why is the government worried about the judiciary taking a look at everything unfolding? If it’s all rock solid and defendable, I would think they would welcome that. But instead, in Bill 36, it’s trying to attempt, just like it did in Bill 26, to remove the judiciary that’s supposed to be independent, an independent judicial oversight that people in this province are supposed to have access to. The government wants to remove that. Again, ask yourself why.

I’m not from Surrey. This, to me, is not about SPS ver­sus RCMP. This is about process. This is about a government that has failed miserably over the last five years and created a huge problem within a municipality and will not provide transparency. All indicators are saying that there must be massive cost implications on this provincial decision if they don’t want to provide any of that. Then they end it all by Bill 36, to take away what are existing rights of a municipality.

The fact it happens to be about policing is really neither here nor there. As our critic from Prince George–Mackenzie has pointed out, policing will still happen. The public will be safe. I firmly believe that. But this is about a government that, for whatever reason, refuses to be transparent while, at the same time, doubling down and bringing in sledgehammer legislation.

It’s worrisome. It’s problematic, and sadly, it’s starting to be a regular occurrence from this Premier and this government. I think everyone in B.C. should be nervous about that, because again, if you take the actual SPS versus RCMP out and layer in just about any other topic, this government has shown a willingness to go there.

[3:25 p.m.]

That is why I have issues around Bill 36, and that is why I can understand the concerns that we hear emanating out of Surrey and surrounding communities around how this has been mishandled by this Premier and by this government to this point.

I thank you for the time on Bill 36.

Hon. H. Bains: I stand in support of this bill. I’ve lived in Surrey almost all of my life since I’ve been in Canada. It’s a great city. The diversity that you enjoy in that city, the food, the people…. I think they deserve the best and less than no one when it comes to services. I won’t get into how Surrey had been neglected.

I continue to hear, coming from the other side, why we shouldn’t be doing certain things in Surrey, whether it’s health care services or education services. We have a whole list. Public transportation. I won’t get into that because that’s not what the bill is all about.

I go back to the time when the previous council was running for election. Their main platform was that they wanted to bring their own police. They made all kinds of good arguments: that Surrey is the largest city in the province that doesn’t have their own police force, that they have no control over how the policing model is utilized to deal with the diversity and the special needs of the city.

They were successful. The mayor at that time, Doug McCallum, and his council were in a majority. They fulfilled the promise that they made that they wanted to bring in their own police force, and they would relieve RCMP services with thanks.

I want to say many people talk about all kinds of different things. I will not get into the good and the bad of different police forces. I would say that the RCMP has a great history in this country, in this province and in Surrey. Since that time, there are all kinds of arguments being made, whether the RCMP should be providing policing in communities or they should be concentrating on different, higher levels of service that our country and the province need. I will not get into those arguments.

I do want to talk about…. The people of Surrey have gone through a lot. First, the council said that they have given us the mandate to bring in their own police force. So they followed the process, contacted the province, and they received the okay to go ahead. Talk about the local government’s authority.

They said: “Yes, go ahead. Bring your own police force.” The transition committee was put together, and they looked at whatever was needed. They recommended that Surrey police services made sense. They were almost halfway to succeeding, to continue to have Surrey police services established as the police in Surrey.

Then the next election came. The next election was debated that, no, they want to keep the RCMP, and they were successful. They have the majority — the current mayor. Now they want to go back to the RCMP. What I’m trying to say here is that different politicians, different political stripes, come, and they make those arguments. One said: “We want to move on to Surrey police services.” Next one comes in and, “No, we want to go back to the RCMP,” although we are halfway through the transition.

[3:30 p.m.]

Where are the people of Surrey? Their safety and security, in the meantime, is being compromised. That is one thing that is missing with all the arguments that are coming from that side.

When they talk about the mandate — yes, that’s democracy. That is part of democracy, but we also have to make some commonsense decisions. How many people actually voted, and how many people voted for that particular mayor versus all the others who were against that proposal? You can make all kinds of arguments, but at the end of the day, it has to have the people of Surrey and what is good for them.

[J. Tegart in the chair.]

What is good for the people of Surrey? Their safety and security is exactly what should be at the centre of the discussion. That is being missed here. Sides are being taken, but that’s not what this House should do. Analysis was done when the Solicitor General provided the information that he requested. The independent analysis was conducted, and numbers were given that $150 million over five years, or $30 million, was short. This government decided that Surrey citizens should not be responsible for that extra cost. So what does the government do? They said: “Okay, we will come in and provide $30 million a year to fill that gap, over five years.”

I think this government is doing everything that it can to make sure that the safety and security of Surrey and Surrey people and their population is looked after. That is the number one driving force under this act. That’s exactly what this act is all about.

City, you made a decision to go in one direction. Now you want to go back in the other direction. What stops you even then, next year, from saying: “No, we made a mistake. We want to go back to the Surrey police again. We’ll call it something else.” Or the next mayor comes in, and they say: “No, no. We don’t like this. We are going to go back to something else.” Well, you can’t run a city like that. You can’t leave people, especially their safety and security, in limbo like that, in uncertainty like that.

What this act does is say: “City, you make up your mind. Once you make up your mind that you’re moving in that direction, you move in that direction.” You can’t have a decision going back and forth and back again. How do you run a city like that?

Politicians can make that decision. “Well, this is more convenient for me to do it this way.” But the people of Surrey are saying: “Move on, people. Move on. You made a decision to bring in the Surrey police, now move on with the Surrey police.” They have asked the B.C. government, “Help us, because there may be a gap in finances here,” and the province responded with $150 million.

All we need is cooperation from the city government. People are crying out for help out there. They’re saying: “You made the decision. Move on.” They want to get it over with. They want to know that if they make a phone call, if there’s a crime, if they witness a crime in front of their house and they call police, someone would respond. That hasn’t happened over the years. That hasn’t happened.

I remember that one city mayor running for the position said: “We will bring in 100 new police officers.” Obviously, they knew that they were short 100 police officers. Well, why not bring ten a year in the previous ten years? It’s not the fault of the police force. It was that those politicians made those types of decisions. Did they bring those 100 additional ones? People questioned. Did they? You know, this cry for help continues on.

[3:35 p.m.]

We were making a phone call that I witnessed a crime in front of my house. They will take your phone call, but no one shows up for hours, if at all.

I want someone from that side to walk with me, a few neighbourhoods, and I will show you how many people will tell you they made a phone call and no one showed up. It’s not the police force’s fault. They prioritize their calls. They have to, with the limited resources they were given over time.

I think what people of Surrey are saying is: “Let’s have our own police force. We, then, can decide what kind of policing model we need so we know that when someone makes a phone call, their call will be answered and responded to.” That’s all they’re asking. I think this is what they are saying.

You have a nice house. You have a nice neighbourhood. You have a nice job. But they don’t feel safe in their own home, or they walk their kids in their neighbourhood, in their neighbourhood park, and they don’t feel safe there. If they don’t feel safe while they’re using their public facilities, nothing else matters. Nothing else matters.

People of Surrey are tired of this back-and-forth and back-and-forth position that the city of Surrey has taken. They are saying: “Let’s move on.” You made a deci­sion. You’re halfway through. Let’s have your own police force. The province is willing to help you bring in our own police force so that we can have safety and security better than before.

Is this going to solve all our problems when it comes to crime? Probably not, because solving crime is very, very complex. There’s no one answer, and people understand that. But let’s not make this a political football, as some people are trying to make it in the city government and here in this House.

Let’s look the people of Surrey in the eye. They are asking for help. They said: “Don’t just go back and forth and back again.” Their safety and security, their children’s safety and security, is important. We’ve seen incidents where shots were fired even at a school.

People don’t feel safe in their own homes. They understand that there are issues out there. But what they are asking for is that when they make a phone call to the police station, their call is answered in a timely fashion and is responded to in a timely fashion. That’s all they’re asking. That’s not too much that they are asking.

Let’s not make this a political football any more than it has been out there. Let’s pass this legislation and move on. That’s exactly what the people of Surrey want us to do.

E. Sturko: I’m going to speak for a couple of seconds here about a couple of statements made by the member for Surrey-Newton. I want to clarify that it’s actually not about a transition back to the police of jurisdiction. It’s not about going back to the RCMP.

The fact of the matter is that the police of jurisdiction has remained the RCMP since the beginning, the outset of the proposal of the policing transition, and has not changed over to the Surrey police service. In fact, it’s not halfway complete. It’s not even close to being halfway complete. Thanks to the mismanagement of this NDP government, it’s not even halfway close to being done.

Today I’m rising to speak to Bill 36, the Police Amendment Act. I want to begin by being very clear that my statement regarding this bill is not an endorsement. It’s not a critique of any of the police services or the officers, whether they’re from the RCMP or the SPS, who are currently serving in the city of Surrey.

[3:40 p.m.]

We have a great deal of respect for anyone who will put on a uniform and patrol the streets to keep our community safe. My statement today is a critique of this government and its decision to strip away the powers of the lawfully elected municipal government and their fundamental right to decide their own policing model.

Subsection 7(2) of Bill 36 states: “Despite the Police Act, the City of Surrey….” It goes on, despite the lawfully elected mayor and council, who were elected on a platform of choosing to keep the existing police of jurisdiction. Despite having a lawful mandate, this government has written legislation to force them to continue with a law enforcement transition process which they don’t want and which they’ve stated that their municipality cannot afford.

The second-largest city in B.C. will effectively have one of their fundamental rights — to decide upon a service model and how much of a tax burden they’re willing to place on their taxpayers — forced on them, and forcing them now to decide what other local services they’re going to have to cut to afford this transition.

If this stripping of municipal powers can happen to B.C.’s second-largest city, then it surely should be a concern for smaller cities, for smaller municipalities, be­cause it’s not only Surrey that’s going to pay. Right now, every municipality that is served by the RCMP in B.C. pays a shared administrative cost, which gives them a savings advantage. How much will their municipal costs increase when B.C.’s largest detachment and its 800 members are removed and are no longer paying their share of administrative costs?

The minister has pledged $150 million for the Surrey transition. It’s nowhere near enough, but he has pledged $150 million, and I hope he is going to be announcing soon the payments to every other RCMP-served city whose town’s costs will now go up because of his decision. These costs are likely to be between 5 and 20 percent in division administration costs alone.

This is all coming at a time when British Columbia is facing an unprecedented affordability crisis, housing crisis and overdose crisis the likes of which our country has never seen. Six people a day are dying; health care is in crisis.

I can’t in good conscience stand by and watch these costs to taxpayers continue to rise, higher and higher, at a time when I have people coming into my constituency office in tears because they’re not going to be able to get urgent cancer treatments for surgeries to save their lives. This is how this NDP government is choosing to spend your tax dollars. Bill 36 makes it clear.

This minister has stated that he made his decision based on safety, because there’s a requirement that he ensure “adequate and effective” policing. This is true; however, adequate and effective policing isn’t defined in the Police Act nor has it been defined in Bill 36. This was an opportunity for all British Columbians to see how the minister made his determination regarding safety. Once again, this minister failed to do that; this government has failed to do that. It’s a lack of transparency that has continued from day one of this botched transition.

It surely couldn’t have been based on crime rates, be­cause under the current police of jurisdiction, the crime rate in Surrey has been trending down for the last ten years, and they have never received any notice of deficiency in the last 72 years of service in the community.

The minister stated that he made his decision because he was concerned that retaining police of jurisdiction would create a situation where officers might leave their detachments across the province to fill vacancies, and that would need to be them going to replenish jobs in Surrey. He stated this belief despite receiving assurances from the national police that they would be able to fill those 100 to 200 vacancies without disruption in the rest of the province.

On the other hand, the minister makes no mention of where the incoming police service will recruit upwards of 1,000 police officers and the consideration for the disruption and instability that it’s going to create in policing all across the province.

[3:45 p.m.]

