The House met at 1:32 p.m.

[The Speaker in the chair.]

Orders of the Day

Hon. Mike Farnworth: In this chamber, I call continued second reading debate of Bill 5. In the Douglas Fir Room, Section A, I call continued committee stage on Bill 7.

[Lorne Doerkson in the chair.]

Second Reading of Bills

Bill 5 — Budget Measures
Implementation Act, 2025
(continued)

Deputy Speaker: We’ll call this chamber to order, and we will be contemplating Bill 5 comments today.

Brennan Day: Today I rise on Bill 5, the so-called fudge-it budget measures implementation act, 2025.

Let’s talk about that word: implementation. It suggests action, direction and maybe even a touch of responsibility, but what this government has tabled with Bill 5 is anything but. There’s no plan, no course correction and it certainly doesn’t show much leadership. What we’ve been handed is the legislative equivalent of a shrug — a limp, reheated version of last year’s record-setting deficit budget, this time with a slightly different haircut and some new buzzwords.

This isn’t a budget to meet the moment. It’s a smokescreen, a document crafted not to lead us out of crisis but to paper over the fiscal mess of their own making. Unfortunately for this government, the bond markets have caught the scent of the smoke.

Just days after this budget was released, while families, business owners and taxpayers across British Columbia were still reeling from what they saw in the fine print, we learned that not one but two major credit rating agencies had downgraded our province’s credit standing. This isn’t a warning shot across the bow. This is the financial world throwing up red flags.

A downgrade is not just an abstract metric. It’s a flashing neon sign that says: “We don’t trust this government’s numbers. We don’t trust their plan.” Because there isn’t one.

[1:35 p.m.]

Let’s be absolutely clear for the record. That downgrade affects real people. This isn’t just about spreadsheets and bond yields. This is about trust. This is about consequences. This is about the cost of living, and it’s about the increasing burden being quietly dumped on the backs of everyday British Columbians. Because when your government loses credibility, the cost of everything goes up — borrowing, building, living. That’s the price of this government’s broken promises and fiscal fantasy land.

Let’s unpack that a little. Two credit downgrades don’t just make for bad headlines; they make life more expensive for everyone in British Columbia. They mean our already ballooning provincial debt — a debt fuelled by this government’s reckless, record-breaking spending — just got even harder to manage.

It means that every borrowed dollar now carries a bigger price tag. It means that trying to fix our collapsing health care system, already brought to the brink by years of mismanagement, just got a whole lot harder. Every MRI machine, every ambulance, every surgical suite now comes with a higher cost just to finance.

And who’s footing the bill? Not the Premier. Not the Finance Minister. It’s the people of British Columbia: families, workers, seniors and small businesses who are being forced to pay more and getting less.

Let’s talk about schools. The dream of getting kids out of portables in Courtenay, Surrey, Chilliwack and Sooke just got kicked even further down the road with this credit downgrade. Thousands of children are learning in plywood boxes parked in fields, trailers jammed in gravel lots, because this government can’t build schools fast enough to keep up with the communities they claim to care about. Now, instead of investing in classrooms, we’re burning taxpayer dollars just to serve as the interest on our ballooning provincial debt.

In Courtenay-Comox, the story is the same, or worse. Our schools are over capacity. Portables are multiplying like weeds. We’re not building skyscrapers of portables like Surrey yet, but per capita, we lead the province.

Parents are tired of the excuses. They want a plan. They want timelines. They want action. What they’re getting instead is the slow drip of decline. Now, thanks to this downgrade, the odds of meaningful infrastructure investment just took another hit.

Then there’s health care. Just this week I spent hours in estimates trying to get straight answers out of the ministry. I asked about transport delays in the north Island, where patients can wait hours, sometimes an entire day, just to be moved to a hospital with space. I asked about the ER nurse and doctor shortages. I asked about seniors clogging up acute care beds because there’s nowhere else to go. I asked about the decaying state of long-term care in this province and the huge cliff that we are facing in terms of numbers.

What did we get in return? Vague talking points, dodged questions, little in the way of timeline, very little in the way of numbers. No real plan. Just recycled slogans from a government that has run out of ideas and credibility.

Here’s the truth: this budget drains the cupboards dry with no plan to refill them. It kicks every major problem further down the road while loading up the cart with more debt, more risk and more empty promises.

Now we know why, because even as we sat in that chamber asking tough, necessary questions, this government already knew what had happened. They already knew the downgrades had come in. They already knew the numbers in this budget did not add up. They already knew their house of cards was collapsing.

Moody’s is now forecasting a provincial deficit of $14.3 billion. Let me say that again: $14.3 billion, with a b. That’s not a typo. That’s a train wreck, a record-setting train wreck.

This budget is selling out my son’s future because this government is unwilling to make the hard decisions required to ensure sustainability and prosperity in the future. We need creative ideas, and we need to meet the moment.

Both rating agencies have made it clear that more downgrades are likely. Why? Because this government has no credible plan to balance the books, no path over the next three years to fiscal recovery, no willingness to make hard choices — just vibes, slogans and spreadsheets built on sand.

I’ll say it again for the record. This Finance Minister and this Premier are the downgrade British Columbians were worried about.

This bill, the so-called Budget Measures Implementation Act, is supposed to be the mechanism by which the financial backbone of this province is laid out and reinforced.

[1:40 p.m.]

This is the bill that enacts the tax and revenue measures proposed in this budget. It should be foundational. It should be bold. It should be something that meets the scale of the very dangerous moment we are in as a province. But what does it contain? Not a plan, not a reset, not a single sign that this government understands the gravity of the crisis we are in outside of the flag-waving and virtue-signalling that has become a habit.

What we have before us isn’t a roadmap. It’s a pamphlet. Most years, this document is a thick, detailed and substantive piece. This year, it could be mistaken for a flyer taped to a lamppost. As my colleague for Kamloops–North Thompson so rightly observed, this thing is a quarter-inch thick and mostly revolves around the film industry. That’s it. And honestly, it’s appropriate because this budget is itself little more than political theatre. A stage prop. A photo op wrapped up in political spin.

There’s nothing in this bill that addresses the $3 billion revenue crater exposed in the budget since its release. No corrective measures. No cost savings. No course corrections. No vision. Just a faint outline of some pre-election window dressing while the fiscal foundations of this province crumble beneath it.

This government is flying blind. They’ve charted no direction, there’s no fiscal compass, and this bill, this hollow, anemic document, is their flight plan. If this is what implementation looks like, then British Columbians should be worried, because we’re being taken for a ride with no map, no gas and no brakes.

Let’s zoom in on just one piece of this implementation bill, a small section but one that screams volumes about this government’s priorities and their hypocrisy. The government has decided to hike provincial sales tax on used zero-emission vehicles, the very same things they’ve been touting for the past eight years. Yes, you heard that right. The same government that never misses a chance to preach about its climate leadership, that floods social media with slogans about a clean economy, is now taxing working families for making the responsible choice to drive electric.

This isn’t a tax on luxury Teslas, which I’m sure many members of this House own. This isn’t going after millionaires with shiny new Rivians. This is a direct hit on the used market, the LEAFs, the Bolts, the entry-level EVs that real families in places like the Comox Valley are scraping together to afford — the ones who want to reduce emissions but still need a reliable way to get their kids to work, to school and to hockey practice.

So here’s the reality. If you’re trying to do the right thing on a modest budget, if you’re a young family, a senior on a fixed income or a worker in a community with unreliable public transit, as is so common in rural B.C., this government has a message for you: you’re going to pay more.

What kind of message is that? It’s not green, it’s not just, and it’s not even rational. It’s punishment for doing the right thing, dished out by a government that’s far more interested in sounding good than doing good. It’s the kind of policy-making that looks great in a press release and falls apart in real life.

And British Columbians, they see it; they feel it; they know exactly what this is: not climate policy, but a cynical cash grab dressed up in greenwashed language; not environmental justice, but fiscal hypocrisy.

This bill is full of moments like this, policies that say one thing and then do another. The government calls it implementation. I call it deception. And I’ll stand here every day and call it out for what it really is.

There is one, and only one, major tax cut in this entire bill. Is it for struggling seniors? No. Is it for working families? No. Is it for small businesses just trying to keep the lights on? No. This government found room for a $45 million tax credit for the digital animation sector, a sector formerly led, conveniently, by the government’s newly appointed deputy minister.

Now, let’s be clear. Nobody, including myself, is questioning the cultural value of digital media. British Columbians are proud to see our landscapes, our talents and our creativity on the world stage. But pride doesn’t pay the bills. So I ask: is this really meeting the moment?

[1:45 p.m.]

When seniors in Port Hardy and Cumberland are rationing medication just to keep a roof over their heads, when emergency room nurses and doctors in Courtenay and Campbell River are hitting their breaking point, when families from Kelowna to Courtenay are being forced to choose between fueling up the car or putting food on the table, this government combed through every line of this legislation and decided that the only group they could afford to help was a well-connected industry with a direct pipeline to senior leadership. That’s not economic stewardship. That’s insider baseball.

And let’s not kid ourselves. This is not targeted relief. This is political favour trading. It’s a golden handshake disguised as a policy tool. While front-line workers are crying out for support, while communities are buckling under the weight of inflation, the NDP’s response is to hand $45 million to their friends in film. The disconnect is not just glaring. It’s offensive. It certainly is to me.

In normal times, you wouldn’t just skip over a tax credit like this one. It would be buried amongst other relief for other sectors. But this one is only notable in that it stands alone in a sea of red ink. This bill could have offered relief. It could have signalled that this government finally understands the scale of hardship facing ordinary British Columbians. Instead, it signals that if you don’t have a good lobbyist, you don’t count. Frankly, British Columbians deserve better than this.

Let’s not sugarcoat this. The parking tax hike, which is also included in this bill, isn’t a parking policy. It’s a commuter tax. Full stop. This tax doesn’t hit luxury vehicles or high flyers. It hits working people. It hits the nurse commuting into Vancouver General at 6 a.m. It hits the parents trying to make it to daycare pickup before late fees kick in. It hits the senior who has to drive hours to reach a specialist appointment because their own community was never given the resources they needed.

This is what you get when a government rips a $2.7 billion hole in its revenue stream with the sudden elimination of the carbon tax without a real plan to control spending or boost growth. They’re scrambling now, and they need to fill the gap. Surprise, surprise, whose pockets are they again reaching into to fill this hole? Yours and your children’s.

Here it is, the parking tax hike. This is just the beginning. Everyone in this House knows where this is heading: road pricing, per-kilometre tolling, a tracking device on your wallet. If you drive to work, drive your kids to school or drive your parent to a care home, this government wants to bill you for the privilege.

They say it’s about climate, but if they were serious about reducing emissions, they’d invest in real public transit options instead of throwing transit agencies under the bus. They’d fix the broken permitting system that delays green projects. They’d help families upgrade to cleaner vehicles. But instead, they go after commuters, the hard-working men and women who have to show up for a 9-to-5 to put food on the table.

What do people outside Metro Vancouver get in return? In Courtenay-Comox, we’re not getting the new schools. We’re not getting the hospital upgrades or the seniors’ homes. What we’re seeing is the same pattern again and again. We pay more, and we get less. We borrow more and get nothing but IOUs that our children and their children will continue to pay off on our behalf.

This government continues to commit to doing better next time, just after the next election. This budget is more of the same. This government is asking British Columbians to foot the bill for its own mismanagement, and instead of facing up to the consequences of their unsustainable spending, they are quietly laying the groundwork for even more invasive and regressive forms of taxation. British Columbians are not ATMs, and this government needs to stop treating them as such.

Here’s the truth. British Columbians are facing the most punishing affordability crisis in a generation. Rents are skyrocketing. Grocery bills are through the roof. Heating costs are up. Insurance costs are up. Property taxes are up. Everyday working families are being forced to make impossible choices just to stay afloat. What has this government brought forward in response? Not leadership, not urgency, not even a tacit recognition of the scale of the crisis that they could see coming from miles away.

This government has failed to meet the moment. The Premier likes to say he understands the pressures people are under. But if words were enough to pay the bills, British Columbians would be thriving. Instead, they’re drowning. The Finance Minister insists she’s investing in people. But ask anybody outside of this chamber — the families I’ve spoken to in Black Creek, the seniors I’ve met in Port Hardy, the exhausted front-line health care workers in Campbell River — and they’ll all tell you the same thing. They feel forgotten. They feel like government has left them behind.

[1:50 p.m.]

We saw it clearly during the estimates process, ministry after ministry, file after file. This side of the House asked for timelines, for metrics, for real answers, something we could point to next year to say: “Look, we’ve seen progress.” What did we get? Shrugs, buzzwords, bureaucratic fog. No clarity, no urgency and no real plan.

Take health care. We asked direct questions about rural ER closures, ambulance staffing, surgical backlogs. The response? Vague reassurances, no targets, no dates and no accountability.

On housing, we pressed for details on timelines for affordable builds, on accountability for B.C. Housing failures, on relief for renters. Again, nothing. No course correction. No urgency.

This isn’t just incompetence; it’s a lack of will, a lack of connection to what people are living through on the ground.

And the so-called Budget Measures Implementation Act? It’s the final proof. A bill that should be a blueprint for recovery, for relief, instead reads like a government on autopilot: drifting, directionless and disconnected. It’s not that they can’t lead; it’s that they’re incapable of it. And British Columbians deserve better than a government that governs without a compass.

British Columbians deserve better than this. They deserve a government that doesn’t just acknowledge the seriousness of the moment but one that rises to meet it; a government that leads with clarity, not confusion; one that understands that photo ops won’t build hospitals and hashtags won’t house families. They deserve a government that’s focused on outcomes, not announcements; on measurable progress, not press conferences; on impact, not image. They deserve a government that will restore fiscal credibility and rebuild trust — not with more hollow promises, but with real, transparent, accountable action that improves the lives of everyday people across this province.

That means confronting the debt spiral before it buries the next generation in ever-growing interest payments and a broken system. It means investing where it matters: in front-line health care, in education, in seniors care, in safe communities. Not in growing the bureaucracy. Not in padded communications budgets. Not in another glossy advertising campaign or rebranding exercise to try and slap some paint on an old B.C. ferry that just needs to be replaced.

We need more than spin; we need substance. It means telling British Columbians the truth, even when it’s uncomfortable, having the humility to admit when your plan has failed and having the courage to change course before more damage is done. We don’t need a government that hides behind the spin cycle and throws blame around like confetti. We need one that rolls up its sleeves and gets to work, that listens, that acts, that leads.

The problems we’re facing are not theoretical. They are real, they are urgent, and they are getting worse, not better. We need leadership that matches the seriousness of the challenges we face. We need accountability that goes beyond empty words. British Columbians are ready for it.

This isn’t just a bad bill. It is the living legacy of a government that has utterly lost the plot and has fallen out of touch with the very people that put them there. A government that came to power promising affordability and delivered austerity for everyone except their well-connected friends, it would seem. A government that promised transparency and gave us canned talking points regurgitated by a bloated communications department.

A government that promised bold leadership and delivered stagecraft, slogans and the slow, dwindling erosion of trust in our institutions and our elected officials. They said they’d be different. They ran on being different. They promised this time it would be better. And instead, they’ve turned out to be just like every tired, cynical, out-of-touch administration that came before them, only with slicker ads and far larger deficits.

But what makes this moment more than frustrating, what makes it infuriating, is that British Columbians believe them again. They believe the promises. They believe the Premier. They believed this government when it said it would make life better and more affordable. They believed they would get the much-needed $1,000 grocery rebate cheque. But it turned out that campaign bribe didn’t even last to the first cut in this government’s fiscal dumpster fire.

Now they’re paying the price: two credit downgrades, a projected $14.3 billion deficit, skyrocketing costs, broken services and a province being run like a bad PR campaign. With all that staff that you’ve recently hired, I would presume you could do better, at least on that one file.

[1:55 p.m.]

But what do we get with this Budget Measures Implementation Act? No plan, no pivot and certainly no clear path forward for British Columbians. Just red ink and a lot more recycled spin.

So to the members opposite, I ask you plainly: what exactly are we doing here? Since this House sat, I’ve seen the government pivot into a shadow of itself, adopting conservative positions, flailing in the dark, looking for solutions. I’ve seen them filibuster their own housekeeping bills, because they weren’t ready with meaningful legislation to meet the moment.

Is this the leadership that you promised British Columbians? Is this what you meant by investing in people? Because this bill doesn’t invest. It doesn’t fix. It doesn’t deliver. It delays, it deflects, and it doubles down on eight years of fiscal mismanagement and failure by this government. It isn’t pragmatic, it is certainly not forward-looking, and it is definitely not in the best interests of British Columbians.

And if you won’t pull it back, if you won’t even acknowledge the damage that this budget does, then at the very least have the courage to call it what it is: a broken promise wrapped in red ink, sold with a straight face and a smile. British Columbians are not smiling.

I cannot and I will not support this bill. British Columbians definitely deserve better, and I will not stop fighting until they get it.

Rosalyn Bird: I rise today to speak against Bill 5, the Budget Measures Implementation Act. As a member of the opposition, the MLA for Prince George–Valemount, a proud veteran and, above all, a British Columbian, I believe it is my duty to shed light upon the failures of this government, which are only further illuminated by this bill.

When we stand here today discussing the future of British Columbia, we cannot ignore the profound impact that the actions of this government are having on everyday British Columbians. I am deeply disappointed in the direction this government has taken us in. Bill 5 is not a technicality. It’s not some routine procedural bill. It is the legislative mechanism that gives teeth to this government’s flawed fiscal plan.

Over and over, I hear the same concerns from British Columbians, from the cities to the rural corners of our province. The affordability crisis is worsening, opportunities are dwelling, and too many are being left behind. People are struggling to make ends meet as the cost of living continues to rise. Yet this government’s response is to create more of a financial burden rather than offering any meaningful relief.

This bill, like the budget it enacts, fails to address the very challenges British Columbians are facing every single day. It does not create a plan, and it certainly doesn’t provide hope for a better tomorrow.

I’ve heard from people in my riding of Prince George–Valemount and from across the province — good people from all walks of life. They are asking us what happened to the promise of a brighter future. Every time I’m asked about how this government is doing, I must tell them the truth. It’s unreliable, and it’s reckless.

Families are feeling the strain. Parents are finding it harder to provide for their children as inflation continues to outpace wage growth. Seniors are worried about whether or not they’ll have enough to retire on. All we see is growing deficits and greater financial strain on the people who can least afford it.