In fact, the minister didn’t do a service-to-service comparison. As the public was notified after the decision was made, the minister had advised and we learned through the media that the incoming police force actually doesn’t have an HR plan. So how could he have known how many officers would need to be recruited? How would he know what would be more disruptive to the policing environment?

At the time he made his choice, he didn’t know how many officers would be needed in Surrey. He didn’t know how many would leave their detachments to join the incoming police service from across B.C., other municipal forces or across Canada or how many would need to be trained at the Justice Institute. It begs the question: how on earth did the minister have sufficient information to form an opinion based on the potential for destabilizing police across B.C.?

I’m going to be bold, and I’m going to say that he didn’t have enough information to make an argument on the basis of safety. Based on what the public can glean from the court petition by the city of Surrey, it’s becoming clear that there was no basis to invoke a decision under the Police Act citing safety. That’s why this government is ramming through Bill 36 to make up for their shortcomings.

It’s another example in a long list of legislation that the NDP has rammed through to crush opposition to their political will. We saw it with the Kitsilano Coalition. We saw it with provincial lawyers and their unionization, and now we’re seeing it in Surrey. Municipalities should be worried. What’s next? What’s next? What other powers?

It’s clear, after seeing this legislation, that there was no basis for ramming through a decision. It feels like a political decision. It feels like bullying.

I can tell you that I, too, am a resident of Surrey. I hear from my constituents, and I hear from people all across the city that they’re afraid of something else besides crime, and that’s their tax bill, because they’re not sure how, in the middle of an affordability crisis, we’re going to be able to afford to live in Surrey.

One of the best things about Surrey is its affordability. It’s been a place where people across this province have been able to come. People from around the world have been able to come and eke out a small corner of the world to make their own, to have a great life in Surrey — actually, I should tell you — one of the safest communities in B.C.

Statistically speaking, Surrey is one of the most safe communities in the province of British Columbia. We have a lower crime rate than Vancouver, less of a case burden. We’ve been well served by our current police of jurisdiction. We’ve been well served by keeping the costs of safety in our community low.

It’s actually not only police that create safety in a community. It’s actually ensuring that we have adequate activities for people to do, making sure that kids have access to libraries, pools, clubhouses, parks, playgrounds.

These are all things that won’t be able to be afforded when our property tax goes up in the double-digit percentages. How will people be able to afford leaving their homes, going out for activities? How will we continue with a lot of the anti-gang programs that we have in Surrey, when a lot of them are dependent on parks and recreation that we won’t be able to afford because of this decision that’s being forced by the NDP government on the citizens of Surrey?

There are lots of arguments back and forth about: “Well, you know, there was a mandate from the previous government, but more people showed up for him and didn’t, and how many people....” You know what? It doesn’t matter. There was an election, a lawful election in the city of Surrey and a government that had a clear mandate. It’s clear to me, based on information that wasn’t analyzed…. Members from Surrey-Newton and other places can say that there was an independent analysis, but an analysis of what?

We now know it was not a force-to-service comparison. There was no HR plan. There has not been and there still is not a completed transition plan. It’s like the province of British Columbia’s government, the NDP, are forcing the citizens of Surrey and our city council and mayor to write a blank check on a project that they don’t even know how it’s going to be completed.

[3:50 p.m.]

It’s not going to just be $30 million extra a year. At this point, we don’t know what the true cost will be be­cause they don’t have an end-game. They don’t know how many people. They don’t know how much it will cost to get the information technology. It’s not fair. It’s not fair to the taxpayer.

While I agree that people are fatigued with the policing transition — I’m fatigued; the men and women, the people who are serving in Surrey in uniform are tired — it is truly mismanagement by the NDP government from day one of this project. Approving a police transition with an incomplete plan, unrealistic financial expectations, no HR strategy and no legal framework is an absolute cluster. It is completely irresponsible.

The reason our community finds itself in the situation it is in now — facing huge tax burdens for the individual, being forced to undertake a transition that people who elected the mayor and council clearly indicated that they do not want…. This is all being foisted upon taxpayers’ shoulders by the NDP government and their mismanagement, their lack of leadership, their lack of transparency, for what is clearly political will.

You might have gleaned that I’m not in support of Bill 36. I feel that it is an abuse of power. It is stripping away and setting precedents to remove authority from municipal governments. Why bother having municipal elections? Why bother making promises to people that will elect you, if the government can simply write legislation to suit its needs — to bully, to pressure, to push its way, to force you into a decision?

Like I said, talking today on Bill 36 is not an endorsement of one police force over the other, because I have great respect for both the Surrey police service and the RCMP. I think that both of them are capable. Both of them have shown a loyalty and dedication to our city.

This is about a government that has at every corner, at every turn in this transition, just simply messed the bed and left us with something that nobody wants to have to clean up. I’m sure the RCMP are sick of it. I’m sure the SPS is sick of it.

Now we’re in a situation where not only does your vote for a mayor and council to pause the transition and to keep the police of jurisdiction count for nothing, essentially, under this government, but they’re also going to be removing the members of the police board — the police board that, as the member for Surrey-Newton said, is supposed to be advocating for the resources, advocating for how many people you need, and making decisions and choices for your community about policing that are in the best interests of your community. That’s being stripped away under this legislation.

Instead, it’s being replaced with someone from the government, a director from the ministry. Instead of a group working together — with a mayor, with people with a vested interest in our community, people with knowledge of policing, people with knowledge of different community groups, Indigenous representation — now it just comes down to one or two people working for the government who are going to dictate to Surrey what’s in their best interest: “Government knows best.” We see it at every turn. Every opportunity to do the right thing, and this government does the wrong thing.

I want to wish every member of the RCMP and every member of the Surrey police service the very best in this stressful time.

For the officer in charge of the RCMP and to the chief of the Surrey police service, thank you for your dedication. Thank you for working together and trying your very best to keep the morale high among your members in what is a terrible time.

It has been a terrible time for members working in Sur­rey RCMP and SPS for a number of years now. We know this is not your fault. This is not laying the lack of leadership at the feet of police leaders. This is a lack of leadership that starts from the Premier and runs through the ministry and into this chamber. This is clearly at the feet of the NDP government, which is why I will not be supporting Bill 36.

I thank you for the opportunity, Madam Speaker. Thank you very much.

[3:55 p.m.]

A. Olsen: Thank you for the opportunity to speak to Bill 36, the Police Amendment Act.

It has been interesting listening to this debate. I had the benefit of spending about 15 months on the Special Committee on Reforming the Police Act. One of the positive experiences that I’ll take away from my time in here was my experience on that committee. It was tough, arduous work.

We spent many, many hours in those 15 months hearing testimony, hearing from policing services, hearing from communities, hearing from Indigenous leaders, mayors and councillors, listening to leaders in the policing community and hearing from other stakeholders that engage with policing on a regular basis.

We worked very diligently to come together with a set of recommendations that fulfilled the mandate that we had as a committee. It’s important to acknowledge that the name of the committee was about reform — “Reforming the Police Act.” That committee started before the snap election in 2020, and it continued through to this parliament with some new members and with some of the members that had been sitting there originally.

We have memories that reach back to the summer of 2020. We know that it was a particularly tense time. COVID-19 — there were more questions than answers. Then, as well, the murder of George Floyd and the impact that that had, not only on the United States but on the discussion and the public debate that was happening here in our province. The members of the committee were seized of this opportunity to present to this government a set of recommendations that fulfilled the mandate, as I said, of reforming the Police Act.

What’s important for the public to understand about our committee process is that unlike this chamber, where we come in here and the partisan divide is easily identifiable — either physically by this red carpet in between us, or in the vote when we stand and vote and the Clerks call out the names, or in Hansard, where you see this side and that side — in committee, we work to an end that is agreeable to everybody. We work toward consensus.

We spent a lot of time deliberating on those 11 recommendations. At the time, the three political parties that were represented in the House were represented on that committee. Part of the reason why I feel so good about that work we did was because where there was disagreement, we were committed together to working toward agreement, so that when that report was finally tabled here in April of 2022, I believe it was, the report had agreement by all the members of the committee and, as an extension, by the members of this place. Consensus had been reached.

Consensus wasn’t easily found. It was negotiated, it was discussed, and it came through effort. I think when the public looks at their governing institution, that’s what they hope for. That’s the hope that they have for the people that they send to represent them in rooms like this or at the council table at their local government or in the federal parliament, the House of Commons, in Ottawa.

[4:00 p.m.]

They hope, when they elect us, that we come here and work collaboratively, that we take our differences of opinion, and we round the edges a little bit. We take some sandpaper, and we work on them until there’s a smoother finish than was there when we first showed up or when the issues were initially laid before us.

The volume of content we accumulated in that committee was immense. We had over 1,000 people participate in one way, shape or form. I think that’s even a conservative number. I think that there was far more than that.

In those recommendations, distilled from all of the things we heard…. The experiences of people who engage with the police, the experiences of police who engage with the public, the experience of the experts, of the academics who study policing, the experience of former Solicitors General, of people who led policing in this province and in other provinces informed those 11 recommendations. In the end, there was more than 11, but there were 11 broad categories of recommendations.

At the top of that was a new community safety and policing act. I think that what’s important to point out here is that we agreed and felt it important to frame this new legislation that we could envision, sitting at that table, as an act that dealt with community safety first and, obviously, policing as well but that there was a frame around it — that it wasn’t just about police. It was about community and public safety, an issue that continues to bubble to the surface here in the Legislative Assembly as it gets debated publicly but in probably the least effective….

If the committee space is the most effective space that we work in, in this House, one of the least effective spaces that happen in this place is question period. So we’re debating incredibly important and sensitive topics like public safety with the volley of question period and not a very effective place to debate.

It’s an effective place for opposition parties to raise im­portant issues for British Columbia. I don’t want to diminish question period as being not of any use, but it’s not of a use in order to get to the bottom of an issue like the committee process was. So we proposed a change to community safety and police, a change to the frame of the act that would emerge from this successful process.

We also made a number of other recommendations. One of those recommendations was a transition to a provincial police service. Now, we have a provincial police service. We just contract it to the RCMP. But what we were talking about was a provincially controlled police service, one that is not the RCMP, one whose chain of command ends in this place, one who is not also burdened with an RCMP Act and a bunch of federal politics, frankly, and a bunch of federal considerations — a policing service that is a British Columbia policing service like we once had.

We recommended an all-party oversight committee to oversee the transition to a provincial police service. Now, we know that the contract is coming up at about 2030. I think it’s 2032. So at the time that we tabled the report, we looked at it and we said: “Look, it’s ten years from now, a decade.”

When we looked at what happened in New Zealand, it took a decade for them to transition their policing services. We looked at the timeline, and we said that this would be a perfect timeline for us to continue to live to the agreement that we have with our current policing service and begin the transition and create a collaborative framework in which the members of this place, over a number of parliaments, potentially over a number of brands of government too — it could be several different governments or a few different governments — that that would provide some continuity in the transition.

[4:05 p.m.]

So create an oversight committee that is as inclusive as the committee that was tasked with reviewing and making recommendations to reform the police. Continue with the collaborative sense, the momentum that had been generated from the 15 months of us working together.

We encouraged the minister: “Don’t lose that momen­tum. Create that all-party committee. Have the work continue.” Put the same members on it. Put some new members on it. It didn’t matter, really. The parties could pick whoever they want to be on that. But continue the work, the atmosphere of collaboration. Create an independent, civilian-led oversight.

This is about trust in policing, making sure that when the public takes a look at the review of incidents that occur, they are confident that the public interest is the thing that’s put forward and not necessarily the policing interest. Make sure that there is an independent, civilian-led oversight of policing in the province.

Right now we have the Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner, who deals with the municipal police services, and we have the CRCC, the complaints process for the RCMP. So we have two processes: one that is entirely responsible and the chain of command ends here in B.C., and one that leaves this province and goes somewhere else. Once it goes across the Rockies, there’s nothing we can do about it. We just have to accept the result.