Meanwhile, the government responds with growing deficits and legislation like Bill 5 that compounds the hardship. The affordability crisis that has been stoked by this NDP government is universal, and people are desperately looking for a solution. Is that what this budget does for British Columbians? The answer is a resounding no.

This budget is not the solution. It is part of the problem. It is unreliable for small businesses, it’s unreliable for families, and it’s unreliable for all British Columbians. This government’s approach has been to bury our future in debt, hoping it will somehow go unnoticed, hoping that people won’t feel the weight of the decisions being made today.

[2:00 p.m.]

But I will not sit idly by while this government continues down a path that will only hurt the people of British Columbia. The people I represent, the people of Prince George, deserve better. We need a government that will listen, a government that will prioritize the needs of British Columbians and one that will work towards real solutions. The current path is not one we can afford to stay on.

This budget tries to neatly wrap a $10.9 billion deficit and present it as a gift for British Columbians. Oh, my apologies. According to Moody’s, it is now a $14.3 billion deficit.

To that I ask: where is the gift receipt? Because this government is offering not a gift. It’s a burden, and one that will be felt for years to come, one that will be felt by my family and my family that follows, my grandchildren. The people of British Columbia did not ask for this, and they certainly didn’t ask to be saddled with this kind of debt without any meaning of relief in return.

Let’s cut through the government’s rhetoric and break down the harsh reality of Bill 5. British Columbians deserve to know exactly what this bill is all about.

The Budget Measures Implementation Act represents the government’s attempt to legislate tax changes in British Columbia. On the surface, this may seem like a routine procedural matter. However, let’s be clear. This bill is more than just a set of technical adjustments. It is a direct reflection of this government’s priorities, and it’s a failure to address the real concerns of British Columbians.

Instead of offering meaningful tax reforms to stimulate growth, create jobs and alleviate financial pressures, this bill perpetuates the status quo, one that is leading to higher deficits and greater financial instability. It’s a bill that serves the interest of a government that continues to prioritize its own fiscal policies over the well-being of all British Columbians.

This bill is not just about tax changes. It’s about a government that continues to put its own interests ahead of the needs of British Columbians instead of focusing on the people who are struggling to make ends meet. This government has used Bill 5 to prioritize policies that will only add to the financial burden on hard-working families and small businesses.

Take, for example, the tax hike on electric vehicles. This is a government that claims to care about climate action but at the same time imposes a tax increase on the very vehicles that are supposed to be part of the clean energy future. It is a contradiction that hurts those that are trying to make environmentally conscious choices.

Then there’s the tax for the Minister of Finance’s previous employer. This is a glaring example of a government more concerned about pleasing its allies than addressing the real issues facing the public. And let’s not forget the increase to parking taxes in Metro Vancouver at a time when people are already burdened with rising costs.

Fundamentally, Bill 5 will be making life harder for those who are already living paycheque to paycheque. It’s about people who are $200 away from not being able to pay their bills. This government seems content to make their situation even worse while giving their friends and insiders a break.

Let’s talk about taxes again. This proposed piece of legislation fundamentally alters how taxes are managed in British Columbia. While there is one tax cut included in this bill, let’s be clear: this change will do little, if anything, to improve the lives of everyday British Columbians. It won’t make life more affordable for the families struggling to make ends meet, nor will it provide any meaningful relief to those grappling with rising costs across the board.

At a time when people are dealing with the fallout of an affordability crisis that this government has played a significant role in creating, you would expect them to prioritize the needs of ordinary citizens. But instead, this government has chosen to reward the Minister of Finance’s former employer, DigiBC, with a generous $5 million tax break.

This is not the kind of priority that British Columbians need right now. This decision is a missed opportunity to help those in need. It’s an alarming indicator of where this government’s priorities lie.

[2:05 p.m.]

On this side of the House, we are not against supporting industries that contribute to the economy. However, in times of economic hardship like these, when British Columbians are being squeezed from all sides, handing out taxpayer money to industry is a glaring example of misplaced priorities. The people of this province deserve far better than to see their hard-earned dollars directed towards an organization that doesn’t address the immediate needs of the public.

In times like these, British Columbians need a government that will focus on helping them directly. They need affordable housing. They need more accessible health care and tax policies that will provide real, meaningful relief. Unfortunately, Bill 5 does none of this. Instead, it reflects the government’s true priorities. Those priorities are not with the people of this province.

Another tax change under this bill. How about the proposed tax hikes on electric vehicles? This is yet another glaring example of the hypocrisy of this government. For a government that constantly claims to champion electric vehicles and environmental sustainability, their decision to make EVs more expensive is incomprehensible. Instead of incentivizing British Columbians to transition to electric vehicles, they are now making it more difficult, more costly and out of reach for many individuals who are trying to make environmentally conscious choices.

This is not just about luxury electric cars like those from Elon Musk’s brand. It’s about everyday British Columbians who are trying to make the shift to EVs and this government increasing taxes and making it harder for individuals to own the very vehicles they claim to encourage.

It’s not even surprising given the level of hypocrisy from the government surrounding this issue. On the one hand, they claim to advocate for the widespread adoption of electric vehicles, and on the other hand, they impose tax hikes that make EVs even more out of reach for everyday folks. It’s a classic case of saying one thing and doing another. This is hypocrisy at its finest.

In the same vein as making things more expensive under this government, let’s talk about yet another increase they are proposing. This time it’s taxes on parking in Metro Vancouver.

Now, I don’t know who this government is listening to, but I can tell you the people I’ve spoken with certainly aren’t saying: “I wish I could pay more to park my car.” But that seems to be the pattern with this government. There is an affordability crisis staring them in the face, people are crying for relief, and their response is to make basic, everyday things like parking more expensive.

Parking in Metro Vancouver is already difficult and extremely expensive. For working people commuting to the city, for families going to medical appointments or for small business owners trying to stay afloat, it’s another hit to their wallets. Instead of working to ease that burden, the government chooses to pile on. They talk about affordability and about helping families, and then they turn around and push forward policies like this. It’s unintelligible and irresponsible, plain and simple.

And while regular people are asked to pay more and more, we continue to see this government handing out $1,000 paycheques to their friends, insiders and politically connected allies. At this point, they might as well start handing out blank cheques for them to fill in, because it sure looks like those who this government is working for are not everyday British Columbians. So let’s call this what it is: a cash grab that hits the middle class and working families the hardest.

It’s one more example of a government completely out of touch with the people it’s supposed to serve. The people of Metro Vancouver and across this province deserve better than to be nickel-and-dimed by a government that refuses to get its own fiscal house in order.

The only thing unprecedented about this budget is the deficit. We are not the only ones to sound the alarm bells. Two credit downgrades in one day — two. This is not just a minor concern. It’s a loud and clear signal that something is deeply wrong with this government’s fiscal management.

[2:10 p.m.]

When credit rating agencies lower their outlooks on the province, it’s not just an abstract concept. It affects real people. It means higher borrowing costs, less investor confidence and, ultimately, more financial strain on people in British Columbia. It sends a stark message about the direction we’re heading and the financial state of this province.

It also means that B.C.’s deficit just grew substantially. The $10.9 billion deficit we were initially presented is now a staggering $14.3 billion, according to Moody’s. Yet, despite this alarming increase, what do we hear from the minister and this government when asked about it? No answers and empty platitudes. There is no real explanation, no meaningful response to questions that British Columbians are asking.

How did we get here? What’s the plan to fix this? How will this impact our province’s future? Instead of addressing the growing crisis head on, we’re told vague talking points, given a budget that does nothing to ease the anxiety that so many British Columbians are feeling.

In fact, this government has proven, time and time again, that they’re overachievers and not in a good way. Two credit downgrades aren’t enough for this minister. No, now we’re being told to expect even more downgrades to this government’s credit rating. And these downgrades can’t simply be contained within the scope of this government’s budget. This government has downgraded public confidence in its ability to govern, the accountability of this budget and the transparency of their actions.

What else do we hear from Moody’s? They make it clear that despite what the Minister of Finance may say, they have no expectation that this government will be able to balance this budget. The reality is that under this government’s current approach, we are stuck in a cycle of unchecked deficits with no clear plan to turn things around. Not only are we facing an unprecedented deficit, one that continues to grow with each passing day, but there is also no end in sight.

The people of British Columbia deserve more than a never-ending cycle of deficits, rising debt and a government that cannot commit to a fiscal responsible path forward. Instead of offering hope for a balanced budget, we are left with uncertainty, continued financial instability and the looming threat of even more downgrades.

Unfortunately, to get yourself out of a hole, you can’t just keep digging. And we’re not talking about a small hole here. We’re talking about a massive financial hole that this government has been digging for years. Yet, instead of halting reckless spending or taking the necessary steps to reverse the damage, this budget continues to pour money into the abyss, hoping that it will somehow solve itself. But it won’t. The consequences will be felt by future generations who will inherit the debt and the broken promises of this government.

What are the three things that should be prioritized above all when it comes to government handling hard-working taxpayers’ dollars? Well, above all is transparency, accountability and efficiency. Unfortunately, not only with this piece of legislation, this government fails to satisfy all of those criteria.

On this side of the House, we believe that British Columbians not only need but deserve a government that is prepared to rise to the occasion and face real challenges we are currently living with. These aren’t distant problems or hypothetical concerns. These are cries that affect people’s day-to-day lives, cries that this NDP government has not only failed to address but, in many cases, has actively made worse.

British Columbians are looking for leadership. They’re looking for action, not more talking points. They want a government that doesn’t just speak about affordability but one that delivers on those promises. They want a government that not only talks the talk but actually walks the talk. Unfortunately, what they’re getting from the NDP government is more of the same: grand rhetoric, flashy announcements and very little meaningful follow-through.

[2:15 p.m.]

Bill 5 is just the latest example of this government’s ongoing failure to meet the moment. This bill does nothing to make life more affordable for British Columbians. It does nothing to ease the burden on families who are already struggling to pay rent, buy groceries and fill up their gas tanks. In fact, in many ways, it makes things worse through increased taxes and misplaced priorities.

British Columbians don’t need another empty promise. They need a government that shows up for them, that listens, that leads and that delivers results. We need a government that understands the urgency of this moment and acts like it — a government that backs up its words with concrete, effective action. That’s not what we’re seeing. That’s why Bill 5 is a missed opportunity and why British Columbians deserve better. B.C. residents need a government that doesn’t just say it will act but does.

Where does this bill leave us? It leaves us with more questions than answers. It leaves us without meaningful solutions to the affordability crisis. And it leaves us with tax changes and fiscal decisions built on the shaky foundation of a budget that is not only unreliable but already outdated, as loss of carbon tax revenue is not accounted for. I have spent time in this House debating a budget that isn’t even accurate. And that alone is a striking representation of how this government operates — disorganized, disconnected and fundamentally irresponsible when it comes to financial stewardship of this province.

Time and time again, this government has proven it is not up to the task, it is not competent, it is not accountable, and it is certainly not prioritizing the people of British Columbia. To that, I say: when someone tells you who they are, believe them. And this bill tells us everything we need to know. It showcases this government’s fiscal mismanagement, its obsession with spin over substance, and a set of tax changes that benefit a narrow slice of industry, predominantly the film and digital media sectors, while doing absolutely nothing for hard-working British Columbians I represent.

The Minister of Finance has stood in this House and said that this budget reflects “a moment in time.” Well, we know exactly what that moment of time is. It is a moment of recklessness, a moment of missed opportunity and a moment that will be remembered as one of the most disappointing chapters in British Columbia’s fiscal history. This budget is not a reflection of prudent financial planning or responsible governance. It’s a reflection of a government that is out of touch with the realities facing its people — a government that continues to ignore the warnings and the calls for action.

British Columbians deserve transparency. They deserve action. They deserve a government that puts their needs above photo ops and insider deals. Bill 5 offers none of that. For this reason and many more, I urge all members of this House to vote against this bill.

Scott McInnis: I rise today to speak on behalf of the wonderful people I represent in the Columbia Valley and Revelstoke — hard-working, everyday British Columbians who are doing their very best to make ends meet in a province that’s becoming less and less affordable by the day. I rise today not only as a Member of the Legislative Assembly but as someone who has watched with growing concern the fiscal mismanagement that this government continues to perpetuate.

I rise in opposition to Bill 5, the Budget Measures Implementation Act, not out of partisanship but out of principle, because this bill fails to meet the moment. And worse, it actively makes life harder for those who are already struggling the most.

[2:20 p.m.]

Now, let me be clear. Budget measures implementation bills are not inherently bad. They’re standard legislative tools. They’re supposed to implement the tax and revenue changes presented in a provincial budget. But when the budget behind the bill collapses under scrutiny, when it no longer reflects fiscal reality, then the bill that flows from it is compromised. That is exactly the case with Bill 5.

We learned, shockingly, shortly after the Finance Minister tabled the budget — a budget she asked British Columbians to trust — that she had already been informed of not one but two impending credit downgrades. Not one but two financial institutions looked at the government’s fiscal track record and found it so lacking that they dropped our province’s credit rating.

Let’s not mince words. A credit downgrade is not just an embarrassment. It’s a cost — a cost borne by the taxpayer, a cost that drives up the price of borrowing — that makes investments in health care, education and infrastructure much more expensive, a cost that ultimately makes life less affordable for British Columbians.

While the Premier and Finance Minister were busy patting themselves on the back, the financial world was sending a very different message. This government’s fiscal plan isn’t credible, isn’t balanced and isn’t sustainable. Moody’s, one of the largest credit agencies, now expects our provincial deficit to balloon to $14.3 billion — $14.3 billion. That’s money we just don’t have being spent with no clear plan to pay it back.

And worse, neither Moody’s nor the other agency expects this government to balance the budget anytime soon. In fact, both agencies suggest further downgrades may be on the way. That’s not just a warning. It’s a 5-alarm fire.

Let’s return for a moment to the matter that should concern every single member of this House, and that is these credit downgrades that our province just suffered. This isn’t just a financial footnote. This isn’t a technical adjustment that ecosystems whisper about behind closed doors. This is a concrete, painful development that will affect every taxpayer, every parent, every senior, every patient waiting in line at an emergency room and every child sitting in a portable classroom. This is real, this is serious, and this is the direct result of this government’s choices.

Let’s be crystal clear on what a credit downgrade means for a province like British Columbia. When credit agencies lower a province’s credit rating, they’re not doing it for fun. These are not partisan organizations. They’re cold, analytical, evidence-driven institutions that evaluate fiscal risk the same way they do for corporations or municipalities. And what they saw in B.C.’s budget in this government’s trajectory alarmed them enough to hit us with two downgrades in one day.

Now, what does this actually do? First, and most directly, it makes borrowing much more expensive. Just like a family that misses credit card payments and sees their interest rates go up, a province that fails to manage its finances sees its borrowing costs climb. Given the size of B.C.’s debt and the $14.3 billion deficit forecasted, that increase is going to cost us dearly.

Every time this government issues a bond, it will now have to pay higher interest to investors to compensate for the perceived risk. That means millions and millions of extra dollars out the door just to service the debt, not to pay for new nurses or schools or wildfire response, which is extremely important where I come from. This is just to pay the interest. That’s taxpayer money flushed down the drain because this government can’t balance the budget.

Let’s put this in real-world terms. When our debt becomes more expensive, that creates a cascading effect across every major public investment. Want to build a new hospital in the Interior? It just got more expensive. Want to replace aging schools in Surrey or Chilliwack? That just got more expensive. Want to expand long-term care beds in rural communities? That, too — more expensive. Even the borrowing required for much-needed wildfire mitigation or climate resilience projects will now cost us more because our government did not protect our fiscal credibility.

That’s the thing about interest payments. They don’t build anything. They don’t solve anything. They don’t reduce classroom sizes or wait lists. They don’t build homes or fix roads. They just take away our options, our flexibility and our future. And here’s the real injustice. It won’t be the government that feels this pain. It will be everyday British Columbians who pay the price. Because when borrowing costs rise, governments typically have two choices: cut services or raise taxes.

[2:25 p.m.]

We’ve already seen which direction this government is leaning — parking taxes up, used EVs more expensive, no meaningful plan to protect the most vulnerable from the cost of inflation. They were already reaching deeper into the pockets of families who are $200 away from financial collapse every month. And now, because of these credit downgrades, they’ll have to reach even further.

What will it be next? Higher property taxes to plug the hole? Service fees tacked onto ICBC or hydro bills? More climate levies that somehow never make it to emissions reductions?

The worst part is these downgrades didn’t come out of nowhere. They were predictable and preventable. The warning signs had been flashing for months. British Columbians had been watching the size of government spending balloon, even as the quality of services declined. Yet the Finance Minister tabled a budget on the very day she knew the downgrades were coming and made no meaningful adjustments, no plan to correct the course, no strategy to regain credibility — just more spending, more borrowing and more wishful thinking.

Let’s not forget, these downgrades are not necessarily the end of the story. Both agencies indicated they expect this government’s rating to be downgraded again if there’s no material change in approach. We’re not just dealing with today’s higher borrowing costs. We are standing at the edge of a cliff knowing full well we might be pushed further if this government continues down this reckless spending path.

Some may argue, well, British Columbia has a relatively strong credit rating. That’s like saying a healthy person shouldn’t worry about high cholesterol, because they haven’t had a heart attack yet. Downgrades are the warning. They are the red flag. They are the fiscal equivalent of smoke in the engine compartment.

Here’s what’s so disappointing. British Columbia used to be a leader in fiscal discipline. Investors in financial institutions used to look to our province as a model of sound budgeting, proof that you can invest in health care and education without losing control of the books. But not anymore. Under this government, B.C. has become a cautionary tale — a province that burned through its surplus, blew through past budgets and dragged its people into debt without results to show for it.

This is not just a financial failure. It’s a moral failure, because every wasted dollar is a dollar not spent on the people who need it the most. Every point of interest we pay is a point of pressure on the single mom looking to afford daycare. Every downgrade is another door closed on the next generation of British Columbians who will inherit this debt, this burden and this diminished trust.

Let’s talk about that trust. Credit ratings are not just about money; they are about credibility. They are a signal to investors, developers, entrepreneurs and business leaders that this is a government they cannot count on. That B.C. as a stable, reliable place to build and grow no longer exists.

Our credibility has taken a hit, and once lost, credibility is incredibly hard to earn back. It takes time. It takes discipline, and it most definitely takes leadership. Unfortunately, that’s precisely what’s missing from this government. The Finance Minister could have used the budget as a moment to pivot, to acknowledge that the economic outlook has changed, to prioritize investment that builds long-term growth, not short-term popularity. But instead, she handed out tax breaks to some of her industry colleagues.