Standardize the initial and ongoing police education and training. We heard so much about how we are letting our officers down and not having the type of training that’s required in order to deal with the new and emerging roles and responsibilities that police, unfortunately, are having to play. Front-line workers on the opioid crisis.

Are they the correct people to be deploying to a mental health crisis? Absolutely not. But until this government finds a way to deploy the correct resource, they are the people that are showing up, and we owe it to them to give them the training and the ongoing education in order to be able to do that and not carry the burden of those incidents, day in and day out. Those sirens that we hear, day in and day out, just grinding away on people. The trauma that they carry because we, as an institution, haven’t provided the correct resource with the right type of training.

We said: “Look, we need to make sure that the type of training the communities want, the type of policing the community wants, the type of policing the Surrey police service, when they came to us and explained to us….”

They’re developing a community-based, grassroots, ground-up training and policing philosophy so that not every officer has weapons. The first point of contact isn’t necessarily a fully uniformed police officer. There is a variety of different policing responses, a variety of different community and public safety responses, being delivered by the policing service in place and a fair and equitable funding model.

There were a few other recommendations we made. These were the key recommendations we made that are directly applicable to Bill 36, the Police Amendment Act.

Part of the reason why I enter this debate with frustration in my voice is because all of this…. Everything that we’ve been experiencing with Surrey, as I’ve said repeatedly in the media and as I’ll continue to repeat if this unfortunate situation continues to go as it has, is…. All of it was entirely avoidable. None of it was necessary.

If the minister at the time of receiving the report had indicated — the initial mandate that the minister, himself, had given us to make recommendations about reforming police — that this government was committed to police reform, as they suggested when they struck the committee, we would have been given an indication that the recommendations that were put in that report weren’t going to be sitting on the shelf and collecting dust. They were going to be implemented.

[4:10 p.m.]

The momentum that was generated in the consensus-building process…. We could have capitalized on that. Instead of having the debate here in question period, we could have been having thoughtful discussions at the committee table.

Instead of Surrey being a political lightning rod, instead of it being this ball that gets kicked back and forth across the net, we could have been having that discussion at the committee table with the minister, with the ministry, with the director of policing services. We could have been working through those challenging situations.

Public safety wouldn’t need to be brought up in this place at question period because there would have been a place that would have been reserved for that discussion. We gave the tools to the minister, but the minister chose to ignore them. The minister chose to put the report on the table.

Now, I’ve been told…. I’ve heard several times: “Don’t worry. Those recommendations are going to come forward. There are going to be changes made in the fall session. There are going to be changes made.” When the new Premier got sworn in, they’re going to bring forward those changes in the Police Act committee. “Don’t worry. In fall 2023, you’re going to see some of those recommendations be brought forward in legislation. Oh, not fall 2023; maybe the spring 2024 session.” More momentum lost, more time wasted, more tension and stress brought to this discussion and on to this House.

We’re dealing with this Bill 36 today because of several missed opportunities by this current government. First, the missed opportunity to not embrace….

I recognize it’s going to take some time for the minister to look at the report, to understand the report, for government, for cabinet to talk about the report. But at the time, the director of policing services was presenting information to the committee. The ministry was paying close attention to the work that we were doing.

None of the conversations that we were hearing, the information that was coming, was too far away from the ministry to understand where this was going, the direction that we were headed in, the advice and the recommendations that we were being given to follow through on.

It really shouldn’t have been too much of a surprise — what was in the report — to the minister, even though the deliberations are in camera, and they’re not made available to the minister until the whole House sees them. Nothing that we proposed was too surprising to anybody who has been paying attention to policing in this province.

So the first missed opportunity wasn’t till shortly after that, a couple of months afterwards, maybe at the end of the summer of 2022. We’re going to strike that committee, and we’re going to start this work in earnest and that committee is going to work alongside the minister and the ministry. It’s going to work alongside every minister that sits in that seat until the reforming of policing happens in this province.

At that moment, the minister shows a type of leadership that, frankly, I haven’t seen in this place since I’ve been elected in here. That would have been a real show of leadership, to say: “Look, this is not something that the minister needs to do alone, that the ministry needs to do alone. This is a project that, indeed, in order for there to be broad acceptance in the public, we can all do together.” Just like we did the review of the act all together.

It wasn’t just a committee of government members. It was a committee of all members representing all the political parties here. So that was a missed opportunity.

The second missed opportunity was in the fall 2022 municipal election. There was a moment at the beginning of that election where it was gearing up to be a debate about policing in the city of Surrey, where the minister could have said, “We are on track. A decision is made. We’re going to sit with that decision,” similar to what the government is actually saying in this bill today — several months later, a lawsuit later, several millions of dollars expended needlessly later, a bunch of political will lit on fire later.

[4:15 p.m.]

It’s essentially what’s happening in this bill, which is that you made a commitment and you’re going to follow through on the commitment. That’s clause 3.1(4)(b), I think, which is that when you make the decision, you follow through on it.

The minister, at the municipal election, could have stood up and said: “There’s no debate about this one, about this issue. We’re just going to follow through on the decision that the Surrey council has made. We’re going to continue the police transition. The municipal discussion, the debate about all of the issues, can con­tinue forward, but this is not going to be an issue that the provincial government is going to have debated or that we’re going to change our minds on, so find some other issues to debate.”

By not doing that, by allowing the municipal election to become, as we’ve heard from several speakers, all about policing, all it did was build up a huge amount of tension on both sides of this issue. It really created an absolutely no-win situation. The only people that are winning in this are lawyers, as they’re going to be getting paid to continue these arguments. This has really become, because of the lack of the minister stepping in and saying, “We’re not going to entertain this debate,” a no-win situation.

So here we are debating a bill which, I think, for the most part, when you take a look at it, provides a couple of things. It provides clarity for communities under 5,000 that are getting towards that threshold, which we also talked about in the committee — how it is that they can transition from an RCMP service to taking full respons­ibility of their policing services. Communities at that stage have a choice. They can continue with the RCMP service, or they can staff up their own municipal police force. This bill provides some clarity for that.

This bill isn’t entirely…. There is usefulness to this bill outside of the Surrey policing service. But what this does is that, in a unique way, it enshrines some specific things about Surrey to only exist in this bill that are not going to exist in the Police Act. When you consider it in that context, it’s kind of just cleaning up a mess, and it actually leaves a mess as well.

What we see is that this lack of intervention, this lack of embracing the recommendations that the all-party committee made, has created a mess in Surrey. It’s going to create a mess on our books, and it’s going to create this remnant where we’re going to be able to look back on it and say: “What is this piece about Surrey?”

The historians will be like: “Oh, let me tell you about this piece about Surrey. This was this unfortunate situation that cost the city of Surrey, cost the people of British Columbia and cost the whole discussion around policing and public safety a whole bunch of money, a whole bunch of time and, in some respects, in this House, some ill will.”

Unfortunately, after all of that work, 15 months of work to build goodwill around public safety and policing, somehow we are in a worse spot today than we were before we did that work. There’s more division on the different sides of this House. There is more finger-pointing about it or a type of finger-pointing that wasn’t happening before. There were all sorts of other things being said about policing, but this debate that’s happening around Surrey certainly wasn’t the tone or the context of the debate.

[4:20 p.m.]

When we look at this bill, to me, it’s cleaning up something that need not be cleaned up, and it’s not addressing some of the key issues. One of those issues I asked in the technical briefing was around police of jurisdiction. One of the recommendations that I didn’t point out, which directly came to us by both the RCMP and the Surrey police service during our deliberations, was that the way that we handle police of jurisdiction in this province creates unnecessary competition when a community is in transition.

So you have the police of jurisdiction making the deci­sions, and you have a new police service coming in wanting to create and establish themselves. But until they become the police of jurisdiction, until they become the service that has the larger number of officers, they don’t get to make some decisions that need to be made in order to establish that system. There was this competition inherent in the way that our law is crafted.

Months ago I asked this minister: “Let’s make a change. Let’s make it so that we can remove the competition from it.” I asked where it was in this bill — not there. And then I asked where the new provincial police service was in this bill, knowing that it’s not there either.

The reality of it is that there are some recommendations that we made in the Reforming the Police Act Committee that would have helped us, that would have helped the government, that would have helped the minister, that would have helped the cabinet and, in the end, would have helped the provincial treasury, would have helped the mayor of Surrey with clarity, would have helped the people of Surrey in the municipal election and would have helped the people of Surrey’s treasury at the end of the day.

To me, this situation that we find ourselves in is incredibly unfortunate. We are now going to be put in a position where we come in at the end of this process to clean up a mess, to make some changes, to leave some legal remnants in the laws here that need not be there, all to do what the minister could have done months and months ago at none of the costs that we’re seeing today.

With that, I take my seat.

HÍSW̱ḴE SIÁM.

Hon. R. Fleming: Thank you to members who participated in the debate this afternoon.

I want to speak in favour of Bill 36 for a number of reasons, many of which relate to policing experience here in the capital regional district and the experience of the former Esquimalt police department and its merger in 2002-2003 to VicPD.

Perhaps I should begin my remarks this afternoon using the latitude of second reading to praise the Victoria police department and the Saanich police department, two forces who I have the privilege of working with.

We’re talking about the different evolutions of policing in British Columbia throughout this debate and how for 92 or 93 years, we did have a B.C. police service and then transitioned in the early ’50s to the RCMP and to the municipal model that we have today, and quite rightly.

I should have researched how many times the Police Act has been amended in the modern era. I suspect it’s on quite a number of occasions. In fact, that’s what we do as legislators: improve laws all the time. As society changes, as the way policing is conducted changes, legislation has to keep up with those changes that are happening in society or organization.

VicPD, in fact, is the oldest police department west of the Great Lakes in Ontario, so an incredible history there. Of course, we thank them, I think, as Members of the Legislative Assembly, for working with our legislative precinct protective services and keeping all members and the public safe here in these buildings, which are within their jurisdiction.

Let me go back to 2002-2003.

[4:25 p.m.]

We don’t actually know the circumstances, ultimately, because the report was sealed, and I believe continues to be sealed, as to why the Esquimalt police department faced a crisis and needed to be absorbed by the Victoria police department. They had a cooperative mayor and council at the time. Obviously, probably had in-camera sessions with legal counsel and, I expect, the Attorney General and the Solicitor General Ministry as well.

They needed to make that change, and they needed to come up with a transition plan. But they did so under a crisis, and they did so in a collaborative manner. That’s getting to be ancient history — 20-odd years ago.

It was also expected that it would become an exercise, going forward, that may have created a regional police force in greater Victoria. It did not do so, although I do recall that for at least seven or eight years, on a voluntary basis, there were discussions between the four municipal police departments and the RCMP. As one officer who I know personally described it, at the end of the seven or eight years, they couldn’t agree on very much, including what kind of dog food to feed the canine units.

So that went nowhere in moving us towards a regional police force. I suspect one of the reasons why it didn’t go very far was because there was the lack of clarity that Bill 36 is trying to correct.

In other words, having many municipalities around a table developing, collaboratively, transition plans that could then be undone quite easily, without the ability of the province to make sure that those transitions would be completed, probably created a fear factor that led those discussions, ultimately, to be abandoned.

Yes, the elephant in the room in this debate is Surrey — an anomaly, for sure, in the country of Canada. I can’t think of another city quite so large, with 600,000-plus residents, under that police model.

They had a discussion. They’ve had numerous proposals over many decades to transition to a municipal police force. They had a council and mayor that endeavoured to do just that — engaged in the transition process, created a Surrey police service. For a time — especially, as we know, over the last year — we had, for a period, two concurrent police departments with overlapping jurisdiction.

I should use the word “responsibilities.” I should use the word “jurisdiction” correctly, I should say. But overlapping responsibilities while the meter was running on both of them.

We had an election in the middle of that, and a new mayor and council sought to undo the transition plan that the previous mayor and council had undertaken. We can have that all day long, if we want, in the province of British Columbia, and have those kinds of cycles undo very committed, detailed and quite expensive work if we wish to.