British Columbians deserve better than that. They deserve a government that earns trust, not squanders it. They deserve a government that protects their future, not mortgages it, that keeps its financial house in order so families can keep their house in order.

These credit downgrades aren’t just numbers on a chart. They’re a siren warning us that the current course is not sustainable. If we ignore them, if we treat them as politics instead of policy, we will all pay the price, especially the working families this government claims to be fighting for.

That’s why I oppose Bill 5, because it’s built on a budget that lacks credibility, because it ignores the growing storm clouds on the fiscal horizon and because it does nothing to repair the damage already done by this government’s refusal to lead. What has been this government’s response? To continue spending recklessly while failing to produce meaningful results

Our hospitals are overwhelmed. Our schools are overcrowded. Crime continues to rise in urban and rural centres.

[2:30 p.m.]

Rural communities struggle to access the basic services. In the middle of all this, in the middle of this fiscal crisis, this government has decided now is the right time to raise taxes on parking, raise costs for used electric vehicles and hand out tax credits to digital media industry players. Let me talk about that for a moment.

The government would have you believe that Bill 5 is a modest set of adjustments, a few minor tweaks. But that’s not the case. The implications of this bill are far-reaching, and they reflect this government’s misguided priorities. One of the most notable changes in this legislation is a tax hike on used electric vehicles, used EVs. This, from a government that has spent years telling British Columbians to switch to electric. This, from a government that claims to be a climate leader. And yet, they are making EVs more expensive to own. Not for the wealthy elite, not for those buying the latest off the production line, but for ordinary families trying to afford a reliable, efficient, second-hand vehicle.

I don’t know how else to say it. This makes no sense. It is a policy without logic, a tax without principle, a contradiction in motion. For years, we’ve heard this government champion the shift to electric vehicles as part of their climate agenda. They’ve wrapped themselves in the rhetoric of sustainability, told British Columbians that driving an EV is the responsible thing to do. And in many cases, it is.

But here’s the catch. While they are regulating and pushing people toward EVs and mandates and advertising what they would like to see, they are simultaneously making it more expensive for working families to own one. What message does that send? This is a government that has mandated by law that all new vehicle sales in B.C. must be zero emissions by 2035. They have introduced the CleanBC Roadmap, which encourages rapid electrification of the transportation sector. They’ve even offered subsidies in the past to help people make the transition. But now they’re taxing used electric vehicles, the most accessible affordable point of entry into the EV market for regular, middle-income British Columbians.

Let’s be honest. The vast majority of people in this province cannot afford a brand-new EV. They can’t drop $60,000, $70,000, $80,000 on a shiny, showroom-fresh EV. They’re not shopping for luxury. They’re shopping for something reliable that fits their budget and helps them meet the government’s climate expectations. And what does this government do in response? It punishes them.

We’re not talking about luxury vehicles. We’re talking about a family in Langley trying to replace their aging minivan with something more efficient, a young tradesperson in Vernon trying to reduce their fuel bill, a retiree in Kimberley who wants to do the right thing for the environment but can’t spend half their savings to do it.

By making used EVs more expensive, this government is saying the quiet part out loud. This shift is not about affordability or accessibility. It’s about appearances, about checking climate policy box without doing the hard work of helping real people through the transition.

Let’s look at the bigger picture for a moment. Major auto manufacturers around the world — Ford, GM, Volkswagen — are scaling back their EV production. Why? Because consumer demand is slowing. Because people are hesitating. Because the infrastructure isn’t ready. Because these vehicles don’t work in cold weather. Because they’re too expensive. And the reality of daily life for the majority of Canadians still includes long distances, long, cold winters and limited charging options.

Yet here in British Columbia, the government is moving full steam ahead, not with supports, not with rebates, but with more taxes. It is as if they have decided to push a policy agenda no matter what it costs, no matter what it breaks and no matter who gets left behind.

We are at a pivotal moment in the transportation sector. And instead of offering leadership, this government is offering confusion. On the one hand, they regulate combustion engines into extinction. On the other, they slap a tax penalty on the very EVs people are expected to switch to. This is not an incentive. This is a barrier. This is not how you build momentum toward a more sustainable future. This is how you breed resentment and skepticism.

Let’s not forget the EV market is already facing challenges in B.C. Once again, the infrastructure remains patchy, especially outside of the Lower Mainland.

[2:35 p.m.]

Wait times for certain EV models stretch into months. Battery degradation and cold weather remain a real concern for those in the Interior, the North and the Kootenays. And now, just to add insult to injury, this government is deciding that if you can finally afford a used EV, you should have to pay even more for it.

This isn’t just bad policy; it’s bad economics. Higher costs mean fewer sales. Fewer sales mean slower adoption. Slower adoption means we don’t meet the targets the government itself has enshrined into law. So we tax people trying to comply with the law, which causes fewer people to comply, which then becomes justification for more regulation, more interference and, yes, more taxes. It’s a cycle of failure, a feedback loop of poor planning.

Let’s also consider equity. The EV transition has been subsidized primarily for those who can afford new cars, urban dwellers with access to chargers and people with stable incomes. Used EVs are the bridge — the only bridge — for lower- and middle-income families to participate in the transition. Taxing them is a direct hit to the very people who are least able to absorb it.

So who benefits here? Not the environment, because fewer EVs on the road slows emissions reductions. Not the consumer, because their costs go up. And not small used-car dealers, because demand falls off when prices spike. There is no policy justification for this. None. It is punitive, it is incoherent, and it is completely out of touch with economic reality and consumer sentiment.

If the government truly wants to encourage a shift to electric vehicles, then it must remove barriers, not create new ones. It must make that shift easier, not harder. It must work with the market, not against it.

The fact this tax exists at all in Bill 5 tells us everything we need to know about this government’s approach. They’re not planning; they are reacting. They are not supporting; they are punishing. They are not leading; they are stumbling. British Columbians want real solutions. They want to be part of the clean economy, but not if it means financial disaster. And certainly not if the rules change every few months, punishing those who try to play by them.

We cannot ask people to transition to electric vehicles while increasing the cost of doing so. We cannot say “go green” while emptying their wallets in the process. It’s not fair. It is not consistent. And it is not the way to build public trust. This component of Bill 5 is not just flawed. It is self-defeating. It undercuts the very goals it claims to support. And for that reason alone, it deserves to be struck from this legislation.

This tax will disproportionately affect working-class families, students and seniors. It sends the message that sustainability is only for the rich, that owning an electric car is fine, as long as you can pay the premium.

This bill also includes an increase in parking taxes for Metro Vancouver. Let me ask this chamber a sincere question: who in this province is asking to pay more for parking? I’ll tell you who: nobody. No one is walking up to their MLA saying: “I wish I could pay an extra dollar or two every time I go to a doctor’s appointment or to drop my kids off at the rink.”

This isn’t policy driven by public demand. It’s policy driven by a government that sees the people of this province as a piggy bank. We have British Columbians — seniors, young families, small business owners — who are barely holding on. And instead of offering much-needed relief, this government is looking under the couch cushions for coins. Parking taxes are a regressive tax. They hit low-income earners hardest. They hurt small businesses. They hurt tourism. And they punish people for trying to live their lives.

While this government continues to pay consultants and insiders handsomely…. We’ve seen $1,000-a-day contracts handed out like candy while nurses are burning out, while teachers are struggling, while paramedics work 14-hour shifts with no relief in sight. What message does that send? This government has lost its way, and nowhere is that clearer than in Bill 5.

[2:40 p.m.]

Let me be clear. We’re not opposed to supporting industries like film and digital media. These sectors contribute to our economy, our culture and our international profile. But the timing and the manner of the tax change matters. When the rest of the budget is based on flawed projections, what is the priority?

Oh, sorry, sir.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you very much.

A reminder to rise if you’d like to be addressed. But thank you, Columbia River–Revelstoke, for the pause, and we’ll make sure we protect your time.

Member for Vancouver-Langara.

Sunita Dhir: Hon. Speaker, I seek leave to make an introduction, please.

Leave granted.

Introductions by Members

Sunita Dhir: Thank you, everybody. Today I have some very special friends sitting on this side of the House visiting us from all over the Lower Mainland. They all are members of Renmin University of China Alumni Association of Canada, and this is their very first visit to the precinct.

I’m very pleased to introduce them here. We have Hu Minghan, Xiao Nan, Cui Wei, Men Jingyang, Xing Guoxin, Liu Yuebing, Li Xufeng and Li Qun. May I request everyone to make them feel welcome here in the House.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you very much, Member. Apologies, Columbia River–Revelstoke. Take it away.

Debate Continued

Scott McInnis: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. No apologies necessary. Welcome to our guests.

At the core of my opposition to Bill 5, and what I believe should be at the core of every member’s concern in this House, is the simple, unavoidable reality that British Columbia is on a collision course with a fiscal reckoning. This government is doing nothing meaningful to stop it. In fact, with this legislation, they’re stepping on the gas.

Let’s face the facts as they are. Our provincial deficit is projected to soar to $14.3 billion. That’s not a rounding error. That’s not temporary fluctuation. That is a structural, long-term financial chasm, the largest deficit in our province’s history.

This isn’t driven by a recession. It’s not driven by an economic shock. It’s driven by government decisions, a deliberate choice to spend more, borrow more and plan less. At the same time, our debt is climbing at a rate that should alarm every British Columbian. We’re on track to more than double our provincial debt over the coming years.

The consequences of that debt are not theoretical. They are real, they are measurable, and they will hit us hard. By 2028, we’re forecasted to be paying over $2 million an hour — an hour — in interest payments on our debt. That’s $48 million a day or $17 billion a year. Not one penny of that goes to building a new school, hiring a nurse, opening a new mental health bed or preventing wildfires.

That is money gone, burned, disappeared into the pockets of banks and bondholders, not because of a natural disaster or a war, but because this government refused to rein in its own spending. That kind of interest burden is more than unsustainable. It’s immoral, because those payments aren’t abstract. They represent the programs we won’t be able to fund. They represent the services that will be cut when the money runs out. They represent higher taxes that will inevitably come, not for politicians or high-paid consultants but for working families, small business owners, seniors on very fixed incomes and young people trying to build a life here.

We need to change course, and we need to do it now. Not next year, not after the next election. Now. That begins with rejecting Bill 5, not as a symbolic gesture but as the first real act of fiscal responsibility we’ve seen in this chamber for far too long.

If we don’t — if we let this debt spiral continue unchecked — the next generation will look back and ask: “Where were you when the warning signs were flashing red? Where were you when the interest payments reached $2 million an hour? Where were you when the future was slipping away?” I want to be able to tell them that I stood up, I said no, and I fought for something better.

[2:45 p.m.]

As we examine Bill 5 and the broader fiscal plan this government has laid before us, one thing becomes painfully clear. Rural British Columbia has once again been left behind — more specifically, resort municipalities, those vibrant, hard-working communities that drive one of B.C.’s largest economic sectors. They’ve been treated not as partners, not even as stakeholders, but as cash machines for a government that sees their success only as a source of revenue, not a call for reinvestment.

In Columbia River–Revelstoke, where I represent, I have five of the province’s 14 resort municipalities, and this is exactly how they feel. Whether it’s Revelstoke, Golden, Radium Hot Springs, Invermere, Kimberley or Fairmont, these communities are the economic backbone of B.C.’s multi-billion-dollar tourism industry. These communities attract millions of visitors every year from Alberta, the Lower Mainland, the United States, Europe and Asia.

What do those visitors bring with them? Spending, jobs, economic opportunity. They eat in the restaurants. They rent hotel rooms. They visit shops, book tours and pay taxes on fuel, liquor, accommodation and meals, all of which goes straight into the provincial coffers.

Let’s be honest here. The B.C. tourism economy is rural-led. It doesn’t live in a downtown office tower. It lives in our mountains, in our lakes, in our forests and along our coasts. It is stewarded not by big corporations or bureaucrats but by small businesses, volunteers, seasonal workers, families and municipalities that are trying their best to do more with less year after year.

Despite this enormous contribution to provincial revenues, resort municipalities received almost nothing in return. They bear the full burden of servicing those tourists — emergency services, water, infrastructure, waste management, bylaw enforcement, road maintenance and environmental protection — on the backs of their limited tax base. These are small towns with humongous responsibilities.

Every long weekend their populations triple or quadruple. Yet when they ask this government for support, they are met with silence. Take the resort municipality initiative, a modest provincial program, at best, meant to provide some reinvestment back into these communities. It hasn’t seen meaningful increase in years. It doesn’t come close to addressing the real needs.

This year there’s no mention of any expansion or new infrastructure funding in Bill 5 for resort municipalities. No help with affordable housing for seasonal workers. No transit support to connect rural resort areas with regional centres. No targeted investment in emergency services for communities whose call volumes spike in the summer and winter tourist seasons. Nothing.

Instead, this government continues to download responsibilities onto these towns while extracting revenues they generate to spend elsewhere. This is extremely frustrating for the resort municipality communities I’m here to represent. These communities are not just underfunded; they are being exploited.

This budget, and the legislation implementing it, treats their economic contributions as a one-way street. Let’s do some math. British Columbia’s tourism industry contributed over $22 billion in pre-pandemic revenue. A massive share of that comes from tourism anchored in resort municipalities. Yet when these same municipalities ask for help for the lift operators, the servers, the paramedics and the seasonal maintenance crews, they’re told to wait.

When they ask for help managing the influx of tourists during wildfire season or extreme weather, they get a press release and a pat on the head. When they ask for long-term infrastructure investment — bridges, waste facilities, fire halls — they’re told there’s no room in the budget.

Yet somehow there’s always room in the budget for tax breaks. Somehow there’s always room for $1,000-a-day consultants. Somehow there’s always room to grow the bureaucracy while ignoring the communities that actually generate revenue for this province.

[2:50 p.m.]

What kind of economic stewardship is this? What kind of government takes and takes from rural B.C. without ever giving back? It’s not just unfair; it’s dangerous. These municipalities are at a breaking point.

Deputy Speaker: Just a couple of friendly reminders to have our electronic devices on silent. Also, just a general reminder to be careful of some of the words we choose to use in this room. Let’s stay away from anything that might be unparliamentary this afternoon.

Korky Neufeld: I’m privileged to represent Abbotsford West and to be here this afternoon to speak to this Bill 5.

I have to say that the community of Abbotsford is a resilient bunch. We have a city in the country. We have farmlands. We have businesses. We have innovation. We have aerospace. And we have a lot of opportunities for growth. But what I’ve seen over the last, let’s say, ten years is the negative impact of policies and decisions being made by this present government.

It used to be known as a gem in the Fraser Valley, the City in the Country. Today we’ve seen an influx of big-city issues that plague not only Abbotsford…. I would say it plagues every community across our province.

I just had the opportunity over lunch to meet with a group of law enforcement people. Four of us from Abbotsford sat down and met with them, and they just talked to us about some of the challenges they’re facing. And they’re real. The front-line workers are facing real challenges, and I think it behooves all of us in this House to make sure that when we make decisions, we contact and communicate with those who are on the front lines to make sure that our policies aren’t hindering them or hurting them or impeding them from doing their jobs.

I rise to address a critical piece of legislation that affects the very foundation of our province and the lives of British Columbians. The Budget Measures Implementation Act, commonly referred to as Bill 5, is not just a mere formality. It encapsulates the priority and, dare I say, the failures of our current government.

Let us reflect on the events of last week, when the Minister of Finance presented a budget that was predicated on not one but two credit downgrades. This is a staggering development, a clear signal that fixing British Columbia’s broken health care system just became considerably more expensive. It’s a troubling harbinger of what’s to come. It means that our deficit, already distressingly high, is poised to increase.

Moody’s, one of the credit-rating agencies that downgraded our province, now anticipates that our deficit will soar to an alarming $4.3 billion. The implications of that are profound. We stand in a landscape where not only is there no expectation of a balanced budget but where further downgrades are on the horizon, as predicted by both credit-rating agencies.

Well, let’s just talk about some of the areas that are going to be impacted because of this. We all know that our health care system in British Columbia is in a state of crisis. The Budget Measures Implementation Act paints a grim picture of our financial state, and the future investments will be hard to come by. Yet this government continues to speak of long-term strategies and future investments.

The question is: how? How will they pay for it? Will they just increase our debt? There’s no plan to build our economy so we can pay for these much-needed services.

British Columbians are suffering now, today. They have been suffering, and they continue to suffer under this government’s lack of leadership. Across the province, we’re witnessing the consequences of years of underinvestment, mismanagement and delay. And it’s not just policy that’s failing, it’s people. Patients, families and front-line workers are paying the price for a system that’s buckling under pressure.

So let’s be honest. There are not enough health care workers. We’re in the middle of a staffing crisis across hospitals, clinics, long-term care and community health. Nurses are burned out, doctors are leaving and those who remain are stretched beyond capacity.

[2:55 p.m.]

All you have to do is visit one of our hospitals. One million British Columbians don’t have a family doctor. That’s one in five people without the basic access to care, forced to rely on walk-in clinics or overcrowded emergency rooms just to get the help.

I have witnessed this. I have been in those clinic lineups with my mom at age 91, 92 and 93. By the time you get to the door…. The doors close at 11 or 12 o’clock because they’ve met their cap. They have to close.

Now we have to go to the emergency room. Now emergency rooms are clinics or doctors’ offices. That’s why we have the overcrowding — forcing many to use ER as clinics and family doctors.

Wait times are growing, and that is why. They’re not shorter; they’re getting longer. Whether it’s to see a specialist, receive diagnostic tests or get much-needed surgery, people are waiting weeks, months and even years. In some cases, the wait is the difference between recovery and irreversible harm.

Emergency rooms are overcrowded and overwhelmed, closing altogether in some communities. Think about that for just a second: a province as developed and prosperous as ours unable to keep the doors open at the most critical point of care. Let that sink in.

Now, if you haven’t experienced it, you need to experience it — being rejected. You have to drive hours when you’re not feeling well. You may be ill. You may be injured. Now you have to travel hours just to get the basic care.

Mental health and addiction services remain under-resourced even as an overdose crisis continues to climb on record levels. This is not a system that needs tweaking; this is a system in need of transformation. Again, Bill 5 and this budget give little comfort to British Columbians that this will improve.