I’m not sure I’m hearing that, explicitly, from the other side of the House in this debate thus far. I think, in many ways, they’re trying to have it both ways. They’re trying to defer to the new council and their wish to undo everything that was done by the previous one, but they’re also, at other times, acknowledging that that’s no way to conduct business or to provide proper police oversight in the province of B.C. or in a city as big as Surrey. I look forward to more clarity as we get closer to the closing stages of debate.

To get back to the issue here and what this legislation is doing…. I sympathize with the member from Saanich North because I know that he’s very interested in police reform, but the focus of this bill is to address a situation and to ensure that we don’t have a seesaw back and forth at an advanced state of an RCMP jurisdiction, in this case, transitioning into a municipal police force.

There has to be a Rubicon that is crossed where there can be no going back, and there isn’t one right now, or it’s unclear how that is to be exercised by the minister re­sponsible for Public Safety.

We’re in this logjam situation and, as I said earlier, a very, very expensive situation to be in. The meter is ticking on both police forces and has been for the better part of a year now.

[4:30 p.m.]

We can’t have that as we look forward. We can’t know that there are some deficiencies in the Police Act, much less any other piece of legislation, and fail to address them. The experience…. We learn as we go. One of the great strengths of this institution and parliamentary democracy is that we are able to introduce reforms and use our parliament to put them into law.

Having knowledge and having had a recent very poor experience in Surrey, how would we justify doing nothing? How would we justify keeping the status quo situation? It has had some very unsavoury and difficult situations to navigate, including accruing liabilities for the city of Surrey, I might add, who had gone ahead and hired hundreds of officers, put them in uniform for a new police force and then was basically taking a course of action that would have exposed them to tens, perhaps hundreds, of millions of dollars’ worth of exposure and liability.

It became part of a bigger discussion as well. The Solicitor General, in determining what was safe and best for the community, also had to look at other communities in the province of British Columbia. The RCMP — and we’ve heard the opposition say this in question period — faced a hiring crisis: Regina Depot shortages, postings not being filled. That would have been put at greater risk had the government not acted.

Yes, we have to learn from and act upon the most recent experience in Surrey, but we also have to anticipate other municipalities doing this. I started my remarks by talking about the capital region and an abandoned police regionalization effort led by the previous government that went on for years and, ultimately, concluded with nothing. That may be renewed and taken up going forward.

You have to have a set of rules about mayors and councils getting into a process where they sign on to a transition and that they have, as this legislation will require them to, a commitment to complete that transition. When they get into the transition, they have to have a proper plan that is vetted and approved, that is well thought out, that takes into account all the policing needs of their community. Then they have to commit that the municipality will complete that.

Sure, there will be election cycles in the middle of those, undoubtedly. But as we all know, it is sometimes the worst type of folly to undo everything that your predecessor has done after a significant body of work and tens and tens, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars, have been invested in something. I’m talking about the Surrey police service, as you know. We would have had a net loss of sworn officers to policing overall in British Columbia, which would have been a very poor situation, not just for Surrey but for everyone.

I go back to my friend the member for Saanich North and the Islands. I think he spoke about the frustration he has about the lack of civilian oversight in the RCMP. That’s a point that has been made for many, many years. But I’m not sure I heard him talk about the improvements that have been made to civilian oversight of municipal policing in the province of British Columbia.

The IIO, the independent investigations office, does have oversight for any incident in policing covered by a municipal police force that either causes death or serious harm that involves a police officer, even if they’re off duty. It is chaired by a chief civilian director who, as a requirement, has to have many skills in their background. One of the things that they are required not to have had is to have ever served as a sworn officer in a police department. We have those features. We have those police reforms.

I do also want to say that I think police have been under an incredible amount of strain and very unfair accusations about the job that we ask them to do. Of course, we have some terrible examples recently of those who have paid the ultimate price for keeping our communities safe. Policing has changed, and I hope all members agree with that. I think they do, because they undoubtedly work with those who are part of policing.

[4:35 p.m.]

I look at my own department. I go back to VicPD in this instance because I know them best. Somebody like Chief Constable Del Manak, who is the face of VicPD and has had an exemplary career in policing, looks about 40, but I understand he’s about to, or he’s certainly eligible to, retire. I want to thank him for his service in the event that he does something like that.

He’s a role model in the community, has very strong support out there, is an excellent leader. Certainly, the South Asian community is very proud of him, having come from that background and serving in a very high-profile public position. But he has a tough job leading his sworn officers.

I think what I appreciate is that he has inherited and continued on and deepened some of the community policing initiatives that are to the credit of the Victoria police department. This police force in Victoria has had an LGBTQ liaison officer for 30 years. Before parliaments like ours legalized gay marriage and adoption and all those sorts of things, they were there, understanding that this was a community that could face the threat of violence and was often afraid to come forward to police to make complaints.

Similarly, and I can say this last week, VicPD anticipates any community that is facing danger. The Jewish community, who held a number of events last week, were not there alone. They had police officers both discreetly and in uniform making sure that they were safe. So did the mosques after those horrific attacks in Quebec some years ago.

They have a faith outreach unit within the police department. They have dedicated units that work with the street-engaged community to keep people safe and to keep those in the health professions who work with populations that live or are at risk of homelessness safe as they go about doing their job.

That’s a long way of saying policing has evolved. Policing will continue to evolve. Bill 36 is a bill that responds to what we’ve seen — a situation in Surrey, which is also evolving to this new police system. There will be clarity in Bill 36, as well, around communities that cross the 5,000 population threshold, as they will also be obligated to develop transition plans and be able to work with the Solicitor General and the director of police services in the civil service to complete those transitions, whichever direction they choose freely and make.

I’ll come to a close in a moment. I find it interesting that that is all the bill does. It obligates the transition to be completed. Once it’s initiated by democratic representatives, it needs to be carried on to its completion. Now, what does the opposition call that? They called it a sledgehammer over and over again in this debate. That is not a sledgehammer. That is the fulfilment of an obligation freely undertaken by a democratic level of government — local government — with the province.

I’m not clear if I’m hearing that the opposition wants to keep the status quo, where an element of chaos is allowed to be maintained. But if they are saying that, it’s a curious position, because it’s not the position that the Leader of the Official Opposition has expressed on a number of occasions. I want to read into the record his position, and I’ll be curious to see if he participates in this debate, because he’s had very strong feelings about this issue and the situation in Surrey as it relates to policing.

Just last May, on a popular radio program in Surrey, he said, quoting himself, of course: “I said early on that if I was the mayor, based on the information I know, I would take the money from the province every year and I’d go with the Surrey police service.” A pretty clear position. Not sitting on the fence on that one. Very definitely coming out and saying, “This is the direction I would take,” were the Leader of the Opposition the mayor.

[4:40 p.m.]

He was asked a follow-up question by the host. “If you were the Public Safety Minister, would you give a binding decision?”

An Hon. Member: What did he say?

Hon. R. Fleming: “What did he say?” my colleague asks. Well, let me tell you. He said very, very clearly: “I would absolutely make a binding decision. For sure.”

I’m not hearing that in the debate this afternoon across the way. Not a very united position, if I may say so. And that’s okay. That’s okay because he was actually even more instructive about the scenario we’re in this afternoon, reading legislation that would put an end to the situation that he found intolerable, where he would have issued a binding decision but couldn’t.

He said on another popular radio program, the very next day…. The host asked the Leader of the Official Opposition about the scenario that we face this afternoon. “If there is legislation on the floor about the policing, implementing that recommendation the Solicitor General had made, would you vote for it?”

Hon. R. Fleming: A very clear question, isn’t it? You know, I don’t think it was hypothetical. Today it certainly isn’t hypothetical, or tomorrow — whenever we vote on this.

Interjection.

Hon. R. Fleming: My friend is very eager to hear. Let me quote accurately. I’ve got the transcript here. He said this: “First of all, we’d have to call back the Legislature.” Here we are. “But I’ve been very clear. Not only should they do that, if that’s what’s necessary to make it happen, but we” — his party — “would certainly be there and make sure that we help get that done.”

So he contemplated Bill 36, demanded that the province do it and then said: “We would be there to help vote for it.” Yet I’m not hearing that this afternoon. Well, I guess that was May 26, all those many months ago.

What we’re clearly seeing, after hearing the statements from the Leader of the Opposition…. They are pretty instructive, pretty precise. You can’t say he was answering a hypothetical question. It was a scenario that has played out, and here we are this afternoon.

What we have is the opposition trying to have it both ways. They’re demanding the government do this, but they’re hinting that they might vote against that very thing. You know what? In terms of playing politics, which is what the opposition is trying to do, I’m not sure they’re satisfying either side.

They certainly aren’t satisfying the huge portion of Surrey that supports it and says: “Get on with it, with the Surrey police service. Stop wasting money. Stop having two meters running at the same time.” And they’re certainly not pleasing the people that would rather remain with the RCMP, because they’re not even clear about which side of the issue they’re going to vote for.

That’s very interesting. But you know what? On this side of the House, we’ve got to get on with governing the province. When we see a problem in the Police Act, we’re here to fix it. The opposition leader demanded it. We’re doing it, and I look forward to hearing from the opposition if they’re going to vote for it.

B. Banman: It is indeed an honour to get up and speak with regards to Bill 36.

I think I’d like to start my comments by stating I have friends on both sides of this issue. I have friends that are RCMP, and I have friends that are in the Surrey police force.

This is not about the great job that both of those parties do every day. I have a great respect for those that run towards danger while others are running away from it. I feel for those members that are tied and caught in this debate, because it’s very hard not to take it personal when you’ve sworn a duty and an oath to protect the public and find yourself stuck in this incredibly divisive debate for Surrey.

[4:45 p.m.]

As a mayor of Abbotsford, I sat on the chair of a municipal police force, the Abbotsford police force. I am so incredibly proud of the work that they do. I cherished the relationship that I had with the chief of police, and I was always so incredibly thankful that they were there to protect the citizens of Abbotsford.

Now, Abbotsford and Matsqui, before they amalgamated, actually had a municipal police force, the Matsqui municipal police, and they had the RCMP in Abbotsford. Abbotsford has kind of gone through this transition where they had to make a choice as to whether or not they would go to the RCMP or whether they would go with a municipal force.

After amalgamation, Abbotsford made the choice to continue with a municipal police force because they felt that was what was best for them. The politicians, the local politicians of the day, made that choice. The province didn’t make the choice for them. The local politicians did. I believe that is the way it should be — that the citizens who elect their officials rely on them to make the choice as to what works best for their city.

Here we find ourselves now…. I heard the previous speaker use the word “undo.” I’ve heard that a few times throughout this debate. Here’s one of the primary things of democracy. You cannot make decisions that handcuff future elected officials. You cannot make decisions that can never be undone.

The right of all councils is to say: “You know what? That decision that was made long ago no longer works for us, and we want to reverse that decision.” Whether that be on a police issue, whether that be on legislation of many, many items, you cannot handcuff future generations.

I heard one of the speakers say it is unwise to undo such a decision. Well, that may be, but that is a decision that the elected council of Surrey ran on. They said, “We will stick with the RCMP,” and that’s what the people voted for. They have a mandate. This was not about, for us or myself, which style of policing is better than the other. That truly is a no-win conversation. What’s important is that the democratic process that Surrey went through and what the people of Surrey voted on is upheld.

One of the arguments is it’s better to stop this before it’s fully implemented than to wait until after it has been. So while one of the members may say it was unwise, what those in Surrey said is: “Hang on. We are not so sure that before we go down this road too far, we can still undo this and stick with the RCMP.” That’s what the people of Surrey voted on. It was divisive. Not everyone in Surrey agrees with that decision either, but it was the decision that was made.

I guess British Columbians need to ask themselves: “Is it acceptable for this NDP government, for this Premier, to override the democratic will of voters after a municipal election has occurred?” That’s exactly what’s going on here.