What’s most frustrating is this: many of these problems aren’t new. It’s not because of the tariffs. We’ve been warned for years. The signs were here. Health care workers raised the alarm. Patients have told their stories. Experts have presented solutions. But still, action from this government has been too slow, too reactive, too focused on headlines instead of outcomes.

It’s time for accountability. We need immediate investment in front-line staff, not just in training future professionals but in retaining the exhausted ones we already have. If the bucket, in the bottom, has got holes in it, and you pour water in it, it won’t stay. If the back door is as big as the front door…. It doesn’t matter how many people you’re adding to the system if they’re leaving as fast as they’re coming. You’re not adding; you’re subtracting.

A real transparent strategy to ensure every British Columbian has access to a family doctor or primary care team…. Well, let’s talk about how our post-secondary institutions need to prioritize the training of health care workers today, not tomorrow, not a year from now, because it takes seven to ten years before one of those physicians will be able to serve the public.

We need bold reforms to reduce surgical and specialist wait times, not in five years but starting today. Infrastructure that matches our population growth, including more hospitals, more community clinics, more long-term-care beds. And, above all, we need leadership that listens not just to advisors whom they pay an exorbitant amount of money, not just to another committee meeting, another report but to the people on the ground.

In order to pay for this, we need to unleash all of our province’s potential to create wealth. Because health care is not a luxury; it’s a right. And in a province as wealthy and resourceful as British Columbia, there is no excuse for this system to be as broken as it is.

To this government, we don’t need more press conferences; we need action. We don’t need more promises; we need performance. British Columbians deserve better, and it’s long past time that you deliver it.

While as being a trustee for over 16 years in the public school system…. Another issue that affects all of us, whether you’re a student, a parent, an educator or a community member, is the state of our public education system in British Columbia. B.C.’s public education system is one of the cornerstones of our society, shaping the minds and future generations. But despite the dedication of our teachers and school staff, the system is under significant strain.

[3:00 p.m.]

Let’s start with the major issue: teacher shortage. Across the province, we’re facing a growing lack of qualified educators. This shortage has led many school districts to rely on uncertified teachers. In Abbotsford alone, we have over 50.

Many school districts are forced to do this because there are just not enough educators coming out of our post-secondary system. The end is also an increase in class sizes, which can negatively impact the quality of education and the support each student receives.

Closely tied to this is the problem of inadequate funding. Public schools are struggling to keep up with the rising costs. Per-student spending hasn’t kept pace with inflation, forcing many schools to make difficult budget cuts. Here are some of the budget cuts: libraries, extracurricular programs. Many of these extracurricular programs keep some kids in school. This is the only thing that keeps some kids in school — a sport program, an arts program, a drama program. This is being cut in schools because they have no choice.

Student services often are the first things to go. As a result, classrooms are becoming more complex. More and more students come with diverse needs, including those requiring specialized support. Unfortunately, the resources and staffing to properly support these students simply aren’t there.

We also need to talk about school infrastructure. I love what this government has done. They have taken the school facilities and put it under the Ministry of Infrastructure. So when I ask the Minister of Post-Secondary certain questions: “Oh, you need to ask the Minister of Infrastructure for that.” We’ve done that also with training of doctors and nurses. It’s under the health care. So when you actually want to ask the questions, they punt the question between two ministries, and no one ends up answering the difficult questions.

Portable classrooms meant to be temporary solutions have become a long-term reality in far too many communities. We’ve seen more and more portables in Abbotsford, and look at the highrise portables they’re building in Surrey. These conditions are not conducive for learning or to create a safe, welcoming space for students.

Let’s not forget post-secondary education, of which I am critic. Institutions across the province are facing financial pressures, affecting the quality and availability of programs. This is a real concern for me. When they have to make budget cuts, I hope they’re not dropping programs that are employable programs. I hope they’re dropping programs that are just kind of the peripheral programs that aren’t going to be impacting our economy and the workforce that we desperately need.

According to the British Columbia Federation of Students, students are worried about rising tuition, cuts to services and the accessibility of education beyond high school. So what does all this mean? It means we’re at a crossroads. Does Bill 5 speak to these issues? No. Again, the silence is deafening.

We must make public education a priority not just in words but in action and investment. This is about more than policies and budgets. It’s about the future of our province and the opportunities we provide for our young people, and it directly ties to our economy. We owe it to our students, and we owe it to ourselves to build an education system that is strong and well supported.

Well, another pressing issue that affects every fabric of our lives here in British Columbia is transportation and infrastructure. Our beautiful province — and I’ve driven it from border to border, east to west — characterized by its breathtaking landscapes and diverse communities is faced with significant transportation challenges that require our immediate attention and collective action.

First and foremost, we must acknowledge the limitations of our public transit system. While urban centres have access to a network of reliable transit options, many rural and remote communities, particularly in the heartlands, find themselves with inadequate transportation alternatives. This reliance on private vehicles not only places a financial burden on families but also creates transportation deserts that isolate residents from essential services, employment opportunities and social connection. We cannot allow transportation barriers to hinder the livelihoods of our citizens.

Furthermore, we must confront the reality of our aging infrastructure. Years of neglect have taken their toll on roads and bridges, particularly in the Interior, where deteriorating conditions pose safety risks for drivers and pedestrians alike. These shortcomings not only threaten our safety but also impede economic activity. Poor infrastructure is a barrier to growth, and it’s our duty to pave the way for a prosperous future.

[3:05 p.m.]

Also, with the increasing frequency of extreme weather events, we are witnessing firsthand the vulnerability of this infrastructure. Flooding, landslides and other natural disasters disrupt services and create hazards for those who depend on our roads and public transit. We saw that firsthand in November 2021 in the Fraser Valley. Our Highway 1 was completely cut off.

We need to take proactive steps to adapt our infrastructure to withstand the impacts of these disasters when they occur. I just read last week that the province has decided they will not invest in any flood prevention with this budget, yet two-thirds of the Sumas flats require infrastructure to be built. The next flood, the same thing is going to happen — this happened in 1990; it happened in 2021; when’s the next one going to happen? — unless we take action and build that infrastructure that’s so needed for the farmers and the food that it produces that each one of us has on our kitchen tables each and every day.

Moreover, the interregional transit connections that bind our communities together often fall short. Infrequent and expensive public transit options hinder the movement of people across regions. We must strive for a system that makes it easy and convenient for all residents, regardless of where they live, to travel freely for work, education or leisure. In many communities, basic infrastructure such as a bus stop shelter or washrooms is lacking, further complicating the transit experience for users.

We must also prioritize creating user-friendly information systems and investing in the necessary infrastructure to serve the needs of all citizens. We need to be committed by ensuring our transportation infrastructure is resilient to natural disasters.

Does Bill 5 speak to the transportation and infrastructure needs in our province? Again, silence is deafening. Together we can build a transportation network that connects our communities, supports our industries and fosters economic growth, if we had a government that had the foresight instead of only being reactive. Let us invest in our future, ensuring that every resident has access to reliable, safe and efficient transportation.

Small and medium-sized businesses are the backbone of our local economy. They bring character to our streets, provide jobs to our neighbours and drive innovation from the ground up. But right now many of them are under serious pressure.

One of the biggest challenges small businesses face today is attracting and retaining workers. In B.C.’s tight labour market, where unemployment is low and the workforce is aging, it’s becoming harder for small employers to find and keep staff. This shortage doesn’t just affect hiring. It impacts operating hours, service quality and, ultimately, revenue. And if they can’t make money, they’re not going to stay.

Higher wages are necessary, but they can also be hard for small enterprises who are already stretched thin. Inflation has also left a lasting mark. Even though the inflation rate has slowed, the cost of goods and services remains high. For small businesses, this means squeezing margins and constant uncertainty. They’re paying more for supplies, they’re paying more for utilities, and they’re paying more for rent, while trying to avoid passing those costs on to local consumers.

Let’s not forget the financial burdens of overtaxation and bureaucracy that many small businesses face. So many small businesses took loans to stay afloat during COVID. Now repayment deadlines are approaching, and not all have the resources to meet them. Without any additional support or flexibility, we risk seeing more closures — not from poor business practices but from circumstances beyond their control.

I have seen this in our city, in Abbotsford. We’ve seen some really, really great businesses having to shutter their doors because of bureaucracy, because of all these other issues that they’re facing on a daily basis. They can’t stay open.

Competition from larger companies, especially those with massive online platforms, adds another layer of difficulty. Small businesses must keep up with digital marketing, e-commerce and evolving consumer expectations, just to stay in the game. And they often have to do it with fewer resources.

Other external pressures, like public safety concerns…. I’ve gone to many establishments in Abbotsford where I see the owner. Before he is able to open up his shop, he’s got to show up a half an hour early to clean up needles, to clean up excrement from the front of the door, whether it’s vomit or it’s other disgusting things.

Unpredictable supply chains and fragile global economy only add to the daily stress of running a small to medium-sized business in B.C. And, again, does Bill 5 speak to any of these concerns? No. Just silence.

[3:10 p.m.]

Now more than ever they need our support, whether it’s shopping local or advocating for policy changes. But when we support small businesses, we’re investing in our neighbours, in our neighbourhoods, in local jobs, in a stronger, more vibrant British Columbia. So let’s stand with them. Because when small businesses succeed, we all do.

Then there are the challenges facing our small and rural communities in British Columbia. These challenges are not just statistics. They are everyday realities for countless individuals and families who call these areas home. As we navigate the complexity of modern society, we must recognize the unique struggles our rural communities face, which include economic instability, infrastructure gaps, limited access to essential services.

Let us start by addressing the issues of economic instability. Many of our rural communities rely heavily on single industries, which leaves them particularly vulnerable to economic downturns. We’ve seen the closing of many of these industries throughout our interior. This dependence can lead to job losses and higher unemployment rates, ultimately destabilizing households and families.

Again, this bill, in the form of a budget, left small and rural communities behind.

Compounding this issue is the state of the infrastructure. Aging roads, aging bridges, aging utilities hinder not only economic development but also the quality of life for residents. Let’s not forget the tune “Quesnel Bridge is Falling Down.” Our communities deserve access to reliable, safe infrastructure that supports their lives and enables economic growth. It is imperative that we prioritize the revitalization of these essential assets.

We must also confront the reality of limited access to services. Rural residents often face significant barriers when trying to access health care, education and other vital services. The recognition of services, all but designed to reduce costs, can exasperate these challenges as residents find themselves travelling long distances to receive the care or support. We must ensure that every resident of British Columbia has access to the services they need without invasive travel.

As we reflect on the demographics of our rural communities, we must consider the impact of aging population and workforce. With fewer young people and skilled workers, we face challenges in delivering services and maintaining our infrastructure. We need to invest in attracting and retaining talent in our rural areas, ensuring a bright future for our communities. Again, nothing in this bill or budget addresses educational institutions in small and rural communities.

Housing shortages further complicate the landscape. The influx of workers due to industry projects often drives up housing costs, leaving local residents struggling to find affordable housing. This issue demands attention as we strive to create sustainable communities where people can live, work and thrive.

In addition to these challenges, we must address the digital divide faced by some of these rural areas. Inadequate digital connectivity limits access to information, online services and opportunities for remote work and business development. In today’s world, digital access is not a luxury; it’s a necessity. And we must work diligently to bridge that gap.

Transportation is another critical aspect of this discussion. Limited public transportation options can impede rural residents’ ability to access essential services, including health care and job opportunities. We need to invest in reliable transportation solutions that connect our communities and ensure that every resident can reach the services they require.

Furthermore, the regionalization of services must be approached with caution. While intended to streamline services, it can create additional barriers for rural residents who may not have the necessary transportation or support system in place.

We must prioritize local input and ensure that our rural voices are heard in the decision-making processes that directly impact their lives. But this government’s focus is on Metro Vancouver, leaving small and rural communities far, far behind and to fend for themselves.

We cannot overlook the unique perspectives and needs of Indigenous communities in our rural regions. These communities often face distinct challenges and have rich histories that must be taken into account in service delivery and policy development. It is our responsibility to engage with Indigenous leaders and communities, integrating their insights into our path forward.

We must also recognize that the regionalization of services has had an unintended consequence: a decline in community engagement. When decisions are made far away, like in Victoria, far from the affected area, it diminishes the voice of the rural residents. We need to foster an inclusive environment where community members have the opportunity to participate in shaping the future of their own community.

[3:15 p.m.]

The challenges facing our small and rural communities in British Columbia are significant, but they are not insurmountable. That is why, on this side of the House, we will continue to advocate for innovative solutions, prioritize local needs and invest in the future of our rural areas.

This government needs to create a more equitable and sustainable future for all residents of British Columbia, including small and rural communities.

I invite the members opposite to drive in the Interior this summer with their cars so they can see firsthand the condition of our infrastructure, see the shuttered businesses, see how their decisions here in Victoria are impacting the Interior.

How will this government hope to ever invest in our province while carrying such a large deficit? The two credit downgrades should alarm us all. The real downgrade is not merely a reflection of our credit rating. It is emblematic of our government, which has lost its way. The Minister of Finance and this Premier have proved time and time again that they are the real downgrade. Their governance is lacking the foresight and accountability we so desperately need.

Now let’s talk about Bill 5. This legislation is meant to codify tax changes in our province, a process that should prioritize the well-being of all British Columbians. However, the proposed tax hikes on used electric vehicles are indicative of a misguided approach.

While the government extols the virtues of electric vehicles and aims to encourage adoption, it simultaneously imposes a financial burden that makes ownership more expensive. This isn’t a mere taxation of luxury vehicles. It’s a tax that will impact average British Columbians seeking to make environmentally conscious decisions.

To add insult to injury, while this bill does include a single tax cut — a change long resisted by this government until the former head of DigiBC, the creative technology industry association of B.C., assumed the mantle of Finance Minister — one cannot help but question the timing and intent behind it. In a moment when British Columbians are struggling financially, this minister chooses to reward former employers with a staggering $5 million tax cut.

This is a clear prioritization of interests of a select few over the needs of many. British Columbians are just $200 away from paying their bills and going under. And yet here we are, facilitating immense financial gains for the film industry at a critical juncture. Not only does the film industry need tax cuts; many other industries and sectors need tax cuts as well. We cannot cherry-pick.

Furthermore, let us not overlook the tax increases on parking in Vancouver. This is yet another instance of a government that seems disconnected from financial realities faced by its constituents.

British Columbia is in desperate need of a government that not only acknowledges the crisis created by its own action but also actively seeks to address them. We require leadership that translates promises of action into real, tangible results. This Budget Measures Implementation Act fundamentally fails to do just that. As my colleague, the member for Kamloops Centre, succinctly stated: “There’s a budget measures implementation bill with a few tax changes, predominantly for the film industry. That’s about it.”

We are left with a document that lacks accuracy, plagued by a $3 billion revenue shortfall with no clear adjustment made to the expenses that would ensure accountability and oversight. The budget we debate today is no longer a reliable financial document, reflecting a government that operates in a state of confusion and disarray.

In conclusion, let us not forget the urgent need for a shift in leadership, one that prioritizes the needs of all British Columbians and acts decisively to alleviate the pressures they face.

Bill 5 is a reflection of the status quo — a status quo that must change if we are to find our way back to fiscal responsibility and social equity. I will not be supporting this bill, and I encourage my members to do the same.

Bruce Banman: It is, indeed, a pleasure at any time to stand in this House. It’s a privilege, in fact, to stand in this House and be able to respond to any bill that this House puts on the floor.

We live in rather interesting times, and the concern that I have heard from the residents of my riding, and around the province for that matter, is the accumulating debt that has happened underneath this NDP government since they took office eight years ago.

[3:20 p.m.]

The NDP did inherit a debt. They inherited a surplus in their budget of approximately $6 billion, which vanished. But the total debt that they inherited was almost $65 billion. That’s when they took office in 2017. Over the next three years, we are now forecasting the debt to increase by $75.8 billion, almost $76 billion — and that’s with a “b,” not an “m.”

That’s more than all of the debt that has been accumulated since British Columbia joined Confederation 153 years ago. That’s worth repeating. That is more debt since the government took office, in eight years, than in 153 years. And then, David Eby now expects that the province’s total debt….

Deputy Speaker: Member, we don’t use names of our members.

Bruce Banman: I apologize. The Premier, rather. The Premier. Thank you for the correction, Mr. Speaker. It is always a pleasure to be corrected, and I apologize for using a name in this House.

A lot of people actually watching at home don’t know that one of the rather interesting rules about being in this House is we can say, “the member from such-and-such a riding over there,” but we’re not allowed to actually use names in the House, and I transgressed.

The Premier now expects that the province’s total debt is to more than triple since the NDP took office between 2017 and 2028. The reason that that’s important is that most likely this government will not be around to actually fix that problem.

You know, it reminds me of, “Hey, let’s go out for dinner,” with a bunch of friends. It’s your idea. We’ll all go out for dinner. And then when it comes time to pay the bill, you conveniently get up and go to the washroom and leave everybody else hanging with the bill. That’s effectively what’s going to happen here. This government will not be around to actually clean the mess that they created. That will be left to whatever government takes place or replaces them. The burden of this debt, when it gets into these kinds of numbers — I don’t know that I’ll be around long enough to see it paid off.

Sadly, it will be future generations that are saddled with paying off the debt because this government doesn’t know how to balance a chequebook. They’re great at making promises, but when it comes time to pay the cheque, they’re going to go to the washroom, I guess, and they just won’t be around to pay it off.

There are consequences to not paying off a debt. Everybody is used to having a credit card. What happens if you are a bad credit risk, if you’ve ever gone to try and get a car or try to get something, from an RV or a boat, one of those things, those “I want,” not an “I need,” necessarily…. Well, you may need a car to get to and from work, actually. But if you have been poor at managing your debt, you end up having to pay more interest.

Well, governments are no different. A lot of people back at home think: “Well, it doesn’t matter. It’s the government. They can just…. You never have to pay it off. They can just keep borrowing.” Well, it does not work that way. And this government has seen its ability to borrow money, the interest that government does pay…. Governments do get a great deal on interest. They really do. But now what’s happened is: we have seen five downgrades since this government took office.

[3:25 p.m.]

So what does that actually mean? Well, it means that the interest rate went up.

The reason I bring up a credit card is because they have some of the most brutal interest rates that everyday, hard-working British Columbians face. Now, the average British Columbian is $200 away from being able to pay their bills on most months. So that means that a lot of…. If you take a look at the debt across Canada, more and more families are increasing their debt. As they increase their debt, if they’re using their credit cards, they have to pay a much higher rate of interest than they would if it was a line of credit, for instance.