[4:50 p.m.]

This government says: “No, we will decide for you. We don’t care what the democratic process in Surrey was. We know best.” Common sense says no.

We have democracy for a reason, and sometimes it gets a little messy. But we have it for a reason. What I find outrageous is the fact that the province has now decided — the NDP government has decided: “We don’t care what Surrey voted for. We are going to decide for you because we know better than you.”

It sounds very similar to other votes that this particular regime has decided to do. They have overridden other decisions because they know better than the people that live in the cities and exercise their democratic right to vote. Every single British Columbian should be waking up and saying: “Hang on a minute. This ain’t right.” We have democracy for a reason. They should be lying awake at night wondering what the heck is going on.

Separate the distraction of which police force it is. The underlying principle here is: does this government, or should this government, override what local officials have done and campaigned for and what people voted for? I would say no.

With the introduction of this legislation, I would say that this is a warning and a red flag to every community in British Columbia that has 5,000 people or more. They need to stop and think and be worried that this extreme style of authoritarian…. What this authoritarian NDP Premier is going to bully that municipality or city into submission…. What this says is: “We don’t care what you think. We’re going to do the thinking for you.” That’s not democracy.

I don’t have to agree with a decision that a city makes or that the people of the city make. But I was taught that the voter is never wrong. The voters in Surrey made a decision. They said: “We want to stick with the RCMP.” That is their right. You cannot handcuff decisions that past councils have made. It is not unbroken. You cannot make decisions that cannot be overridden and undone. But it’s up to the locals to decide what’s best for them, not this NDP Premier and not this NDP government. It is overreach.

This is what every citizen in British Columbia should be thinking about, with all sincerity: “Moving forward, is this the kind of government that we want?” It basically says: “You don’t need to think no more. We don’t care how you voted. We’re going to tell you how it’s going to be.” That’s outrageous, and it does not sit well with me. It does not sit well with a lot of others. That’s not what democracy is supposed to be about.

Today, in response to my question in question period, the NDP minister said that he made the decision. Wrong. It’s absolutely wrong. Surrey voters made a decision. It’s not up to one person. There were a bunch of people that cast a vote. They made the decision. Now the NDP is literally trampling over the democratic rights of those that voted in Surrey.

[4:55 p.m.]

In addition to that, there’s going to be approximately, I believe…. The last number I heard…. I’m sure it will rise, because as with everything else that comes with the budget with the NDP, they say one number, and it ends up getting bigger and bigger.

Now $166 million that’s going to come out of every other city is going to be given to Surrey. So $166 million that Abbotsford is going to pay for, that Prince George is going to pay for, that the Island is going to pay for, that Victoria is going to pay for. That’s what this government is going to give to the city of Surrey to help with the costs.

The city of Surrey decided that this particular pathway was not what they wanted. It was going to be more money than they wanted to spend. They took a look carefully at the numbers and said: “You know what? Now is the time to put the brakes on this and stick with what we’ve got.” Whether this House agrees with that decision or not, I believe we have to respect that decision. That is the heart of democracy, and I, quite frankly, think that this bill makes a bit of a mockery about it.

With that, I would say I am not in favour of this bill because I think the heart of the matter lies with local officials knowing what’s best for themselves. It is not for a higher level of government to impose their will, to put their thumb on and put pressure on and bully a decision on them that is not what they wanted.

It is up to the residents of that city to vote and decide. It is not up to a higher level of government, which should actually keep their nose in their own lane and allow the citizens of Surrey to decide their own pathway and their own future.

With that, I thank you for the ability to speak on this, and I look forward to hearing what others have to say on this particular bill.

T. Halford: I want to say it’s a privilege to be able to speak in this House, as it always is. This is an important day. I think it’s one that we’re going to remember for quite a while.

I want to reference what was said in a previous speech by the Minister of Transportation. He made a couple of points I think are worth highlighting. One is the minister talked about undoing decisions and the impact that that has on taxpayers’ money and with new governments coming in. This is a minister — let’s remind British Columbians, especially on the Lower Mainland — that wrote off one hundred million taxpayer dollars and cancelled a bridge that was under construction for a project that is not even permitted yet, and we don’t even have a date.

For the minister to come in here and talk about that when he single-handedly oversaw that — while people right now in Surrey, in Richmond, in Delta are absolutely traffic-jammed at 5 p.m. on a Tuesday — can be taken as a little bit disingenuous. We’ll leave it there.

There are a number of individuals that serve in this House that have served at the municipal level. I have always said, and I’ll say it again, that I think municipal politics, municipal service, is probably the hardest level of government. It’s probably the most rewarding as well. I think it’s the most challenging, and it can often be the most complicated. The decisions that elected officials make have an impact on their constituents, and that burden is cast upon them when they put their name on a ballot and they seek election.

[5:00 p.m.]

[S. Chandra Herbert in the chair.]

I live in Surrey. I pay taxes in Surrey. My wife owns a business in Surrey. I can say that part of the challenge here is that we have had a minister, we have had a government that has said completely different things when we get to the position we are in today.

The Solicitor General said numerous times that the decision, this decision that we are talking about today, rests with mayor and council. He said that, not on one occasion, but on numerous occasions. He said that prior to the last municipal election. He said it shortly after the last municipal election.

I think what we’ve asked for, what the citizens of Surrey have asked for, is transparency throughout this entire process. We haven’t seen it. To this day, we haven’t seen it. My colleague asked for that today and hasn’t seen it.

Where I live, I have neighbours that are members of the Surrey RCMP. I have neighbours that are members of the Surrey police service. They’re great people. They wake up every single day to serve and protect our community of Surrey, a growing community, a proud community. This struggle has been a number of years, and the province has made it worse at every single turn they’ve intervened.

Now, we’ve had…. During the election, the minister never gave any indication that this legislation was likely. You would think that if this was being contemplated, they would have introduced that prior to the last municipal election. You would think that if they were looking at this, the minister would not have said that the decision rests with the mayor of Surrey and council.

We’ve known that this is a very, very difficult issue for Surrey for a number of years. We campaigned at the time, in 2020, on a referendum. The government chose not to follow that recommendation, and that’s their right to do. But this situation right now is an absolute mess, and here are the people that are paying the price for that mess. It is the people with a badge on their uniform. It’s a matter of the badge. It doesn’t matter if it’s RCMP. It doesn’t matter if it’s SPS.

It’s also the burden that is…. The price of this is going to fall on the taxpayer. That is going to have to absorb the heavy hand of this NDP government. It’s the taxpayer of Surrey. We talk every day in this House about the struggles that we have with affordability. There’s no shying away from it. In the last seven years, it has gotten considerably worse.

The legislation that’s before us today — we’ve heard that this is going to have dramatic consequences to families in my city. I can tell you that when you have parents that are coming in that are using the food bank for the first time…. You can imagine, when they see the talk of these dramatic property tax increases, what that means to them. They’re potentially having to renew their mortgage as well.

When we talk about…. The fact is we’ve heard different messages from this government. We’ve heard numerous times, when the minister has been in this House or in front of cameras, that the decision is that of mayor and council, and they look forward to working with mayor and council. We’re in a situation today, after numerous delays, numerous press conferences, that we are seeing the legislation that’s before us.

[5:05 p.m.]

Let’s be clear. We’re talking about Surrey, but we should be talking about every other municipality that exists in this province. Like I said, there are a number of us that have sat in this House, that have sat at a municipal level, that I don’t think have ever seen the heavy hand that we are seeing today.

When we look at the fact…. The Minister of Transportation also cited some of the decisions they made regarding policing, early in his career of elected office. That’s great. But they made those decisions independently. They made them as elected officials at the municipal level.

In this House, we have elected officials at the provincial level that are overriding the democratic system that we have seen in the city of Surrey. The key thing that we have asked for is transparency. The fact is that we need all the information to be able to make an informed decision, to have an informed opinion.

The Minister of Transportation talked about the Leader of the Official Opposition. He quoted him, but I’m going to read the full quote because I think it’s necessary.

He said: “This is the time when you have to be a leader. Leadership is having to make a decision. I said early on that if I was the mayor of Surrey, based on the information I know, I’d take the $50 million every year and go to the Surrey police service, but” — this is not even the end of a sentence; this is the continuation of a sentence — “it’s hard to make that decision not having any of the information. That’s the problem.”

To come in this House and give a quote like that, completely misguided…. The other thing that the Minister of Transportation said was about recalling the House. We asked that the House be recalled to deal with drugs in parks and playgrounds.

So if the minister wants to be accurate, then we can talk about his decision to wipe out $100 million of taxpayers’ money for a bridge that would be open right now. But the minister wants to go back and say, “You shouldn’t be doing, binding previous governments’ decisions,” and all that good stuff. So I think if you’re going to talk about having your cake and eating it too, that’s a two-way street for the Minister of Transportation.

I’ll say this. I am incredibly proud of the colleagues that I have on this side of the House, and I will point out two specifically. The member for Prince George–Mackenzie, I think, has served in this House so honourably and in his previous career so honourably in law enforcement, and the expertise that he brings is pretty inspiring.

The second person that I’m going to single out is my colleague and friend from Surrey South, who served with the Surrey RCMP before making a transition to public life. I can tell you that from day one, when that member came into this House, there were some very major focuses. One was public safety, then mental health and addictions and affordability.

When we look at Bill 36, and you heard her remarks here today, that is somebody that has been on the front line. That is somebody that has served not only with the Surrey RCMP, hand in hand, but that individual has stood shoulder to shoulder with the Surrey police service as well.

[5:10 p.m.]

So I’ll take her back any day of the week, when it comes to what she is saying on this piece of legislation. I will stand by the member for Prince George–Mackenzie every day of the week when it comes to this piece of legislation. I will stand by the former mayor of Kamloops when it comes to this piece of legislation, because this legislation is precedent-setting. If this legislation is not a wake-up call to every mayor and council that is currently sitting in British Columbia, I do not know what is. This is a mess. This is an absolute mess.

The province knew we were headed in this direction, yet we still had a minister that continued to say that this was the decision of mayor and council. Again and again, we have found ourselves in a position where the people that are suffering the most are the people that get up every day and put on their uniform to protect our city and those that ultimately have to pay that bill, which are the taxpayers of Surrey, of which I am one, and the member for Surrey South is one.

It’s hard. I can tell you this: this is a situation I don’t think anybody has wished for, but we are here today. We didn’t need to be. We didn’t need to be. We could have had clarity.

With that, I want to thank you for the time to be able to make these remarks today. I look forward to hearing further remarks on this Bill 36.

M. Lee: I rise to join this debate on Bill 36. I must say that when I hear speeches in this House and the speeches that I’ve heard made by members of the government side — the Minister for Labour, the member for Surrey-Newton; and the Minister of Transportation — it’s no wonder why British Columbians have a lack of confidence and trust in this government.

The statements that I’ve heard to justify this action that this government is taking under this activist Premier of our province, as he demonstrated was when he was Attorney General, as he’s demonstrating now as Premier of our province….

Every single time, this Premier and this former Attorney General has a real lack of respect for law, the rule of law and our democratic process. This is certainly about what the city of Surrey decided in an election in October 2018 and then decided again in an election in October 2022.

It’s also about a government that brings in legislation three days after the city of Surrey files a petition in court, a petition in court to question this government. Dare a municipality question this government.

The Minister of Transportation wonders what is the term “sledgehammer” the member for Prince George–​Mackenzie said. Well, it’s a sledgehammer when you bring forward legislation on the floor of this House, when we’re dealing with all of the crisis that we’re facing in this province, for a problem that has been dealt with for five years by this government, Surrey policing, since the October 2018 election in the city of Surrey.

This government has completely failed the citizens of Surrey with a complete lack of leadership. They bring in legislation, which the Minister of Transportation admits deals with the current situation. It’s not about what happened with Esquimalt, regional governments, regional police forces. If this government had concerns about that, they would have introduced legislation seven years ago.