Governments are no different. We now know that there are millions of dollars that this government will pay in interest. How is that important to this? Well, it means that for every dollar we pay in interest on the debt, that’s a dollar that we have less to go towards health care. It’s a dollar less that we have to go towards teachers or programs that we need, a dollar less that we can put towards fixing our roads.

We heard today the dire straits in which the roads and bridges and infrastructure in this province are. Anyone who has driven up and down the No. 1 highway of late has been phoning me up and saying: “Why the heck are we not fixing the potholes?” It’s not just the No. 1 in my area. We heard a rather interesting rendition of “London Bridge is Falling Down” a few days ago. It was sung slightly off-key, in my opinion, but that’s all right. The message was sent loud and clear that the bridges in the North are literally decaying and falling apart. There is concrete that is falling into the river.

[Mable Elmore in the chair.]

The interest that we are now going to pay, the higher interest rate that we are now going to pay because this government mismanaged the debt, means that we actually have less real dollars, less tax dollars collected to actually go towards the things that are important, such as bridges, such as so-called imaginary tunnels at this point that replace the Massey Tunnel, for which, as of yet, there is still not a proper plan in place.

Welcome to the chair, Madam Speaker.

It gets to the point where, if you have a household budget, every dollar that you pay towards the credit card to pay off the debt that you have makes it more difficult to actually put the everyday common things you want to put in front of yourself. Governments are no different. It affects all kinds of things, including Bill 5.

This year, the per capita debt for British Columbia is expected to hit for every man, woman, and child…. This House has gone to great lengths to welcome newborns that our members have had into this House, and I welcome that. It is the future. But that newborn child, thanks to the mismanagement of this government, now owes approximately $27,425. So you get born in British Columbia, and the gift from this Premier to that child is a debt of $27,000, and it’s growing. Think about that. An innocent child has now had this government basically burden them with almost $30,000 in debt.

[3:30 p.m.]

It’s selfish, it’s incompetent, and it certainly is not right. This is 100 percent directly responsible because this government cannot dial in its spending. In this current budget, we know that it’s going to be excessive. We are now faced with…. Who knows what’s going to happen with our neighbours to the south. There has been much talk and much to-do about tariffs, yet this budget doesn’t mention tariffs at all.

Furthermore, it doesn’t even talk about where and what cuts are going to be made. And we know that corporate tax revenue is expected to also drop. It’s no wonder we have businesses that are leaving the province. We have things like the forest sector. Merritt, for example, had six sawmills when this government took office. It’s my understanding the last one closed.

The forest sector is pretty much vanishing in this province. That’s not because of wildfires. As a matter of fact, the forest companies have said: “You know what, after a wildfire, please let us in. Expedite the process to get in there. And not only will we harvest the wood before it goes bad but we’ll help reforest on the way out to speed up the recovery of these areas.”

So, business taxes are dropping, and now, for the first time, we are seeing approximately one out of three people that are either considering leaving the province…. We are actually seeing people leave the province in existing numbers. Worse than that, we are seeing businesses leave because they cannot afford to make a living in this province anymore. There is no point for many of them. They look at the stark reality of: “We have to move or we’re going to go bankrupt.”

Now that corporate tax that I was talking about…. They expect that revenue to drop another 9 percent next year. That adds up to $5.7 billion, almost $6 billion lost in corporate taxes alone, and that does not include the carbon tax, which there was no accommodation for, no planning for.

So there has been no planning for the tariffs. There has been no planning for the carbon tax. There has been no planning for this alone. Yet our spending is going to just keep on merrily rolling along with zero adjustments. That’s the equivalent of you and I still going out for dinner every night thinking life is just a bowl of cherries. The fact that I’ve lost my job or I’ve been reduced to part-time hours, yet I do not adjust my spending one little bit, and I think that magically the tooth fairy is going to come along at night and pay the bills at the end of the month…. It doesn’t work. There is a disconnect from reality to imaginary….

It just doesn’t seem to work, and there has been no one that has actually said: “Hey, you know what? We need to dial this in. We need to ensure that there’s actually a way to pay off the promises that we have made. And maybe we need to make some changes in the meantime so that I’m not saddling my kids and grandkids with the bill that I have, that I’ve spent.” That’s what it appears to be with this government and how they look at the budget.

These are not imaginary numbers. I know there are a bunch of zeros, and it’s hard to comprehend for a lot of people. But when you put it into the basics, we have to sort out our “I needs” from our “I wants.” This government has not done that.

[3:35 p.m.]

Now, I mentioned that we have seen jobs disappear. In my neck of the woods, agriculture is a big thing. In my riding is the most productive farmland in all of Canada. It is a huge economic generator for the province and especially for my riding. Agriculture is big business. We produce two-thirds more per acre for farm-gate sales than any other area of Canada. The next closest is actually the Niagara region. What’s available in agriculture in my area is quite profound.

Yet there is a very troubling shift that is happening in the agricultural sector across the province. We’ve lost 7,300 jobs in the agricultural sector. Yet these are the folks that actually work and put food on our table and help to do that and actually produce. Yet what was government’s response in the very same period? The bureaucracy has exploded by 41 percent.

Now, why is that important, you might ask. Well, those that are actually producing are the ones that are actually paying for the bureaucracy. You need to have a strong, robust economy to pay for the bureaucracy that provides the “I wants” and the “I needs.” Now, you’ve got to sort those out. This government has not done so in this budget whatsoever. The government is growing and growing and growing, while those that are paying for it are either shutting up shop or disappearing. Those that are producing the taxes to pay for the other are going…. It goes back to…. It’s like I had a full-time job, and the boss phones me up and says: “You know what? Times are tough. You’re going to go from five days a week down to three. I’m sorry. I don’t want to do it, but I have to do it.” That happened to someone very dear and close to me.

Yet this government keeps rolling along as if they’re producing overtime and things are just rolling along fantastic. And they’re not. There’s a disconnect from the real world. There’s a disconnect from those that actually produce the income tax required to run this House and run much of the stuff in this province. You then add on to that that interest rates are increasing. It is a recipe for disaster. It’s reckless.

As I mentioned, people are leaving the province. Five thousand residents, approximately, went to other provinces, mainly to Alberta. That breaks my heart.

I’ve said in this House before that I have three grandchildren, one of which is getting a PhD. I’m very proud. He’s getting a PhD in sports management, as a matter of fact. I doubt that he will come back to this province because we have talked and the expenses and the costs of this province…. He just doesn’t see a future for himself here. But that remains to be seen yet. We’ll see whether or not he ends up becoming a professor or whether he goes into sports management itself. That’s yet to be determined. He’s close to his PhD, but not quite.

The other one is a marine biologist, and her specialty is raising sharks. As I mentioned, a few sharks may be swimming around these buildings, but not the kind that a marine biologist would be involved with. She’s looking at an opportunity to work on the Great Barrier Reef of Australia. For a marine biologist, it’s a dream come true. And again, she does not see the ability to purchase a house or a home in British Columbia.

The third one, he’s 12 and he’s…. I worry about him very much. I worry because I don’t want to ever stand in front of him as I’m loading up his stuff in his car and have to explain to him why I didn’t fight for his future.

[3:40 p.m.]

The job of opposition is…. Well, to oppose is not exactly positive. It is what we do in this House. The job of opposition is not only to just oppose — and quite often we vote with government. You’ll see us do that on regular occasions. But it is also our job to say: “Hey, slow down a minute. What you’re doing is going to do harm. Have you thought about the consequences of the decisions that you’re currently making? You’re not going to be around to pay the bills that you’ve been charging.”

It’s not right, and it’s not fair to future generations that are going to come into this province. You’ve actually set us up for failure, not success, simply because you didn’t rein in the spending. You add it all up: businesses are shutting down, bureaucracy is skyrocketing, the amount of money that this government is spending is skyrocketing, and offices’ budgets are exploding to an all-time high.

At a time when we hear an awful lot of praise to front-line workers in our health care industry, for instance, what does the Premier do? He increased his personal office budget by $1 million so he could go hire some spin doctors. I think the Premier is pretty good at spinning his own stuff. I don’t think he really needs…. At a time when we have ERs closing, is it really what we should have been putting our money towards? That’s just one of literally millions of dollars’ worth of examples I could give this House, as to why this budget and Bill 5 are a problem.

As I mentioned, we saw 7,300 jobs lost in the agriculture sector. In this House, for instance, the Premier made sure that every single individual got a pay bump, on that side of the House, by either assigning them a special duty, assigning them a special title, making them a minister or expanding the bureaucracy of government itself. Every single member on that side of the House saw a minimum increase of $18,000 a year.

Now, if you’re an average British Columbian, you’re $200 away from not being able to pay for food, or worse, at the level where it’s: “Do I rob Peter to pay Paul? Do I let the cell phone bill go for a month so I can pay the hydro bill? Or instead of buying what I want for my kids, do I go and buy the no-name stuff, instead of the brand that I would really like?”

Yet this government’s response was to make sure that every single member got an $18,000 pay raise. I am sure there are a bunch of families at home that would love to have had an $18,000 bump. Must be nice. Must be nice.

We have not seen any new capital projects expand for rural connectivity, to speak of, let alone paying for the infrastructure of the bridges that were brought up in this House, the one just outside of Quesnel and also the Taylor Bridge. Literally, I’ve seen a picture where someone is sticking their hand through the rust of steel girders that hold that bridge up.

Our roads are in disrepair. Our ERs are closing at random. We’ve now found out what government should have been spending money on: to protect people’s personal data. Some 28,000 employees of Interior Health have had their data breached, sold for a crummy thousand bucks.

[3:45 p.m.]

We now know, from listening to investigative journalism — the name of the program escapes me for a minute — that there have been fraudulent loans and also fraudulent income tax returns that have been placed. Government had an obligation to protect their data, and they did not. They failed that.

The Premier can spend a million bucks on his own personal budget, but where was the money to protect people’s personal data in the nightmare that is now going to happen as a result of that? These poor individuals will be looking at years to try and get their name and their credit back.

There is that old saying: “You can be penny-wise and dollar-foolish.” Well, I believe we should have been spending money on more important things. We could have been spending money on ensuring that we had education assistants for children that really need it. We could have been spending the money on ensuring that less portables were being put up and, actually, money going towards more new schools that desperately need to be built.

It’s fine for that side of the House. What they love to do is blame a government that doesn’t even exist anymore, that has long since disappeared now, yet they go back past eight years or longer and make up excuses. You know what? That side of the House has had eight years to get their act together.

When are they going to start taking accountability for their own mess-ups? When are they going to take accountability for saying: “You know what? Yep. We got it wrong, and we’re going to get it right.” We don’t hear that. We continually have finger-pointing: “It’s not me; it’s everybody else.” It has been almost an entire decade, for crying out loud. British Columbians deserve better than this.

The promises that were made…. The $1,000 health rebate. You know, it’s fine to promise the world when you need the vote. I would say to the people that are watching: don’t fall for it again. You fell for the $400 rent rebate, and then the red tape basically eliminated that for anybody that’s a renter. Then the $1,000 one. “Oops, we’re going to blame that on Trump.” The tariffs hadn’t even been implemented, and we’re already finding somebody else as a scapegoat on that one, yet there was no mention of it in the budget whatsoever.

In the few seconds that I have left, I want to say that British Columbians deserve better than they have seen over the last eight years. I get that we want to promise things, and we want to make life better for everyone, but more important than words, the actual action and plan mean something. What we’ve seen in eight years are failed budget after failed budget that have increased the debt.

As government has grown by 40 percent, it’s not like we’re getting 40 percent better service. We’re seeing ERs closed down. The vital things that you should be counting on are falling apart. Our health care system is falling apart. The forestry sector is falling apart. The agricultural sector is in trouble. Our roads are in trouble. This budget is in trouble. I wish I could stand here and applaud government. Based on the track record, I cannot.

Tony Luck: Thank you to my colleague for stepping in at a moment. Thank you very much, fellow member, for stepping in for me.

I rise in this House today, not only as an elected member for Fraser-Nicola in British Columbia, but as a father, a grandfather and a proud British Columbian who cannot and will not be silent any longer while this government drives this province into economic ruin, uncertainty and fiscal irresponsibility.

[3:50 p.m.]

This is not the kind of speech I ever wanted to have to give. I had hoped that in my first full year in Legislature, I could be talking about progress, about rebuilding Lytton, improving health care in Merritt and Logan Lake, strengthening local infrastructure and delivering real outcomes for the families I was elected to represent.

But instead, I stand here today responding to Bill 5, the Budget Measures Implementation Act — a bill that, quite frankly, says everything about this government’s priorities and very little about the people of Fraser-Nicola and British Columbia.

This bill isn’t a blueprint of recovery. It’s not even a roadmap of stability. It is a political shield for a government that has maxed out its credit, exhausted public trust and is now trying to spend its way out of accountability. It’s a fiscal document so bloated and so disconnected from the everyday realities of rural communities like mine that it reads like a wish list of ministries, not a budget for British Columbians.

I say this not out of partisanship but only out of duty. But I cannot walk the streets of Merritt or attend a community meeting in Lillooet or visit a farm in the Nicola Valley and pretend that everything in this province is heading in the right direction. British Columbians are paying more, getting less and wondering how long they can keep holding on. Families are falling behind. Communities are being left behind. Meanwhile, this government keeps moving forward with its press releases, its talking points and its misplaced priorities.

Let me tell you something. People in Fraser-Nicola are not asking for special treatment. They are asking for basic special needs. They are asking for basic respect, for functioning hospitals, for a rebuilt Lytton, for tax dollars that go towards tangible assets and results, not campaign-style spending. The budget doesn’t offer them that, and Bill 5 codifies that failure into law.

Fraser-Nicola is one of the most geographically diverse and economically vital regions in the province. From the resource-rich terrains of the Interior to the rich agricultural valleys of the Fraser Valley and Nicola rivers, this region feeds British Columbia, powers our economy and preserves the cultural traditions that make this province what it is today. We are home to dairy farms that supply the Lower Mainland and the rest of the province, to ranches that export beef across the continent and to forestry workers, those that are left still working, who for decades have kept the sawmills running and the province’s economy alive.

Yet we are nowhere to be found in this government’s priorities. Merritt has recently lost five of its six mills over the last decade. Hundreds of workers have been displaced. Families have been forced to leave regions in search of opportunities. And what support has come from Victoria? Not targeted forestry reform, that’s for sure. Not workforce transition plans. Just silence.

Meanwhile, Lytton lies in ruins. Nearly four years after it was burned to the ground, families are still living in temporary accommodations, and Indigenous communities are still waiting on funding. Promises have been made, announcements have been staged, but when it comes to results, there is nothing.

This government loves to talk about reconciliation, but wouldn’t rebuilding a town where multiple First Nations were displaced…? Wouldn’t that be a priority? That is not reconciliation. It’s public relations. And this bill offers nothing, absolutely nothing, for communities like Lytton. No specific rebuilding funding, no emergency infrastructure accelerations. Just another year of paperwork, bureaucracy and delays.

I want to be very clear. This isn’t just about what’s missing from the budget; it’s about what’s in it as well. At a time when small businesses are closing, hospitals are understaffed and infrastructure is falling apart, this government has made one thing a priority above all else: growing itself.

While families in Fraser-Nicola and around the province tighten their belts, the government has opened its wallet to itself. In fact, under this government, the ratio of new government hires compared to private sector jobs is deeply alarming. For every new position created in the private sector, this government has added multiple new government roles, expanding ministries, communication departments and layers of bureaucracy, while the real job creators — the forestry operators, tradespeople, builders, entrepreneurs — face more red tape, more costs and more delays.

[3:55 p.m.]

Let’s call it what it is. This is not a jobs plan; it’s a government plan, and the consequences are real to those living around the province. Inflation goes up, wages get distorted, and small businesses struggle to compete with public salaries and benefit packages paid for by taxpayers who are already falling behind. We cannot have a healthy economy when the only sector that is expanding is the one that spends, not processes.

Yet this government continues to treat private enterprise as an afterthought while growing its own ranks faster than ever before. British Columbians are spending more on food, fuel and housing than ever before.

In Fraser-Nicola, we have families working two or three jobs just to cover the basics. We have seniors who are skipping meals to afford prescriptions. We have young people giving up on the dream of home ownership here in the province. Recently my wife and I have had two of our children move to Alberta for better opportunities for them there.

Bill 5 does not address these issues. It makes them worse. There is no tax relief in this budget. There is no affordability plan in this budget. There is no meaningful response to the skyrocketing cost of groceries, energy or transportation. Instead, this government is doubling down on the very policies that got us here: overregulation, overtaxation and definitely overspending.

They talk about supporting families, yet over 100,000 people are now relying on food banks every single month in this province. One in three of them is a child. Many of them are working, and still they can’t make ends meet. We live in a province of abundance, and yet our people are struggling to eat. How can that be? How is that even acceptable in this province? This budget may mention affordability, but it doesn’t live it — not in the tax policy, not in its spending and not in its priorities.

If you want to understand why this budget is fundamentally out of touch, you don’t need to read through the fine print of Bill 5. You just need to visit any emergency room in Fraser-Nicola, in Lillooet, if you can find one open. In the last year alone, the people of Merritt, Lillooet, Ashcroft and Logan Lake have all faced hospital closures, emergency room shutdowns and ambulance shortages. We’ve had residents forced to drive over two hours for care. Would you like to do a two-hour drive in the dead of winter to get emergency health care? We’ve had paramedics dispatched out of region, leaving entire communities without front-line medical support.

Then there’s a story that truly shocks us, a firefighter in Merritt suffering smoke inhalation and dehydration after responding to a major blaze only to discover the Nicola Valley Hospital ER was closed when he went for treatment. He was forced to drive to Kelowna. That’s a two-hour round trip for anybody going there. While he waited, so did the people of Merritt, without emergency responders, without paramedics and without a plan.

That is not just a breakdown in health care; it’s a failure of government. The NDP say they’ve allocated $15.5 billion to health care capital projects, but where is the accountability? Where are the outcomes? These projects have been announced and re-announced, and no progress on the ground.

The Surrey Hospital is still in planning. Rural hospitals — understaffed and underfunded. Family doctors — vanishing. Meanwhile, this government has created new administrative health agencies, hired more executive staff and layered on more bureaucracy, all while failing to deliver a single new functioning ER in rural B.C.

Health care is not a slogan; it’s a lifeline. And in Fraser-Nicola and the rest of British Columbia, that lifeline is framed by the day.

If you want a symbol of how this government treats rural B.C., just look no further than Lytton. In June of 2021, the community was engulfed by wildfire, and 90 percent of the village was destroyed. Two lives were lost. Nearly 1,000 were displaced, including many surrounding First Nations.

At the time, the Premier announced a swift rebuild. Millions were announced. Headlines were made. But here we are four years later, and Lytton is still in rubble. No homes, no grocery stores, no school, no community centre, not even running water for the community. We’re not talking about a temporary delay; we’re talking about a total abandonment of one of British Columbia’s historic towns.

[4:00 p.m.]

The cultural loss, the economic loss and the psychological loss are immense for the people that live there. The families who live there, families who pay taxes, vote and serve their province have been told in no uncertain terms: “You are not a priority.” Actions speak louder than words. We cannot call ourselves a just province when Lytton remains unrepaired, and this government cannot claim to represent all of British Columbians when they let an entire town vanish off the map.

Another issue close to home and close to my heart, because I live in the area of forestry, is forestry. Five of the six mills in Merritt have closed in recent years. That’s not just a statistic. That’s a reality if you live in Merritt and the surrounding area. That’s generations of family income wiped out. That’s schools losing enrolment. That’s grocery stores losing customers. That’s skilled workers, loggers, machine operators, mechanics packing up and leaving our community.

And what has this government done? They imposed more regulation. They’ve delayed tenure reform. They’ve offered vague transition funds that never arrive. And all that while they’ve kept rural mills at a competitive disadvantage to operations in other provinces. We are one of the most costly forestry operations in the country, if not in North America.

Forestry is not a sunset industry. It is a strategic asset. It can be sustainable. It can be competitive. But only if the government is prepared to work with the forest industry. Right now, they don’t. And the people of Fraser-Nicola are paying the price.

If you walk into a gas station in Ashcroft or a grocery store in Logan Lake, there’s a conversation you’ll hear over and over again. Break-ins are up. Vandalism is up. Petty theft is a daily occurrence. Business owners are installing extra cameras, reinforcing windows and even changing their hours to avoid nighttime crime.

It’s not just a property crime. It’s actual violence. It’s erratic behaviour. It’s addictions spilling out into public places: parks, sidewalks, school zones.

What does Bill 5 do about that? It expands the same failing harm reduction policy, expands government programs without accountability and increases funding to bureaucracies, but not to the front-line law enforcement, not to prosecutors, not to treatment programs with proven results.

Let me be clear. Rural communities are compassionate. We believe in recovery. We support mental health and addiction services, but what we are seeing right now is not a treatment model. It’s an open-door policy for lawlessness.

We need enforcement. We need the courts working. We need consequences. And we need real support for those struggling with addiction, not just more pilot programs and paperwork.

Let me shift gears for a bit and talk about the elephant in the room, and that is debt. It’s a four-letter word, if you haven’t noticed. This government is projecting at least $10.9 billion, but I’m going to guess it’s probably going to be upwards of $12 billion or $13 billion by the time this is over.

And that’s just the beginning. By 2027, they expect to run three more consecutive deficits, with taxpayer-supported debt ballooning from $97 billion to over $166 billion. That’s a 70 percent increase in just three years. I’m not sure how many families could do that in their lifestyles.

What does that mean for real people? Well, it means rising interest payments. Money that could have gone to schools, to clinics, to roads. Instead it goes to banks and investors.

Right now, British Columbians are paying over $400 million every month in interest payments. That’s one month’s interest. That’s not annually. That’s for just one month. That’s enough to repair the water systems in four Okanagan communities, enough to reopen multiple ERs and staff them, enough to kickstart the rebuild in Lytton.

Next year, that number gets even higher. Every time we add on more debt, the interest payments go up. This government calls that investment, but I call it what it is — intergenerational theft. I heard a quote once. I think I’ve used this before, but I think it’s very apropos: “Blessed are the children, for they shall inherit the national debt.”

[4:05 p.m.]

Is this the legacy we want to leave our children? It’s not the legacy that I was elected to. I ran on a platform of doing this for my children, my grandchildren, our children and our grandchildren. This is not the legacy that I signed up for. When my grandchildren ask me what I did in this House, what I stood for, I want to be able to say I fought for their future. I think everyone in this House wants to do that. But sooner or later, the rubber has to hit the road and we have to make some tough choices as we move forward.

This government is mortgaging the future of today’s children, and they are borrowing in our children’s names so they can make announcements now and leave someone else to clean it up later. They continue to kick the can down the road. This is not sustainable, it is not reasonable, and quite frankly, it’s not even moral.

We’re told to believe that these choices are necessary, but the truth is that this is not about need. It’s about lack of discipline, lack of foresight, lack of leadership and a lack of a real, hard plan of how we’re going to deal with this as we move forward. The job of government is not just to manage the present, it is to protect the future, and this government has failed in the most basic duty of protecting the future. We cannot continue to kick the can down the road.

We’re not facing a fiscal challenge. We are facing a credibility challenge. Because while this government says one thing, their actions — or their inactions — say something entirely different. They speak about affordability, but they have created the most unaffordable province in Canada — highest housing prices, highest jurisdiction to do business in, highest taxes.

They speak about infrastructure, but they’ve overseen historic delays on even the most critical projects. Take the George Massey Tunnel replacement, for example. First promised more than a decade ago, this project has gone through more reboots than a Hollywood movie franchise.

Yet this government had the audacity to include it in their capital plans again this year, as though we wouldn’t notice that the shovels still haven’t hit the ground. Had they planned properly when they were first elected, the bridge that had been planned by a former government would be in and operating for the last three years.

And what’s worse, they’re borrowing to do it. Let’s be clear. This budget projects a $14 billion deficit, if we include the full impact of contingencies, funds, shortfalls and structural weaknesses. This is the largest deficit in British Columbia’s history, ever.

And yet many of the capital projects that are in the budget — the tunnel, the hospital in Surrey, the promised rebuild of Lytton — haven’t even started. The money has been announced, but the work hasn’t begun. So where is it all going?

Well, here’s one place it’s going: the film industry. Now, don’t get us wrong. We fully support the film industry and everything, but why is it the only one that got tax credits or tax breaks this year? This government has increased tax credits for the high-budget film productions, projects that often come from out of province, rely on temporary labour and provide little long-term economic return in rural British Columbia.

Now, I support the creative sector. But how can this government justify increasing credits for multi-million-dollar productions while doing nothing for rural communities watching their economies collapse? Where is the equivalent support for the towns losing their sawmills or losing their mines? Where is the tax relief for ranchers feeding this province? Where is the direct investment for local infrastructure that will actually help rural B.C. survive and grow in the future?

I can tell you where it’s not. Lillooet is struggling to find the $100 million in money to fix their infrastructure. They’ve actually had to start turning away developments because they cannot afford to fix their infrastructure. Can you imagine a municipality, a small town of 2,000 people, trying to fix infrastructure worth $100 million?

But they’re one story of many out there. Merritt needs more than $125 million to replace the failing sewer, water and transportation systems. The Osoyoos community’s water systems require $80 million in upgrades to ensure long-term reliability and safety. These are not luxuries. These are essential investments in public health and economic resilience that will help build our community and have the future for our children. But yet, nothing in this budget.

[4:10 p.m.]

I have often met families — as a realtor — who are what we call “house-rich and cash-poor.“ On paper, they had assets, but when it came to paying bills, putting food on the tables or saving for the future, there just wasn’t anything left. That is exactly what British Columbia is today. We are asset-rich, resource-rich, but we are jobs- and cash-poor. We have timber; we have the minerals; we have the land, the water, and the talent. What we don’t have is a government willing to unleash our economic potential responsibly.

We are sitting on wealth but squandering opportunities, the opportunities that can provide the income that we need to fulfil our social contract and be able to provide the money that we need to keep our ERs open, to keep our schools open, to provide the employment in the schools that we need to look after our children. Not only are we failing our children with debt; we are failing our students and children in the school system as well.

Instead of creating sustainable growth, this government keeps doubling down on its central planning approach, picking winners and losers from Victoria, handing out cheques to politically favoured sectors while letting rural communities collapse under the weight of regulatory dysfunction. That is not economic development. That is economic distortion.

It gets worse. Because we’re not even allowed to see how these decisions are being made, this government has become known as the most secretive administration in Canada, full stop. We have no disclosure about the $400,000 consultant hired to assess our broken health care system. No terms of reference, totally inappropriate. No timelines, no performance indicators, just another mid-six-figure contract dropped behind closed doors while patients sit waiting in waiting rooms for over nine hours, the highest waiting times ever in history in the province of British Columbia.

We still don’t know the severance payout given to the recent released CEO of Coastal Health, a CEO who, by the way, was presiding over a system where emergency room closures were becoming routine, not rare. This is not transparency. This is not accountability. This is government by press release and governance by omission.

British Columbians are seeing through it. They’re asking: is this government even trying to balance the books? It doesn’t seem so. Is there any plan to reduce the deficit sometime in the future? Maybe they picked up the same mantra as they did from somebody else in this country that said they’ll balance themselves. I don’t believe that for a moment. I don’t think anybody here believes that.

Any willingness to confront the spending addiction that’s taken hold in this government? I don’t know. Or are we simply kicking the can down the road, leaving the mess for our kids to clean up, while politicians today cut more ribbons, stage more announcements? That’s the question. Is this a government that will tackle our debt, or is it content to pass it on?

Right now we’re not just spending recklessly; we’re even hiding it. We don’t even know where it all is. That’s got to change. We need accountability. We’re failing to be honest with the people of this province about the scale of the problem, the depth of the deficit, the reality of what this will mean for future generations.

The people of Fraser-Nicola and of British Columbia are practical. They balance their budgets, they invest wisely, they take pride in what they build, and they don’t expect others to foot the bill for their mistakes. They expect the same from their government. What they see in Bill 5 is a government that no longer feels accountable, not to the numbers, not to the people and certainly not to the future.

We need to reverse course. We need to return to discipline, transparency, results-focused governance, not more announcements, not more balance — a real plan, a real strategy and real leadership. The people on this side of the House are prepared to work with this government to do that. We’re struggling to endorse this bill. We will not be endorsing this bill, I don’t believe, because there are just too many things in it that aren’t right.

This isn’t just a debate about numbers on a spreadsheet. This is a debate about values — values of our people in our province, the value of this government — and about who we serve, who we listen to and who we fight for when times are tough.

Let me be absolutely clear. The people of B.C. are worth fighting for. The hardest thing we saw in the last number of months is how many people have fled this country. One in two young people want to leave this province because they don’t see a hope. They don’t see a future in this province.

[4:15 p.m.]

They don’t want to be a part of the debt redistribution. They don’t want to have to pay the price that people here who haven’t wanted to be accountable are leaving for them.

The people here are not looking for perfection. They’re not asking for handouts. What they are asking for, though, and what they have every right to expect, is a government that sees them, respects them and actually delivers to them. That’s not what Bill 5 does.

Bill 5 grows government but shrinks opportunities. It borrows against the future but fails to build in the present. It makes headlines but leaves communities like Lytton in ruins and hospitals in Merritt in crisis. Above all, it does not reflect values or priorities of people in British Columbia, especially rural British Columbia.

This government says it supports families, but food bank use has skyrocketed. It says it supports health care, but ERs are closing weekly. It says it supports Indigenous reconciliation but can’t rebuild a community it promised to help four years ago. What it does support is itself. It supports its communications budget. It supports its consulting contracts. It supports its own expansion while leaving everyone else behind.

But this province wasn’t built by bureaucracy. It was built by the people, the hard-working people, by loggers and ranchers and farmers and miners and tradespeople and first responders and Indigenous leaders and immigrants, immigrant entrepreneurs — the people who rise every morning to keep this province moving, not with headlines but with hard work.

They deserve better. They deserve a government that delivers functioning health care systems, not just photo ops. They deserve to drive on safe roads, not navigate around potholes and detours. They deserve a school system that prepares their kids for the future, not one burdened by bloat and underperformance. And they deserve fiscal leadership that puts their needs before the political survival of a tired government.

We in this House are called not just to govern but to steward, to protect the public trust, to strengthen this province for the next generation, not just survive the next election. And on that measure, this government has failed badly.

But hope is not lost. Change is possible. Real leadership is within reach. And the people of this province are ready to do it. We’re ready to do it on this side of the House. The people of British Columbia are ready for a government that treats taxpayer dollars like it treats its own household budget. I dare to say that anybody on that side of the House would do the same to their household budget that they do sitting in this chamber.

They want to see a government that uses discipline, purpose and care. They are ready for a government that prioritizes patients and care over bureaucracy; that restores safety to our streets; that invests in outcomes, not slogans. And that is exactly what I will continue to fight for on this side of the House.

To the people of British Columbia: thank you for your trust, thank you for your resilience, and thank you for reminding me every day why this work matters. I will continue to be your voice in this chamber, loud and clear and unwavering. Let us reject this budget, let us reject this broken approach, and let us build a province where results matter more than rhetoric, where the people come first and where leadership finally returns to this Legislature.

Deputy Speaker: Members, the Chair has been carefully listening to debate on Bill 5, and the debate seems to increasingly resemble budget debate. That debate is no longer before the House, and members are reminded to focus their remarks on the contents of Bill 5, which in large part is focused on taxation measures.

Sheldon Clare: I rise to respond to the Budget Measures Implementation Act. I want to discuss some of the specific provisions in the act through the lens of the people who elected me — good people, hard-working people in the central Interior of this great province, people who understand the discipline of budgeting, of raising revenue, of dealing responsibly with their debts and their obligations.

My constituents, in many cases, are facing tremendous uncertainty, tremendous uncertainty resulting from punitive duties on softwood lumber — duties that have taken their toll on our forest industry, duties that have been resulting in the closure of one mill after another over the course of several years.

[4:20 p.m.]

These duties are an existential threat to the livelihoods of my constituents, and this government has grown long in tooth through three successive mandates without restoring the softwood lumber agreement that protected my constituents, their livelihoods and those vulnerable mills. Add to this delays in permitting, and our resource sector being in trouble. Since 2017, forest cutting permits have dropped considerably. These represent problems that that this budget fails to address.

I begin today by addressing one of the principal and most glaring elements of the Budget Measures Implementation Act, 2025: namely, the amendment to the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act to include the 2027-to-2028 fiscal year in the period of fiscal years that may contain a deficit in the main estimates.

I think we know what it means to engage in deficit spending. You cannot keep spending more than you have and expect that one day you’re going to have the miracle of making money and being able to save money and being able to put it away. That is not how people live their lives. That’s not how they balance their chequebooks. That’s not how budgeting works.

The entire point of the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act is to mandate that government live within its means, that budgets be balanced and that ministers be held accountable. This amendment essentially guts the act of its intended purpose by enabling this government to run up red ink by the billions until the end of the 2027-2028 fiscal year.

Now, the NDP inherited a budget that was in surplus when they took office, with a revenue of $52 billion against expenditures of slightly less than $52 billion and total provincial debt just shy of $65 billion. At that time, there were just over 34,000 full-time equivalent employees on the provincial payroll.

Fast forward to the recent announcements, and this Finance Minister is forecasting 48,000 full-time equivalent employees on the payroll. And yet, offices are being closed for front-line services in Quesnel, for example, for the Ministry of Transportation. It’s closed.

The NDP have added 14,000 people to provincial payrolls. Their hiring and generosity are notable when it comes to millions of dollars for new spin doctors, communications staff and bureaucrats of every size and description. The provincial payroll has expanded by 40 percent. What is needed is some attention to providing doctors, not spin doctors.

In G.R. Baker Memorial Hospital in Quesnel, the typical wait time is about 5½ hours. I know that because I spent 5½ hours in emergency waiting to see a doctor after triage. In the University Hospital of Northern British Columbia, it is typically 7½ hours, depending on triage, and I met people who had spent considerably longer there.

I seem to spend a few hours in hospital waiting rooms. I don’t know what it is. Maybe I’m getting clumsy as I gradually get older.

And yet, school districts across this province are announcing staffing reductions. Bus drivers for special needs students are facing pay cuts. Emergency rooms all over the province are routinely closed because of budget issues. This is certainly the case in Williams Lake.

Can anyone truly suggest that services in British Columbia are 40 percent better than they were when the NDP took office eight years ago? No, they cannot. This is why the amendment to the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act should truly begin by amending the title of the legislation. Really, it should be called the unbalanced budget and lack of ministerial accountability act.

Let’s compare the performance of this Premier and this government to that of his late predecessor when it comes to balancing the budget and being accountable as a minister.

Now, it is true that in the 2020-2021 budget year, the first year of COVID, we saw a deficit surpassing $5 billion. But in previous years, Premier Horgan delivered two successive surpluses and a modest deficit of some $321 million.

In the years that followed the massive COVID deficit, Premier Horgan and his Finance Minister, Selina Robinson, delivered two more surplus budgets, improving the financial position of the province by $2 billion.

[4:25 p.m.]

That’s when everything fell apart. It’s not coincidence that when the current Premier took office and demoted that Finance Minister, he inherited a fiscal framework that had provided the province’s treasury with $81 billion in revenue to cover $79 billion of expenditures. The total provincial debt, including capital expenditures, stood at $89 billion.

I should note here that Selina Robinson’s final forecast for our provincial debt in this current year was $134 billion. Her successor, Katrine Conroy, forecasted our debt this year would be $145 billion. Today the total debt — and I’m not talking about deficits; I’m talking about debt — forecast by the current Finance Minister clocks in at $156 billion, based on the farcical fudge-it budget projection of a record $9.3 billion deficit.

The bond-rating agencies that have downgraded the credit rating of this government not once but twice in recent days put no faith in this minister’s projection of $156 billion in total government debt. They expect it to be perhaps $4 billion higher than the forecast, so total debt north of $160 billion by the end of this fiscal year.

This is from a government that inherited total debt of less than $65 billion on taking office. In less than ten years, this government will have added over $100 billion to the burden of debt that our taxpayers are forced to bear, that they will hand to the younger generation and to generations yet to be born.

When I look my daughters in the eye and I tell them that I expect them to be able to afford a house one day, I want that to be the truth. And it’s not going to be the truth in a British Columbia that continues to engage in deficit spending.

If only this were the end of the story. If only we were not lamenting the sorry conversion of Selina Robinson’s $500 million surplus into this minister’s — by projection — $14.3 billion deficit. If only we weren’t discussing the addition of $100 billion of additional borrowing to the enormous government debt load of the province.