[5:15 p.m.]

This is about Surrey. It’s about this petition, which this government has no hesitation to do. They see an issue of challenge to their jurisdiction and authority. They see a municipality pointing out that this government, in their view, doesn’t actually have the authority. I’m happy to go through this, because that’s what we should be discussing on this Bill 36.

We have seen this time and time again from this government, just like we saw when he was the Attorney General, the Premier of our province, time and time again, putting his hand on the scales of justice. We’ve seen him tip the balance in favour of the result he wanted for the proportional representation referendum. An effort, again, with a lack of respect for British Columbians in terms of what had to be a fair and transparent process.

Those words. Transparency. That’s all our leader was talking about. The Minister of Transportation wants to take issue and come in here to this House, take quotes — half quotes, snippets — and use it for partisan purposes. To splice quotes like he did is insulting. It’s a complete waste of this time of our House.

As the member from Surrey–White Rock read out, it’s a complete concern about how do you make a decision with a lack of information, like we’ve seen. What we’ve seen is this government making a decision on the basis of a report where 80 percent of this 500-page report was redacted. The Minister for Public Safety may stand in this House, as he did today again, citing: “Well, it’s the RCMP redaction.”

This is the challenge. For five years, this government has been trying to deal with what the citizens of Surrey have wanted to do. I would say, under the Police Act, when this was occurring in November 2018, where were the amendments? Where were the amendments to the Police Act then? If this government wanted to expedite and move forward with any transition and support the transition to the Surrey police service, where were the amendments?

If it had a concern about its ability to ensure that that transition would occur, what happened? Where were all the members representing all the other Surrey ridings outside of Surrey–White Rock and Surrey South? Where were they? Where were they standing for the last four years before we got to October 2022?

They’re running for cover. They weren’t doing their role. Now, we’ve got a situation where we had an election in October 2022. We didn’t hear from the government before that election, when Brenda Locke was running for mayor of Surrey, with her major commitment being: “I’m going to restore the RCMP and maintain the RCMP service in the city of Surrey.” Where was this government?

Where was this government saying: “Well, wait a second. We’ve got concerns about public safety. We’ve got concerns about this. We’ve got concerns about what’s redacted in this 500 page report that, of course, didn’t come out until April 2023.” I appreciate that it wasn’t commissioned until, presumably, after the election.

But in any event, the point is the concerns that this government is making decisions about without providing any transparency to citizens of Surrey or this House or the Leader of the Official Opposition makes this very difficult. It makes this a problem, and it makes this a concern around the Police Act.

The Police Act, under section 2, says: “The minister must ensure that an adequate and effective level of policing and law enforcement is maintained throughout British Columbia.”

[5:20 p.m.]

Section 3(2): “A municipality with a population of more than 5 000 persons must provide policing and law enforcement in accordance with this Act and the regulations by means of one of the following: (a) establishing a municipal police department.”

It’s my view that the minister of the Crown here in this cabinet, and these ministers may fumble around and foil and try and provide him some protection…. The fact of the matter is he dropped the ball. He made a decision at a time where he didn’t have the authority under the Police Act. That’s the reason why there’s a petition being filed in the court for judicial review.

Now, I will say, further to my concerns with this government for the last 6½ years, this is the same government that brought closure when they brought forward on the floor of this assembly amendments to the Judicial Review Procedure Act. They brought closure in about five minutes.

Now, when a municipality, the city of Surrey, the second-largest municipality in the province of British Columbia, brings forward an action, on October 13, it brings forward another sledgehammer. This is a sledgehammer.

Not only are they overriding the wishes of the residents of the city of Surrey; they’re doing it in the face of a challenge to their authority in the courts, the courts that are there to ensure that governments act appropriately, that they were acting within the balance of their jurisdiction and authority. They’re doing it away by stripping away the authority and the jurisdiction of a mayor and council that was elected in the October 2022 election on that one issue, that key issue.

There’s no doubt what happened in October 2018, and there’s no doubt what happened in October 2022. That is democracy in action. The member for Surrey-Newton may want to talk about concerns, but you can’t have it both ways. He represents residents of Surrey, just like the member for Surrey–White Rock, the member for Surrey South. You have got to do your jobs. Certainly, my colleagues are for Surrey South and Surrey–White Rock, but the member for Surrey-Newton just to be sitting there on the seats just saying, “Well, these elections….” You can’t just pick and choose here, and that’s what this government is doing.

When I look at the Judicial Review Procedure Act, and I know that when we deal with Bill 31 today in this House on emergency management and disaster recovery…. Mr. Speaker, I spoke in this House and you were in the chair when I was speaking this morning on that same bill.

Statutory decisions under section 7 of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act. That amendment to the Judicial Review Procedure Act that this government shut down debate about is about that: under what conditions and requirements can a statutory power exercised by a First Nation under section 7 of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act be reviewed? This government cut off debate, did not allow any debate, review of that. Why? Who knows? It’s a critical part of the bill.

Deputy Speaker: I think we’re still here on Bill 36.

M. Lee: So they have…. All I’m saying on this Bill 36, as I was saying before at the outset, is we have a petition filed with the Supreme Court of British Columbia under the Judicial Review Procedure Act, the same act that this government has cut off debate about. I would say to you, the reason for that…. This Premier…. Where is the Attorney General here too, the current one who succeeded the Premier in the role? Where is she sitting on this?

Where are we allowing this government to bring forward legislation to cut off any review, any challenge to their jurisdiction? It’s not just under the Police Act. We know that under the Community Charter, which governs the relationship between the province and the city of Surrey and any other municipality in this province other than, of course, Vancouver, which has its separate charter….

[5:25 p.m.]

But the relationship between municipalities and provincial government is based on the following principles — this is under section 2.2 of the Community Charter: the “Provincial government respects municipal authority and municipalities respect Provincial authority.” The “Provincial government must not assign responsibilities to municipalities unless there is provision for resources required to fulfill the responsibilities.”

I would have thought this government would recognize that the Police Act finds that balance. That’s the reason why under section 2, you have the general responsibility of the minister to ensure “adequate and effective level of policing and law enforcement…throughout British Columbia.”

One could question, and certainly we can do this at committee: what’s the import of “throughout British Columbia”?

He is the provincial Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General. Presumably, that’s what that means. But when it comes to a municipality, it’s over to the munici­pality.

The municipality, with a population of more than 5,000 persons, can establish and must establish a municipal police department.

I know that in the petition filed by the city of Surrey, they do make reference, of course, to the agreement that, currently, is still in place with the RCMP. That agreement goes out to the year 2032. This is a municipal police service agreement that has been entered into, dated April 1, 2012.

Interjection.

Deputy Speaker: Members.

M. Lee: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate that.

I think perhaps the members in the House, not to point out anyone specifically, may want to understand the nature of the claim by the city of Surrey, and this is the reason why we have these kinds of debates in the House.

As I mentioned, there is this municipal policing service agreement that’s entered into April 1, 2012, and goes until March 31, 2032, which by agreement, the city and the province agree to have the RCMP provide policing in the city of Surrey.

Well, there is a bunch of concern and consideration, certainly, by the city of Surrey as to the nature of the report that was provided as to the transition — the so-called City of Surrey’s Police Model Transition and Decision to Retain the RCMP, the director of police services’ report to the Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General.

This is the April 2023 report that was tabled with the minister and provided the basis on which the minister came out and decided on July 19, 2023, to exercise his jurisdiction under the Police Act, which I understand his view is — and I’d like him to confirm this — section 2 of the Police Act, because there’s no other section.

The minister, I know, has said that in question period over the course of time. Today he said that this is his decision that he’s made. But we know, as we’ve talked about, members of this side of the House…. The minister does acknowledge that this legislation ends the delays with the city of Surrey — five years this government has been trying to work through the policing decisions that have been made in two elections with the city of Surrey.

It’s a complete demonstration of incompetence and failure by this government. They failed the citizens of Surrey, in terms of the leadership, in performing their duties and responsibilities under the Police Act and meeting the responsibilities of this government.

Because for those members that expressed concerns, including the member for Surrey-Newton, about citizens in Surrey concerned about their safety…. Well, what have they been doing for five years?

[5:30 p.m.]

When we look at the course of the specific bill itself, it sets out the specific provisions that make explicit what the minister can be doing when a municipality proposes to change the means under which a municipality is providing policing and law enforcement under that section. This is the reason why this government is bringing forward this legislation.

I’m going to just make that statement and go to something else that’s very curious in the language of the use of this proposed amendment to the Police Act.

Subclause 7(2) of Bill 36 says: “Despite the Police Act, the City of Surrey must provide policing and law enforcement by the means referred to in section 3 (2) (a) of that Act.” Well, I look at section 3(2)(a) of the Police Act. It’s the same provision I’ve been citing. “A municipality with a population of more than 5 000 persons must provide policing and law enforcement in accordance with this Act and the regulations by means of one of the following: (a) establishing a municipal police department….”

I know the city of Surrey’s view is: “Well, we have done that. That’s why we have a contract with the RCMP that goes out to 2032.”

This transitional provision says “despite the Police Act.” What is that supposed to mean? Isn’t this government presenting a bill to amend the Police Act? And now it’s saying: “despite the Police Act.” So what is it? Does the Police Act apply or not? If it doesn’t apply, why don’t you just bring a bill forward that says: “Hey, in respect of the city of Surrey, the Police Act does not apply to you. We’re just going to direct and dictate to you what you should do”? That’s effectively what this government is doing.

This is not just a matter of concern relating to the heavy hand of this government, the overreach, the lack of transparency, the failure of this government, the lack of respect for the rule of law, our courts. It’s not just that. This is a matter for the city of Surrey.

I would like to know from the minister — the member for Prince George–Mackenzie and the member for Surrey South will certainly want to understand at the community level: how did we get to this amendment? What was the process? Was it done over the weekend, on the fly? Is that the reason why we have wording like this on the transition — “despite the Police Act”? Is that supposed to be a notwithstanding clause? Is that the language this government is using?

I mean, I fail to understand when ministers of the Crown, in cabinet, are standing up in this House, playing partisan games, picking and choosing. I wonder if they fully understand what this amendment is doing and if they understand the affront that this government is having.

When we look at what’s set out to give the explicit auth­ority of the minister under this act, where was that authority when the minister made his decision and announced it back in July of 2023? Where was his authority? What has he been doing? How have we been operating since July of 2023? The answer likely is that there hasn’t been that authority. That’s the reason why this bill is retroactive. If the government had identified a gap in their jurisdiction, they should have brought it forward sooner.

Quite frankly, this is a government that has demonstrated time and time again that they have no hesitance, under this Premier, to change the rules of engagement.

They did that with the proportional representation referendum.

They’ve done that with the city of Vancouver, to side with them, to backstop a flawed public process that citizens in the Kitsilano community had challenged in the courts and still are challenging. They stood with that government in that process and introduced legislation to say: “It doesn’t matter about public process. It doesn’t matter about what the citizens say about that public process. We’re just going to bring another hammer down.”

That’s what this government has done. This government said it to its own government lawyers, in the face of an application to the Labour Relations Board. This government says it stands with labour. Where was that?

[5:35 p.m.]

They trampled all over the rights of those lawyers to choose what union they want to represent themselves. This government dictated to them: “No, you’ve got to belong to this union.” In the face of an application to the Labour Relations Board, they once again brought the hammer down to quash the ability of those lawyers…. These are the government’s lawyers.

Just like we’ve seen with ICBC reform, we’ve seen this Premier, a former Attorney General, have no hesitation to change the rules of court, to trample all over the rights of injured British Columbians. I know the member for Surrey–White Rock fully knows this. We continue to have concerns about how — in the absence of anyone to stand up against ICBC — those individuals who have brain injuries, concussions, complex care needs and pain management have no one to advocate for them. That’s what this government has left them with.