But the amendments to the unbalanced budget and lack of ministerial accountability act, contained in this legislation to facilitate this unseemly orgy of borrowing, cover even more disturbing developments in the fiscal framework. This Finance Minister forecast total debt of $156 billion at the end of this fiscal year on new borrowing just shy of $10 billion. The bond-rating agencies are telling us that debt will surpass $160 billion by year-end.

Let’s look at this Finance Minister’s forecast for next year and the year after that. If the minister is to be believed — and the bond rating agencies say that probably wouldn’t be a good idea — the total debt of the government will rise to just shy of $184 billion next fiscal year and just shy of $209 billion at the conclusion of this government’s mandate.

The minister expects to run a deficit of $10 billion in the year ending March 2028, on a revenue of $88 billion and spending of $98 billion, after running a successive deficit of $14 billion, according to the bond agencies, and another one of $10 billion, according to her own forecast. But here’s the problem: this astronomical debt load does not account for the government’s decision to eliminate the consumer carbon tax.

The entire forecast — the revenue forecast, the deficit forecast, the debt forecast, everything — has gone out the window. And this House, on behalf of the people — the taxpayers, the pensioners, the loggers, the miners, the school teachers, the nurses of this province, the working people of British Columbia…. None of us have any idea, based on this budget, on these budget measures, of just how big these deficits are actually going to be in coming years.

Now, sometimes the opposition is faulted for being a little harsh, for being judgmental. I think that we try to be curious, not judgmental. We try to ask questions. We try to get information. And then we can make an informed debate and an informed opinion.

We’re not failing to show empathy or charity to those on the government bench. I think we understand the challenges that they face. We understand the difficult circumstances faced by this Minister of Finance. But let’s unpack the criticism and see if it applies here in these circumstances.

[4:30 p.m.]

In her final budget as Minister of Finance, Carole James forecast a surplus of $227 million for the 2020-2021 fiscal year. Her successor, Selina Robinson, delivered a deficit of over $5 billion. What happened? Well, COVID happened, but the very next year, instead of the deficit approaching $10 billion….

Deputy Speaker: Member, just a reminder to connect your remarks to Bill 5.

Sheldon Clare: Yes, thank you, Madam Speaker. I am definitely intending on doing that, but do indulge me.

Instead of the deficit approaching that $10 billion that Selina Robinson originally forecast, she instead delivered a surplus of over $700 million.

When we’re looking at this particular bill, and we’re trying to consider this past history, and we’re trying to consider the choices we’re making when we examine the clause-by-clause issues within this bill and how they affect ordinary working people, we have to consider the past so that we can make good projections into the future.

When Minister Robinson had forecast revenue of $68 billion for the year that she delivered that surplus, the economy recovered strongly, and the revenue came in at nearly $82 billion. And despite the unexpected surge in revenue following COVID, the NDP still found the way to spend most of it.

We suppose that the NDP’s tendency to want to spend every available dollar is enough of a problem. However, under this Premier and this Minister of Finance, we’re now spending more than every available dollar. We are instead spending every available dollar that this Premier, this Minister of Finance, can possibly borrow to the tune of at least $14 billion this year and $10 billion a year after that, assuming that the government can find some way to plug the additional hole created by the end of the consumer carbon tax.

I do have some condolences to express to the gentleman who normally sits slightly ahead and to the left of me here. I reflect sadly upon their predicament that they find themselves in. Our Green friends have literally had to sell their political souls to the Premier, marry themselves to the NDP and the original opponents of the carbon tax.

On their watch, the consumer carbon tax has now disappeared, and with it a chunk of that revenue needed by the government to honour its modest, some would say infinitesimally tiny, commitments to the Greens in exchange for keeping this government in place for nearly four more costly and destructive years, notwithstanding that they were able to vote with the opposition in a recent vote.

The budget provisions contained in this bill eliminate the sales tax exemption for used electric vehicles. Just as the government eliminates the carbon tax, it has become suddenly more expensive for a well-intentioned supporter of the Greens, or someone who is environmentally conscious, to even purchase a green vehicle.

The member for Kamloops Centre has shared with us the shenanigans surrounding this government’s taxation of used vehicles, how the insurance corporation essentially sees your vehicle as a worn-down junker in the event that it is totalled in an accident, and they have to reimburse you what they believe to be its market value.

But heaven forbid you narrowly escape catastrophe in that worn-out junker of a vehicle, you deftly manoeuvre around the oncoming tractor-trailer in the intersection, you make it to your meeting with a buyer, and you sell your vehicle — after getting there on the pothole-laden roads and crossing bridges with pieces of concrete falling off of them.

At that point, your worn-out junker is magically transformed into a vintage gem of a vehicle, a veritable collector’s item, a treasure on wheels, as it were, deserving of a far higher price than your buyer actually paid for it. The difference, of course, is in the provincial sales tax, which is due on the used vehicle — another taxation innovation pioneered by this revenue-hungry government.

Even in trading used vehicles to make ends meet, even in buying used electric vehicles to save the world from burning, it seems even our Green friends can’t catch a break. And now their friends across the aisle have eliminated that consumer carbon tax, a measure that they assured us was absolutely essential to prevent the world from burning. As the well-known philosopher Kermit the Frog keenly observed, it’s not easy being green.

I will move on to my conclusion, but when I gaze upon my friends to the left, I’m reminded of a cartoon I once saw where a man was inserting a $20 bill into a slot and above the slot was a simple sign. The sign read: “Gullibility test.”

[4:35 p.m.]

Perhaps this character served as a technical adviser to the Green team when they negotiated their agreement with the NDP, but I would pray that the day will never come when NDP members are dependent on my party for their very survival and when my party is giving a second’s consideration to keeping the NDP in power.

But were that the case, I think I would hold out for a better deal than the Greens obtained. On Salt Spring Island, people are living in tents and trailers, squatting illegally in conditions that no Green Party supporter would consider to be healthy or sanitary or good for the environment. But the Greens negotiated no funding to address this deplorable situation. And what about the state of health care on Salt Spring Island? I could go on and on.

There are other things that I think that these budget measures should have and would have and could have addressed. We look at the state of the health care in this province and the things that are affecting access to prescription pharmaceutical drugs. Right now, huge amounts of pharmaceutical drugs are incinerated every day. They are drugs that aren’t picked up. They are drugs that are not used, but since they have been labelled and named, they cannot be unpackaged and reissued. This is a tremendously wasteful practice that needs to be examined.

Now, many of these constituents have been failed in the simple tradecraft of the Greens not extorting money from a minority government or a better deal. And then, of course, you’ve got the problem of infrastructure and roads everywhere. Many of my previous speakers have addressed these, and I don’t want to belabour the point.

However, I will close with the absence of a critical budget measure, the Premier’s middle-class tax cut. As British Columbians struggle to make ends meet, I think of that nurse and construction worker making $90,000 and $70,000, renting a two-bedroom apartment in Terrace. The Premier, on October 9 last year, promised them $4,000 in tax relief between now and 2028. Or the three roommates renting a three-bedroom apartment in Vancouver. The Premier promised them $6,000 in tax relief between now and 2028. This is not ancient history I’m describing but the Premier’s own words just six months ago during the election campaign.

The Premier told us these short months ago: “It’s really tough out there for families who have been hit hard by the rising cost of everyday essentials like groceries. Under our plan, families will get more support, and you’ll get it right away. John Rustad would hand out tax breaks to billionaires and speculators while leaving you waiting for the help you need now.”

He went on to say: “I’m on the side of everyday people and families who just want to end the day a little further ahead than when they started it.”

Budgets are about choices. That’s what they essentially are — the same kinds of choices I make in managing my household, that my children make when they manage their expenses, when they come and call Dad and say: “Dad, I’m a little short, can you send me some money?” That’s the kind of thing a parent’s supposed to do.

When we vote upon the Budget Measures Implementation Act, we will really be voting on the broken promises implementation act, because the tax relief promised by this Premier just six months ago simply isn’t contained in the act.

We can only conclude from the actions of the Premier and the Minister of Finance that their actions do not measure up to their words so recently uttered and that the Premier does not, in fact, stand on the side of everyday ordinary working people and their families who just want to end the day a little further ahead than when they started it. They instead stand on the side opposite to these people, and, for that, I’m shocked. I can’t believe it, and they are truly deserving of shame.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you, Member. Just a reminder. We don’t use names in the House, and we are currently debating Bill 5, the Budget Measures Implementation Act.

Larry Neufeld: I rise with pride in this special place today as a representative of the hard-working, resilient people of Peace River South. I also rise in this special place as a business owner, as a father and as a very proud new grandfather.

[4:40 p.m.]

What I struggle to find pride in is Bill 5. The absence of some incredibly significant infrastructure projects in my riding, things like the Taylor Bridge, are clearly absent. The critical highway maintenance issues that we’re facing are critically absent, and there is no mention or funding for the twinning of the highway through the Peace River corridor. In addition to that, I would say the absence of incentives or support for small and medium businesses is glaring to me as well.

I would also like to take the opportunity to quote my esteemed colleague from Kamloops Centre: “This is a budget measures implementation bill with few tax changes, predominantly for the film industry. That’s about it.” That’s about it.

I’m going to depart from the practice of most of my colleagues who have previously risen to address the provisions of the Budget Measures Implementation Act and the subsequent amendments. We have heard from our Finance critic, the member for Kamloops Centre, about the many shortcomings of this act.

The member has discussed the sudden good fortune of the province’s digital media industry. No sooner does the former executive director of the Interactive and Digital Media Industry Association of British Columbia become our new Minister of Finance, then good things begin to happen for the industry.

Bill 5, in the words of the minister, “amends the Income Tax Act to increase the interactive digital media tax credit from 17.5 percent to 25 percent for eligible salaries and wages paid in British Columbia after August 31, 2025. The program is also made permanent to provide interactive digital media companies with certainty for long-term investment.”

I think we can all agree that the Interactive and Digital Media Industry Association of British Columbia made a very good long-term investment indeed when they hired the Minister of Finance for her short stint as their executive director.

In addition to the Digital Media Industry Association’s apparent excellence in the field of government relations and human resources recruiting, they make a vital contribution to British Columbia’s economy.

To quote the member for Victoria–Swan Lake: “B.C.’s vibrant creative sector, from film, television, music and publishing to interactive digital media, are not only the cultural cornerstones of our province but major economic drivers. That’s why our government has made the largest one-time investment in B.C.’s creative sector, a historic $42 million spread over three years to help the sector continue to grow and to thrive.”

In reflecting on this historic $42 million handout and the 43 percent boost in the digital media tax credit, from 17½ percent to 25 percent, it is clear that this government is playing the video game on an epic scale. Video game enthusiasts — well, admittedly, I’m not one. I am told that when they are engaging in gaming, from one gamer to another, especially when engaging in challenging team environments, they will sometimes acknowledge fellow gamers by saying something along the lines of: “That was clutch.”

I think we can all agree that in coming through for digital media the way that that she did, the Minister of Finance truly delivered a clutch performance. What’s unfortunate is where she is clutching that money from — from international bond traders, from Bay Street, from Wall Street, from anywhere there is money to borrow to finance industry handouts. The bond rating agencies know this, and this is why our province has suffered two successive bond downgrades since the minister delivered her budget.

We are now facing a record deficit, a deficit surpassing $14 billion, money that the minister will need to borrow as she makes her way toward a total debt of $209 billion by 2028. That’s according to her forecast, a forecast the bond raters believe is too optimistic to the tune of $4 billion in this year alone — a clutch performance indeed.

I’ll admit that I cannot match, or begin to match, the minister’s understanding of the digital media industry. My background is as an engineer in the petroleum industry. I’ve worked in the past as a reservoir engineer, spent decades in the oil patch in a number of roles and have been a professional engineer for probably longer than I choose to admit.

[4:45 p.m.]

My background in that profession causes me a great deal of concern when I look at the Budget Measures Implementation Act as it relates to the international reputation of our province and, specifically, the bond rating agencies like Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s.

In my analysis, it has been the practice of the government in recent years to overestimate their projected revenue from natural gas by a factor of 30 to 50 percent.

When I look through the appendix to the budget and fiscal plan, I see the forecast for natural gas royalties, after deductions and allowances, to be $576 million in the fiscal year just ended, a significant decrease from what was projected; $920 million this year; and $1.2 billion in the fiscal year ending 2027.

To put it simply, these forecasts require an enormous amount of optimism. You need to be optimistic that we will be able to ship more gas through the LNG Canada facility than is probably reasonable to expect. You also need to be more optimistic about the price for LNG in the months and years ahead. Finally, you need to expect that the Canadian dollar will rebound to nearly 72 cents in the 2027 fiscal year and north of 74 cents the year after in order to meet those budget projections.

The bond rating agencies, people from Moody’s and S&P, don’t run their forecasts on optimism and heroic assumptions, but I’m afraid that is exactly what we’re seeing from this Finance Minister and from this government. This NDP government compromised its own credibility — and, let’s face it, all of the forecasts in this budget — when they failed to account for the elimination of the consumer carbon tax.

It was more than six months ago, during the provincial election campaign, that the Premier committed to removing the consumer carbon tax if the federal government removed the federal backstop requiring one to be charged. It was back in mid-March that the current Prime Minister formally removed the federal backstop. Surely the Premier and the Finance Minister knew that this change was in the works.

Surely they possessed the expertise in the Ministry of Finance to produce credible projections for the province’s revenue and fiscal balance in the event that the carbon tax was removed. In fact, I don’t doubt that those projections exist and that they existed prior to the release of this budget document, yet this Legislature, this House, the media and the people all were denied access to the real numbers.

British Columbia deserves better than the game-playing and misdirection coming from this government. I submit that these budget projections are not accurate. I need look no further for proof of inaccuracy than in the news release issued by the NDP on the 9th of October last year, shortly before the last provincial election.

I refer, of course, to the Premier’s so-called middle-class tax cut proposal, which was to be contained in the budget. The provisions of this mythical tax cut were to have been contained in the bill before this House, the Budget Measures Implementation Act. The budget measures to be implemented in this act do not contain the B.C. NDP middle-class tax cut announced on September 29 of last year, little more than six months ago.

How can this tax cut not be included in this Budget Measures Implementation Act? The Premier himself, in the words of his own party, surrounded by hundreds of supporters in Surrey, announced he will deliver $1,000 in a tax cut for the average family every year, starting next year.

It logically follows that if the Premier announced a $1,000 tax cut every year starting next year — and that was last year — then this Budget Measures Implementation Act should include a $1,000 tax cut, but next year is now this year, and this is in fact his budget. Where is the tax cut?

[4:50 p.m.]

Let’s refer back to the Premier’s promise, given in writing and proudly set forth in front of those hundreds of grateful, happy supporters in Surrey. I’m going to read ahead just a little bit, and this time I am going to quote it:

“The Premier’s plan will exempt an additional $10,000 of individual income tax every year, providing a tax cut of $1,000 for households and over $500 for individual British Columbians.” It goes on to state: “In 2025, the Premier’s middle-class tax cut will be provided through a direct rebate so that people do not have to wait for the help that they need now.”

Let’s recap: not only did the Premier promise every household in B.C. a $1,000 tax cut, but he promised to do it by 2025, by way of a direct rebate, to spare us all of the necessity of waiting. The Premier was very clear. He said, and this is quoted:

“If we earn the trust of British Columbians in this election, we’ll make sure people don’t just get by; they get ahead.”

Given these earnest, sincere words of the Premier, uttered just a few months ago, I am, to say the least, shocked, dismayed, flabbergasted in fact, that the Budget Measures Implementation Act does not contain a single word about the Premier’s tax cut — the tax cut he promised so recently in Surrey, not just in writing, not just to voters, not just to British Columbians but to hundreds of his own cheering supporters.

I am not the only one who deserves to be disappointed. Consider the retired couple in the NDP’s election news release, each with income of $50,000 a year renting a one-bedroom apartment in Vernon. There was to be $4,000 in tax relief for that couple, between this budget and 2028.

It was to be this very bill that delivered the tax relief, starting with $1,000 right away, by way of this rebate, in the Premier’s own words, “to spare us all the necessity of waiting.” Despite the failure of this budget to deliver any tax relief of any kind, despite the cruel measure like jacking up the parking tax across Greater Vancouver, we seem to be sinking ever more deeply into debt.

At this point, I would like to reference something that was brought up earlier by one of my former colleagues, because it does quite concern me. As a business owner, I started my first business, literally, at a Costco plastic table, with a computer that was probably older than I was, and a lease on a pickup truck.

To this point in my life, I’ve never yet made a vehicle payment. I’ve only ever purchased what I could afford, and I’ve had $150 cars, I’ve had $300 cars, I’ve had $1,200 cars. The main reason I did that was because, in high school, I sat down and taught myself how compound interest worked, and it scared me. I have paid down my mortgages as rapidly as possible, in every situation that I’ve had in life, and compound interest scares me. This budget scares me.

I’ll get back to the written word. If only all of us, at one point or another, had had the kind of foresight of the people in the Digital Media Industry Association — who had the good sense to employ the Minister of Finance in a lucrative management position before she embarked upon her career in public life.

The Premier was very specific and very generous with his promises to that retired couple in Vernon, and he didn’t stop there. There was a multigenerational family with three adults renting a three-bedroom in Richmond. They were also supposed to be getting $4,000 starting now, starting with a rebate between now and 2028. Another multigenerational family living together, four eligible adults paying a large mortgage — they were promised $8,000.

Where is this budget measure? Where is the rebate? Where is the Premier’s empathy, which he had absolutely no difficulty displaying before his cheering crowd of supporters in Surrey just short days before election?

[4:55 p.m.]

The Premier said: “It’s really tough out there for many families. Inflation and interest rates have driven up the cost of daily essentials. People need help now so that they can get ahead.” Quoted again: “Our tax cut for the middle class supports people now who are struggling with the high cost of groceries.”

Well, Premier, Finance Minister, members of the NDP caucus, here it is, six months later. People are still struggling with the high cost of groceries. As you have said, they need help now. I find it quite ironic, the words of the Premier last September.

He said: “The leader of the Conservative Party would make ordinary people wait 18 months to receive any support. That’s if you believe him at all. That’s if you believe him at all. That’s if you believe him at all.”

It gives me no pleasure to serve up such a heaping helping of irony to the Premier and supporters. Let’s pause and consider the cruelty of the Premier’s actions and the depth of the consequences to the people of this province.