This government can talk about affordability and how they’re saving people money, but the costs for this transition, as the city of Surrey has said, are more than $150 million. This government came forward when they made their decision, this minister, and said, “Well, hey, we’ll give you $150 million.”

It seems like the minister was responding to what was needed in the situation, but the fact of the matter is, as I mentioned, that under the Community Charter, this government has the responsibility already. This government has the responsibility to provide the resources required to fulfil their responsibilities because this government was causing the city of Surrey to reverse course again.

As we look at this bill in front of us, municipalities across this province ought to be concerned, and voters in those municipalities ought to be concerned, truly. When voters voted in an election for a municipal government like Mayor Brenda Locke in the city of Surrey, they expected the change. This is the reason why. When the Minister of Transportation, in this House, talked about expenditures that were put in place, decisions that were made, I had the same reaction as the member for Surrey–White Rock: “Really?”

It just demonstrates how this government makes decisions. It plays politics with good decisions that people have asked for. We know, with the George Massey replacement, that that replacement would have been built two summers ago. This government, when it formed itself in 2017, with the support of the Third Party, reversed course, with a $100 million expenditure of taxpayer dollars but also on the environmental process, all of the work that had been done.

When members of this government stand up and say, “Well, we’ve been doing a transition with the city of Surrey,” the challenge with this government has been, for the five years it has been trying to deal with the situation, that they’ve continued to play politics here. This is why, as well, there has been a complete failure of leadership by this government, for the government now to pull in legislation to fix its mistake, to give itself the authority that the city of Surrey clearly is of the view that it doesn’t have.

[5:40 p.m.]

When I look at the petition, I don’t see in here…. I’m sure the government…. Perhaps this is the thing, right? Government says: “Well, we have safety concerns.” I haven’t seen that. Where are those concerns? We’re talking about restoring and maintaining RCMP service.

I know when…. The member for Prince George–Mackenzie talked about the comparatives of the city of Surrey and policing service under the RCMP — the caseload, the crime rates — and compared them to the other 30 municipalities of a similar nature in terms of policing service. He doesn’t see it. We don’t see it.

There’s a complete lack of transparency here. How you would see transparency is when…. A city, a government, a municipality has to take the provincial government to court to get that transparency. Of course, in response to the petition, the government of British Columbia would have to file its response.

That’s what the Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General has done. He has ended that. Yes, he has indeed. He has ended that legal process. Now they don’t have to file a response. Why? Because they’ve killed the petition. They’ve quashed it. They’ve brought the hammer down.

For those members on that side of the House who still don’t understand what the term “sledgehammer” means, that’s what sledgehammer means. Time and time again this Premier has brought the hammer down on the rights of British Columbians, the rights of municipalities, and that’s what it’s doing under Bill 36.

That’s why I cannot vote in favour of this bill. That’s why I know…. British Columbians and municipal leaders all over this province have to be very, very concerned with this government because of its pattern of behaviour and activity under this Premier. This is the reason why this Premier, quite frankly, is not fit to lead this province, and that’s going to change.

E. Ross: It’s an honour to get up and speak on behalf of Skeena, the constituency I represent, in terms of Bill 36, the Police Amendment Act, 2023.

There was an interesting two-minute statement made here yesterday on behalf of the new member for Vancouver–Mount Pleasant, I believe.

Congratulations to the new member on their first two-minute statement.

The statement was made on democracy and leadership. The context was the new Premier of Manitoba, Wab Kinew, a First Nations person who became Premier of Manitoba.

Congratulations to the Premier of Manitoba.

It was historic, in terms of a person getting elected to be Premier. We’ve had MLAs and MPs that have been First Nations for quite a number of years now.

It was an interesting two-minute statement for me be­cause it touched on a lot of different topics that I’ve been looking into for the last 20 years, namely governance and democracy. Coming from a chief and council…. You do get elected, but the form of governance is not the same as what we experience here in the Legislature. It’s not the same as what you see at a municipal level.

That’s why I appreciate this Westminster model so much. I do appreciate this. I do appreciate the levels of government that go into action — once a government is elected and, in saying that, once an opposition is elected — to hold the government accountable and to try to ensure that the government is being transparent and accountable for their decisions.

Two words that the member from Mount Pleasant mentioned: people and power. She ended off her comments, and she said: “When I listen to some of the issues that are raised in the House, I hear the hurt and the anger, and really, what’s underneath anger is hurt. We’re all in this together, and our constituents deserve that we, as leadership, resolve these issues in a very professional, positive manner.”

Great words. I agree. In over 20 years of service, I have found myself, even in this place, being very angry and not really checking my demeanour or my language. I apologize for those occasions.

[5:45 p.m.]

It is a big job that we have to carry out on behalf of our constituents. Whether you’re a provincial legislator, a municipal leader, a chief councillor or an elected chief and council for a First Nation band, it’s a huge opportunity. There are very few of us in B.C. and Canada. It’s a very select career, if you can call it a career.

I was very interested in that topic. We have a scenario playing out, both provincially and nationally, in regard to what’s happening, the strong-arm tactics that are being employed by this provincial government in regards to Surrey policing.

Right now everybody is evaluating the Supreme Court case where the federal government…. Their bill, Bill C-69, got struck down by the Supreme Court, mainly because it was unconstitutional.

Now, I’m surprised that we haven’t talked about this in the Legislature. Really, what you are talking about, in the environmental assessment process, Bill C-69…. This bill would have taken away powers from this provincial Legislature in terms of determining and approving projects within the borders of B.C. It was a constitutional question. Alberta led the fight and won.

I don’t really think we should devolve into the discussion of whether or not it was an anti-pipeline bill or whether or not it was an anti-mining bill. I think we should really look at the question of constitutional jurisdiction, federal versus provincial. Where the similarity is, when we’re talking about Bill 36 here in the Legislature…. It is exactly the same issue, the division of power between the government of B.C. and the municipality.

In this case here, I think what the federal government will do with Bill C-69 is…. They will go back and rewrite it and try to amend it to fit within the decision of the Supreme Court.

In this case, the government is not going to court. They’re passing legislation to enforce their wishes. They’re going to disregard the jurisdiction and authority that municipalities have.

When you go back to the statement made by the member for Vancouver–Mount Pleasant yesterday…. That municipal council was elected to make those decisions on behalf of that city, the city of Surrey, in a democratic fashion — twice, mind you.

Really, what you’re talking about in terms of what’s happening in Surrey, the mess that is Surrey, and what the Surrey council is trying to do to resolve this mess…. They’re trying to carry out the will of the people. That is democracy.

If we look at what brought us to this day…. I mean, it was going okay in terms of process. Everybody was respecting the lines of authority and chain of command. Yeah, it gets messy but not in the beginning. Democracy is messy. Freedom is messy, without a doubt. But it’s worth defending those values in terms of a population of people electing their leadership to carry out what’s best for that population.

In this case here, instead of trying to resolve the issues, the B.C. government has come down with this heavy-handed approach in terms of Bill 36, the Police Amendment Act, and is saying it doesn’t matter anymore. The municipal authority does not matter.

Now, this is not large enough to go to the Constitution of Canada. But there are rules in terms of how we govern in B.C. Mind you, elected chiefs and councils are separate because they’re under federal jurisdiction.

[5:50 p.m.]

The way I understood it is that division of power was divided and fair between regional districts, municipalities and the province of British Columbia. It was fair. Everybody stayed in their lanes, for better or worse.

From what I could see, after a couple of years, yeah, it was starting to lean towards worse, but it didn’t need this heavy-handed approach, for B.C. to come down and basically override democracy in terms of what the Surrey people voted for. It didn’t need that.

I’ve been watching this as a rural representative and knowing somehow this was going to affect my riding. I didn’t know how, but somehow it was going to affect my riding. Then we find out through Bill 36 that, yes, it will affect us.

Really, what you’re talking about now is a population of 5,000 people, when this legislation will be enforced…. Every municipality in B.C. that has a population of over 5,000: get ready. You will have no authority in terms of determining your own police force. Whatever the political will is of the government of the day, that is what will determine your police force.

In terms of democracy and governance, in 2018 every­thing was fine when the city of Surrey, the elected council of Surrey, served notice to terminate its contract with the RCMP. Everybody was okay with that. They had the authority to do that. August 22, 2019, provincial approval was received to start transitioning to a municipal police department. February 27, 2020, the Solicitor General, the safety minister, formally authorizes Surrey to establish its own municipal police force, confident that key aspects of the transmission plan that required more detail had been thoroughly considered.

In 2020, the Solicitor General: “The decision is Surrey’s, and those costs are borne by Surrey, and the Police Act and the police contract allow for them to make that decision.” The decision is Surrey’s, and rightly so. Surrey should make decisions based on what Surrey needs.

June 29, 2020, the Solicitor General appoints the Surrey police board to oversee the establishment and operation of the new police department. August 2020, the inaugural meeting of the Surrey police board approves a motion to create the Surrey police service. Everything is going fine. It’s going the process, and it is the will of the people that have dictated this to date.

Let’s go to October 15, 2022. Mayor Brenda Locke is elected with the promise to revert back to the RCMP. The mayor got elected with a promise to revert back to the RCMP. The people of Surrey elected a council to say: “We want to keep the RCMP.” It’s still a process; it’s still democracy; it’s still governance. Yeah, it is messy, and yeah, it wasn’t quite what the politics of the day wanted or was expected by this B.C. government.

What happened? Confusion, because on April 28, 2023, the B.C. government makes a vague recommendation to continue the transition to the municipal force, flip-flops on offering financial support and releases a heavily redacted report. Nearly 80 percent of this 500-page report is fully redacted. Even in the 40-page report from the director of police services, 75 percent of the pages are partially blacked out. That is not accountability. That is not transparency.

On July 19, 2023, the Solicitor General uses section 3 of the Police Act and orders SPS to be the police of jurisdiction in Surrey, disregarding the fact that the Surrey voter wanted to keep the RCMP.

On October 13, knowing their power is being taken away, the mayor of Surrey tries a Hail Mary because she’s got nothing left to do. The legislation is going to overpower her power as mayor and council, so she files for a judicial review against the decision to continue with SPS. I doubt it’s going to work because this legislation will override that, and that’s not fair.

[5:55 p.m.]

That is not the form of governance that has been built up in B.C. over the last 100, 150 years.

Of course, October 16, 2023, what we’re doing here today, the Solicitor General introduces legislation to override it all.

I’ve heard all the speeches talking about the cost, the increased taxes that are coming to Surrey. If it doesn’t go to the Surrey taxpayers, it’s going to go to taxpayers all across B.C. I’ve heard all that, but we haven’t really talked much about democracy in terms of what the member for Vancouver–Mount Pleasant talked about, because you can’t separate the two, democracy and governance.

I researched a lot about democracy and governance when I was chief in council, because I wanted to implement a formal, sustainable form of governance for the success my band was about to receive. The only thing I didn’t research, because you can’t research this stuff, is politics. I learned politics here, 2017, and I was shocked at the amount of politics that goes into legislation.

I was surprised. I really thought governance was just basically black and white. No, it’s not. It’s ideology. It’s narrative. It’s spinning the truth. It’s repeating a line over and over until it sticks.

In terms of the politics of what we’re facing now, let’s put aside the fact that Bill 36 is going to ignore the wishes of Surrey residents, Surrey taxpayers and Surrey voters. Let’s ignore that for a second, and let’s try to find some facts, because you’re not going to find facts in this place. I can tell you that.

There was an open letter from the mayor of Surrey on June 19 of 2023, and it was addressed to the Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General, the Deputy Premier, and our new Premier. The mayor’s comments really talk to the politics of the mess that is Surrey policing.

What is it? We’re talking about 2018, a mess that has been created over five years — five years of politicking with the policing and the safety of Surrey residents. The mayor, in an open letter — and you can google this; it takes a couple of seconds — says: “Due to recent and inflammatory press comments regarding public safety in Surrey, I felt it essential to write to both of you. I will also be releasing this letter to the public, as it is vital to clarify the factual realities of policing in Surrey.”

The mayor talks about the decisions that her council made in terms of policing and how the council voted to retain the RCMP as its police force of jurisdiction. She points out: “The Surrey council decision was the second and final time we considered this issue, and we have chosen what is clearly the best option for this city and, in our opinion, the most effective choice for the province.”

The mayor went on. “I wish to be very clear that I would much rather have held the meeting in an open session; however, our ability to do so was precluded by the need to sign non-disclosure agreements to review the full version of your ministry’s report.”

Now, this is what I get from all the parties in B.C. who have an issue with the legislation that comes from this House, very disappointing legislation that puts them at a disadvantage, but they’re not allowed to talk about it because non-disclosure agreements restrict them from talking about anything that’s got to do with the constituents of B.C. or the services of B.C.

It doesn’t matter what we talk about in here. We don’t have details on this side to actually put in front of government to hold them accountable. As opposition, our job is to hold government accountable, but key details are either redacted or people are under gag orders.

[6:00 p.m.]

The mayor of Surrey was under a gag order. She didn’t release anything in this letter that wasn’t already public knowledge, because this mess was in the media weekly. But all the citizens knew that there was some kind of policing issue in Surrey. That’s all they knew. They didn’t know about the backroom politics that was happening. They didn’t understand the ideology behind the heavy-handed approach of the B.C. government to force Surrey to walk away from the RCMP services.

The mayor wanted to work it out. She wanted to cooperate and collaborate. In fact, they went further. They had to maintain confidentiality over their own staff report because it builds on the provincial report. The mayor was very honourable. The council was very honourable. They were trying to do what was best for Surrey. “At the minister’s request, I am prepared to release our corporate report to him and to persons he designates, provided they also sign non-disclosure agreements.”

That’s a matter of trust. Now you’ve got a municipal government that doesn’t trust the provincial government. It’s very unfair. It’s an uneven power structure, where the provincial government has all the power, and the municipal government doesn’t. The municipal government is doing what they can to make the best of a horrible situation, but they’re at a disadvantage. They’ve got to do as they’re told.

Well, we’ve got a mayor and council here that didn’t want to just sit back and do as they were told. They want to fight the politics, and that’s what we’re seeing in the media reports. The mayor went on: “It is incredibly disappointing to receive no response from either of you to my communications last week. I reached out to you both by voice and digitally after Thursday’s meeting, and not once did either of you have the courtesy to pick up the phone or respond. Is it because the decision did not go the way that you clearly prefer?”

It’s quite embarrassing. I thought I had it bad with the Indian Act. At least I could thumb my nose at the Indian Act, and I could walk away scot-free. This municipality is going to get punished, and they’re getting painted as the bad guy in the media.

The mayor went on:

“It seems to me you are more interested in dealing with this very important issue in the media and through headlines, rather than working with or communicating with Surrey council. Surrey council and I also remain committed to providing accurate information to the citizens of Surrey and British Columbia.

“We have respected the review process, which is now complete, and we will ensure that critical facts can enter the public discussion. As you are aware, though media reports have inadvertently confused the subject, our corporate report does not constitute an updated transition plan. However, much of its information will be included in such a plan.”

Here is a mayor trying to set the record straight, but the politics are not on her side. What they’ve done process-wise was correct. In everything that they had done, they followed the rules. It got to a point where, yes, they were going to have the ability, by following the rules, to retain the RCMP.

So what did they find? The B.C. government changes the rules. Uneven playing field. That’s what First Nations used to call it, an uneven playing field. A lot of our work as First Nations over the last 20 years was trying to even that playing field in terms of the Crown, trying to make it more fair from the provincial government and the federal government, make it more fair. We did a great job, but the municipality in this situation does not have that same luxury.

[6:05 p.m.]

The mayor also wanted to address the binding conditions imposed on our city by the minister. The mayor says: “We are quite prepared to meet all the conditions within the city’s jurisdiction. Although the minister indicated that the conditions are non-negotiable, as I have pointed out to both the Premier and the minister, we must work cooperatively with respect to those aspects of the conditions outside our jurisdiction.”

They go on to talk about how Surrey council could not prepare “individualized HR plans” for SPS members unless the province “directs the board to assist us with access to the SPS members.” A failure to work with Surrey council on the conditions will “create unnecessary turmoil, which nobody wants. I trust the province to provide early direction to the board, consistent with clear support for public safety.”

The mayor went on quite a bit. They also talked about the idea about safety coming from this issue — this fiasco, this five-year fiasco. The mayor said in her open letter: “After council’s vote and my press conference, I was in­formed of the Premier’s statement, which included his concern that the ‘risk and the threat of the collapse of the Surrey police service resulting in a policing crisis in the city of Surrey is a real one. This is a very delicate situation.’”

The mayor did not agree with the Premier’s comments. I think this is where we’ve got to separate fact from politics because of what the mayor says to be true. That’s a fact, which only stands to reason that what the Premier stated is politics. What the mayor said about the Premier’s comments regarding safety was: “These are theatrical and unfortunate comments, given the reality of the situation. It is very clear that Surrey is not facing a public safety crisis, and there is absolutely no reason why one should occur.”

Trying to paint a picture that it’s dire straits so the citizens of Surrey can maybe feel unsafe in terms of this political mess that’s been created over five years is not right, especially when you have clear lines of process and clear lines of hierarchy in terms of governance. There’s no need to ramp up the emotions in Surrey.

Surrey understands one thing. They need a police force. They want safety, but they don’t want to be squeezed beyond what they’re already squeezed financially. No British Columbian wants to see any more increased costs, and that’s what a lot of my colleagues here are talking about today. But there is a time and place to separate facts from politics.

I do see the Surrey mayor and council doing their best to talk about the facts, but I do believe all that fighting and all the courage of the Surrey council to stand up to all his politics and his manipulation is all for naught, because this legislation will pass. The government has the majority to vote this through, but I won’t vote for it.

It’s not fair. It’s not right to start changing the government system of B.C. that has served us so well and that has served the citizens of B.C. for so long, just to change that for the sake of politics. That’s not fair to British Columbians today. It’s not fair to them tomorrow, because where does it end?

You’ve got a great system of governance here in B.C. You shouldn’t fiddle with it.

[6:10 p.m.]

M. de Jong: We’re in second reading debate on this Bill 36. Of course, second reading is about principles. What is the principle of the piece of legislation that we are dealing with today?

Over the course of the last five years, there has been a lot of toing and froing. There’s a lot of he said, they said, she said, we said. But the principle that this House is being asked to decide upon today with Bill 36 is whether or not the government of British Columbia should be permitted to jurisdictionally, unilaterally, retroactively — and, in my view, indefensibly — strip away the time-honoured right of a community in British Columbia to select the manner in which it polices itself. That is the principle that is before us in this chamber today with Bill 36.

Now, where does that right I’ve just mentioned derive from — the right for communities to select the manner in which they’re going to be policed? I’m going to suggest to the House that it derives from two sources. It derives from law. This is not the place or the time to engage in a dissertation on the constitutional history of Canada. We have three constitutional levels of government. We have the federal government, we have the provincial government, and we have constitutionally recognized First Nations government.

These bodies pass laws. Those laws provide for the rights that subordinate bodies — local governments, regional governments — should be able to rely upon, should be able to act upon, should be able to make decisions around and not worry that those rights that have been assigned to them via the constitutional powers of other governments are going to be trampled upon. There is a legal entitlement that communities in British Columbia should be able to rely upon.

There’s something else that’s really important at a time like this. That is, I believe, that that right derives from convention. It derives from historical convention. It derives from the fact that…. For example, I come from a community that in 1952 decided it was going to create its own local police force, the Matsqui police force. It made that decision. It was entitled to do so, and that decision was respected.

Then some 40 years later when Matsqui and Abbotsford amalgamated, because Abbotsford had the RCMP as a police force, the community made a decision that it would opt to be policed by what was previously the Matsqui police force but became the Abbotsford police force. The community made that decision. At the same time, communities on either side opted to continue with the RCMP. Chilliwack has the RCMP. Mission has the RCMP. Langley has the RCMP. Those were the decisions that those communities made, and they were entitled to do so.

Years ago the community of Nelson…. People sometimes find this odd. If you go to Nelson — beautiful community, beautiful place, great, fantastic…. They have their own police force because that community decided years ago, decades ago, that that’s what it wanted to do. Delta has its own police force.

Other communities in British Columbia made that decision. Some of them were large communities. Some of them were small communities. Some of those communities made those decisions in councils of six and seven governing…. Very small numbers of people realizing that they were going to bear the cost, but they made the decision.

It is a right acquired both by law and by convention. This government and the ministers involved in this deci­sion repeatedly endorsed that, repeatedly over the course of the last number of years said that this is a decision, in this particular case, for the people, the council and the police board in Surrey.

[6:15 p.m.]

When I say this is a right that communities enjoy by way of law and by way of convention, I can point to agreement from the government benches. Today, by virtue of Bill 36, this NDP government is removing that right. They are stripping away that right. They have included provisions in this bill that would replace the Surrey school board and replace it with an administrator.

Look, I understand that there are times when senior levels of government are called upon to step in. I think, in the time that I’ve been here, it happened once with a school board. There was a school board that was found to consistently be in violation of its governing legislation. It was failing to uphold its responsibilities under the legislation that gave rise to its existence, and it was ultimately replaced with an administrator.

So I asked myself this question: what sin has the Surrey police board committed? What sin have the mayor and council of Surrey committed? What sin have the people of Surrey committed to justify that which is purportedly to be done to them in the pages of Bill 36?

Did they break the law? I have not heard an assertion that any of those three agencies has broken the law. Did they shirk their responsibilities under the applicable legislation? I have not heard a valid assertion that they have done that. Have they in any way ignored the public safety needs of their community, Surrey? They have not.

The sin, apparently, that they committed is that they had the temerity to do this. They had an election where this issue was front and centre. They had the temerity, the candidates that ran in that election — some successful; some not successful — to put this issue before the people of Surrey and ask their electors to decide, and they did.

[Mr. Speaker in the chair.]

They decided the issue. They voted for a group of candidates who pledged to maintain the RCMP as the agency responsible for policing in Surrey. They didn’t vote for a group that said they were going to bring in Pinkertons to police Surrey. It’s our national police force.

Now we hear arguments from the government side that somehow the people of Surrey, the leaders in Surrey, the mayor and council have put the safety of Surrey residents at risk by the course they’ve chosen to take. It’s our national police force.

The principle at stake extends, in my view, well beyond the city of Surrey. Communities in British Columbia be­ware, because Bill 36 is a clear indication of something. It’s a clear indication, from my perspective, that this NDP government in Victoria now claims the right to intrude into and override the fundamental right that communities have to make basic decisions about matters that affect their governance and their way of life in areas that legally, historically and by convention have fallen within their jurisdiction, and it is all being done in the name of political expediency.

[6:20 p.m.]

The House is going to vote. My colleagues have mentioned the likely outcome of that vote. But it is the principle — the abhorrent principle, in my view — that Bill 36 represents that will be remembered long after the court case has been quashed on the backs of unilateral retroactive legislation, long after the details of who said what to whom at what particular time in the last five years.

What will be remembered, what will be reinforced, because it is becoming a disturbing trend on the part of this government, is that when it is confronted by something it does not like, when it is confronted by local resolve and decision-making that it does not agree with, it will use the majority it has in this House to override that local decision-making and impose its will.

That is not a principle that anyone on this side of the House will support.

Hon. A. Dix: On behalf of the Solicitor General, I move adjournment of the debate.

Hon. A. Dix moved adjournment of debate on behalf of Hon. M. Farnworth.

Motion approved.

Committee of the Whole (Section A), having reported progress, was granted leave to sit again.

Hon. H. Bains moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

Mr. Speaker: This House stands adjourned until 1:30 p.m. tomorrow.

The House adjourned at 6:22 p.m.