Not only did he specifically promise specific amounts of badly needed cash to specific individuals living in Terrace, Duncan, Vernon, Richmond and Vancouver; he tallied up all the cash he would provide our hard-pressed seniors, our handicapped, our single parents — $4,000 here, $6,000 there, $8,000 for those four adults with a very large mortgage.

Not only did he promise a rebate, a rebate that was to be contained in this very Budget Measures Implementation Act that we are now debating; but he had the unmitigated gall to take our leader, the leader of the Conservatives, the Leader of the Official Opposition, to task for proposing responsible tax relief, for proposing well-planned tax relief, for proposing reasonable tax relief.

For proposing tax relief that he could actually deliver, the Premier mocked our leader. He questioned his honesty, he questioned his integrity, and he questioned his good faith. He said of our leader’s tax relief proposal: “That’s if you believe him at all.”

Well, here we are debating the Budget Measures Implementation Act. Where is the tax relief? Where is the rebate? Why should we believe you at all, Premier? Why should we believe you at all?

What did those people in Terrace, Duncan, Vernon and Richmond do to deserve what they received? The retired senior couple, to whom you promised an immediate rebate, to whom you promised $4,000; the multigenerational family; the three roommates; the nurse; the construction worker — what does the Interactive and Digital Media Industry Association of British Columbia have that they don’t have? I guess we know the answer. They have a Finance Minister, and the rest of us have an ocean of broken promises.

I have a few minutes remaining, so I did want to, again, talk a little bit more about my disappointment in the budget. Again, I grew up below the poverty line. I was the eldest son of a first-generational farm in Saskatchewan. Growing up below the poverty line, I became very adept at squeezing two nickels together to make a quarter, as we simply had no other alternative. Fiscal responsibility was a necessity of life in my world, and it continued to be that way right through university.

I talked earlier about teaching myself compound interest, and I have lived my life that way, both personally and professionally, throughout. The absence of what I’m seeing, as far as concrete results in this budget implementation act, is concerning to me. It’s concerning to me as a citizen, it’s concerning to me as a business owner, and it’s deeply, deeply concerning to me as a….

Deputy Speaker: Member, can I just ask you to bring your remarks back to Bill 5?

Larry Neufeld: Sorry, I thought I had. But yes, thank you.

[5:00 p.m.]

The absence of Bill 5 addressing those concerns is of deep concern to me, as a father, as a grandfather. We’ve heard of people leaving this province because of the lack of economic opportunity. As I mentioned, I’m a new grandfather, and Bill 5, to me, does not represent a future for my grandchild in this province.

As any of the remainder of us…. Perhaps some of us here do have grandchildren, others perhaps not. That’s how we want to live our lives. We want to be able to grow up around our children and our grandchildren. I believe that Bill 5 is a step in the wrong direction with respect to us being able to do so.

I think the very hard-working and very diligent people of this province honestly deserve better. I think fiscal responsibility is something that is absent from Bill 5, and I believe that our citizens deserve better. I know that they do. That’s something that I am looking very much forward to, an opportunity to bring to this very special place.

Bill 5, again, to me represents — not to be harsh — a lack of understanding of fiscal responsibility. That’s something that I would very much be interested in assisting with wherever possible. I think that is one opportunity where LNG, natural gas, can bring us a significant bump in revenue if it was focused on and if it was given the support from the government.

I think the next debate over the next bill — this one being Bill 5, but the next budget bill — I would suggest could very well have a different outcome were we to embrace and engage very strongly with the natural resources industry.

I think I’ll yield my time at this point, and I thank you very much.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you, Member.

I remind the member and all members of the importance of using careful, thoughtful language in debate. Standing Order 40(2) prohibits unparliamentary language, which includes imputation of motives.

Lynne Block: Before I begin, I would like to go back to a little bit of my roots. I’m looking at Bill 5, Budget Measures Implementation Act, so I thought I should define those terms very clearly before I begin.

Implementation, as defined, is more of the process of putting a decision or plan into effect. It’s basic execution. So that’s the process. The budget is an estimate of income and expenditure for a set period of time. So the implementation is of the budget. And the measures — several dictionary meanings, but the one I’m really drawn to is “a plan or course of action taken to achieve a particular purpose.” So I’m having struggles with Bill 5 because even the title is not clear and lacks decisiveness. I’d like to explain as I speak.

I do rise today on behalf of His Majesty’s Official Opposition in the B.C. Legislature and the people of West Vancouver–Capilano to voice strong opposition to Bill 5, the Budget Measures Implementation Act, 2025, and the NDP government’s Budget 2025 as a whole.

These budget measures, based and predicated on a faulty budget, are a profound disappointment, a package of promises that fall short in every major area. Instead of steering our province toward prosperity, these measures, based on a faulty budget, double down on some very costly mistakes: soaring deficits, unsustainable spending and a lack of transparent planning.

Stakeholders across British Columbia, from business groups to health care advocates, from educators to local leaders, have condemned this budget’s failures. Therefore, they’re condemning its implementation and the measures to move it forward.

[5:05 p.m.]

One such voice is the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, whose B.C. director, Carson Binda, called Budget 2025 “an outright disaster for families and businesses,” warning it will “nearly double the province’s overall total debt in three years.”

Even the typically measured Business Council of B.C. has expressed grave concern about the ongoing deterioration in B.C.’s public finances and the absence of a credible path to restore physical sustainability. That’s why I oppose Bill 5.

Bill 5 seeks to implement this flawed budget, but no amount of legislative fine print can paper over its contradictions and shortcomings. In fact, Bill 5 even amends the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act to extend the period in which deficits are allowed, effectively giving this government a licence to continue its spending binge with impunity. That’s why I’m against Bill 5.

The Finance Minister asked us to approve billions in new spending while pushing balanced budgets off into the future. This is not just fiscally reckless; it’s a betrayal of the trust of British Columbians. My constituents, our constituents, expect prudent management, honest accounting and tangible results.

What tangible results? Well, definitely better health care, definitely quality education and definitely affordable housing. Accessible child care, sensible taxation — and I do emphasize sensible taxation — responsible spending, transparent governance and a thriving resource sector. On each of these counts, the flawed Budget 2025 fails to deliver. Therefore, the consequences are that the measures should not and cannot be implemented.

Allow me to address these areas in turn and to contrast the NDP’s failures with the commonsense alternatives a B.C. Conservative government under leader John Rustad would offer. Our vision is one of fiscal responsibility, transparency and competence — a vision sorely missing here — and a plan that we can build on the basis, which is strong. Therefore, then we can move forward with implementing appropriate measures that build this province.

As I proceed, I will draw on voices of British Columbians — small business owners, health care workers, educators, taxpayers and community leaders who have spoken out. Their words underscore an undeniable fact: this budget and its subsequent implementation measures are not what B.C. needs, so any measures implemented on a shaky foundation are not prudent.

Today’s budget measures are sobering, not my words but those of Fiona Famulak, CEO of the B.C. Chamber of Commerce, who says: “It does not deliver the economic incentives, tax changes, programs or policy shifts required to kick-start our economy.” And that was looking over at a lot of possible or potential tax cuts. And when we look at it really deep, there’s very little, and they’re not very good.

Health care promises are a cornerstone of any budget, and the government would like to boast that this budget adds roughly $4.2 billion over three years to health care. On paper, that sounds terrific. It sounds very generous, and it is. But in reality, throwing money at a broken system is not delivering results for patients. After years of NDP governance, our health care system is at a breaking point. ERs are intermittently closing, surgical wait-lists are growing and British Columbians are struggling to find family doctors.

That’s not the way. That’s not a good measure, moving forward, for this government.

The government also made bold campaign promises to expand health care infrastructure, promises that have been shelved in this budget. We can’t implement any promises that were made before, because they’re not in this budget.

[5:10 p.m.]

What were those promises? The Premier himself pledged new hospital towers in Nanaimo and Langley and a cardiac catheterization lab on Vancouver Island. Yet patient advocates now find those promises conspicuously absent.

“I’m feeling a little bit disappointed and a little bit deflated,” says Donna Hais, chair of the Fair Care Alliance on Vancouver Island. After decades of neglect in her region, she expected this budget to finally fund a new cardiac unit and hospital tower, but as she laments: “There should have been funding announced for our cath lab and our tower.” And where is that funding coming from? Taxes.

It is not only infrastructure; front-line staffing and service delivery are also missing from this government’s equation. These measures may devote money to capital projects, but what about ensuring those new buildings are staffed by doctors and nurses?

Adriane Gear, president of the B.C. Nurses Union, warns that while investing in hospitals is important, “more money needs to be set aside for things like staffing shortages.” But if you add more taxes to the people who are staffing, it’s a vicious circle. It’s not going to work.

She asks a pointed question of this government’s plan: “I’m not sure where we’re going to get the nurses from. It’s not clear how many net new beds there will be, not clear how many more nurses will be needed.” A very difficult plan to follow, because there’s no plan.

Ms. Gear adds that she would have liked to have seen some operational investments as opposed to just investments in infrastructure, noting that no targeted funding was provided to deal with emergency room closures that have plagued many communities. In other words, the NDP budget and, therefore, the following measures expand buildings but not the capacity to care for patients inside those buildings.

The contradictions and missed priorities in health funding have real consequences. Recall that just last year the government touted a new payment model to attract family doctors. Yet today we still have nearly one million British Columbians without a family physician.

Wait times for surgeries and diagnostics have worsened under this government. An estimated 3,365 patients died in recent years while waiting for procedures or tests.

Emergency room shutdowns have become routine in some regional health areas. It is literally every weekend now — totally unacceptable. This is life and death. Yet Budget 2025 and the subsequent measures offer no bold health reforms, only status quo spending that fails to address the systemic crisis. British Columbians expect better management, not just bigger budgets.

The Conservative Party of B.C. believes in innovation and efficiency in health care, doing things differently to get real results. Under the member for Nechako Lakes’ leadership, we have a plan to put patients first, a plan that we can implement and have a strong budget.

What does this mean? It means we will maintain a universal single-payer system while leveraging both public and non-government providers to deliver care, a plan that we will not accept that access to a waiting list is enough. We insist on timely access to actual treatment. This is what B.C. patients want and are not receiving from this failed NDP administration.

A B.C. Conservative government would implement proven solutions such as activity-based funding for hospitals, funding based on the number of patients treated and outcomes achieved rather than blank cheque block grants. This model, used successfully in Europe and even in Quebec, incentivizes providers to treat as many patients as possible and cut wait times. Again, a great plan with a budget that we could implement and change health care in B.C.

We would also immediately establish a patients-first wait time guarantee, ensuring that if the public system can’t provide timely care for certain critical procedures, patients can get that care through approved private clinics at the government’s expense.

Sometimes I think ideology stands in the way, and what happens is government has shut down urgent private care centres and banned independent clinics. I don’t think that’s a really good plan, because we care about outcomes, not politics.

[5:15 p.m.]

The result of the NDP’s rigid approach speaks for itself. “The system is controlled by ideology. The results speak for themselves,” to quote the Leader of the Official Opposition.

A Conservative Party of B.C. will embrace innovation to get British Columbians off wait-lists and into treatment by building the bricks-and-mortar facilities this NDP government has failed to. We will train, recruit and fairly compensate health care staff but also free them from bureaucratic choke points so they can do their jobs.

In short, we will spend smarter, not just more, to fix health care. Bill 5 and its measures does none of this. It caters to bureaucrats and insiders.

As an educator, I’d like to talk about education and why I am opposed to Bill 5, the Budget Measures Implementation Act.

On education, this budget and its implementation measures again present a misleading picture. The government claims it will spend an extra $370 million over three years in K-to-12 education for hiring teachers and supporting inclusive education needs. No one will argue against more support for students with special needs or more classroom resources than myself.

However, funding inputs mean little when our education outcomes are falling and our classrooms are bursting at the seams. Under this government, student performance has declined. British Columbia, once a leader in math, literacy and also science, has declined. Shockingly, we have lowered our standards even further, eliminating letter grades, cancelling provisional exams and weakening accountability in the school system.

That brings me back to Bill 5: accountability. Where on earth are the measures for the implementation? And that’s what we need — measures in this. That’s another reason why I’m against Bill 5.

Parents, because of what’s happened in education, are now kept in the dark about their children’s progress, as report cards come home with the most confusing descriptors instead of the clear letter grades we’ve had for generations. Why is the government afraid of letting parents know how their kids are really doing in school? The parents are confused, and sometimes the teachers are too.

None of these changes, removing grades and exams, improves educational quality. They only serve to obscure underperformance. Meanwhile many schools, especially in fast-growing communities, are literally overflowing.

Nowhere is that more evident in Surrey, our province’s largest school district. According to the Surrey mayor, she states she has been left unimpressed by the budgets and the subsequent implementation of those measures — neglect of her city. She points out that despite Surrey’s rapid population growth, no new school projects were announced for the city, leaving her community — how she felt — overlooked again. The consequences are dire: 400 more portables, forcing thousands of children to learn in cramped temporary spaces.

Surrey school district faces a $16 million budget shortfall this year, even after deep cuts. And now they are cutting out bus drivers, and people in Surrey to do those, to manage their budget shortfall. Again, those are taxpayers who have to pay more taxes.

We have a severe shortage of teachers. This budget and the subsequent Bill 5 to put measures to implement a comprehensive strategy to recruit and retain teachers to provide schools…. It’s not happening.

Even the BCTF president Clint Johnston, reacting to the budget, states: “Now more than ever, we need the government to support teachers so we can support kids. They shouldn’t have to feel the impact of an international trade war. The government needs to deliver on their promises and commitments to B.C.’s teachers and their students.”

He’s referencing that even amidst economic uncertainty like the U.S. tariffs crisis, we cannot shortchange our children’s education, and that’s what we are doing. Yet promises to fully fund education and reduce class sizes have not been met.

[5:20 p.m.]

Instead of proactive investment, proactive development, proactive measures, proactive implementations, the Ministry of Education seems content to watch school boards grapple with budget shortfalls year after year. This is unacceptable.

Education, to our party, is about excellence and opportunity. We believe in setting high standards and giving parents and students the tools to meet and exceed those high standards. As a teacher, I’m looking at Bill 5, and it’s not even meeting the standards set out or the measures or the budget. I’d like to see this Bill 5 not only meet the expectations but exceed them. And they’re not even meeting the expectations.

I would like to also look at the infrastructure deficit in education, because all these deficits are accumulating. We don’t have any plan that I could see except a few little tax cuts here, which…. I’ll come very specifically to the tax hikes, but I would like to see a plan for the capital funding so that we can build on a solid foundation here.

The budget is not a solid foundation. That’s the issue. That’s the problem. It’s like building a school on a shaky foundation. It’s not going to last. It’s not strong. It’s not going to be safe. We have a very shaky foundation with the budget. So to apply budget measures implementation to that is a shaky foundation from the start.

I’m just going to keep going because I’ve got a few more things I want to talk about.

Housing. Talking about housing — shaky foundations. Housing affordability remains the single greatest economic and social challenge for many B.C.’ers. We are in a housing crisis — that’s for sure — and a home ownership crisis, a rental crisis and a homelessness crisis all at once.

How does the shaky Budget 2025 respond? Well, not very well — complacency, half-measures. Even housing industry observers note that there are “no new significant announcements” in this budget for housing. It merely “builds on existing programs,”

How are we going to do anything with the affordability crisis and the housing crisis when we have a shaky foundation to start with? And how can we say yes to Bill 5 to implement measures that are based on, again, a very weak, a very poor, not-well-structured Bill 5?

The budget adds a modest $318 million over three years to the BC Builds program, a program that, to date, has yielded only a handful of projects. The government’s own documents indicate BC Builds will have just 1,400 rental units for middle-income families underway by 2025-26 — 1,400 units provincewide when we are short tens of thousands of homes. Now, with this implementation, the government wants to tax these middle-income people who are struggling to find a house to rent or a place to live.

So even with these taxes, housing prices and rents remain near record highs, and supply remains woefully inadequate. We all recall the lofty promises of the NDP’s 2017 and 2020 campaigns: tens of thousands of affordable housing units to be built. But very few have materialized. Again, shaky budget, poor planning, and it has very serious consequences moving forward.

What did the province try and do? It has increasingly tried to micromanage municipal zoning, to bully local councils who had spent years with their local plans for growth that was in fitting and befitting their local communities.

But we see a defensive posture in this budget. The government’s focus is on the U.S. trade tariffs and protecting the economy, while housing has been deprioritized. Perhaps they think their job is done after introducing initiatives like the homebuyer relief, speculation taxes and rental supplements in previous budgets.

[5:25 p.m.]

But ask any young family or senior renter in B.C. The housing crisis is not solved. And what Bill 5 doesn’t do is address this issue, along with the education and health care.

Local leaders are still not satisfied. Mayors of cities like Surrey, Victoria, Kelowna and Prince George have similarly pointed out the need for provincial partnership in housing infrastructure, and that would be something that would be really valuable to do, and maybe a part of the original budget so that the implementation measures could be strong and fruitful.

The Union of B.C. Municipalities acknowledged that Budget 2025 includes “incremental new spending for local government priorities, including homelessness response, addiction treatment, street disorder and affordable housing.”

Yes, there is some funding for supportive houses and to address encampments, but it also diplomatically notes that longer-term challenges lay ahead, however, with a growing debt. So we’re not going to get as much money from these taxes to address all the issues that were in the budget to start with.

I’m going to skip a few pages because I’ve got to get to a couple of others, and I see my time is running out. I could talk for a lot longer, though, if you want.

Our party of British Columbia recognizes that housing connects to other sectors: transportation — for new housing develops to succeed, we need transit and roads; training — we need skilled trades workers to build homes; and immigration — welcoming newcomers means we must plan for their housing, as well as their health care, as well as their education.

Well, child care is another issue that is not addressed in Bill 5. I won’t go into that, because in the estimates, it was very, very clear that we do not have enough $10-a-day child care at all. We really don’t. As much as the money is there from the federal government, it’s not happening. You can go through the estimates, but the reality is these people who desperately need $10-a-day care are not going to have that. They’re still paying high taxes, and now you want to tax where they park. It’s just a revolving door, and they can’t get out of that revolving door.

The much-celebrated $10-a-day spots are like unicorns. A UBC study spent six months searching for low-income single mothers who actually obtained a $10-a-day space. Do you know how many they found, on the whole? Seventeen — one seven. That’s it. Single mothers. So the tax cuts we’re giving here are not going to help them.

I would like to keep going. I know I’ve got lots of pages.

I’d like to turn to the fiscal heart of this matter: taxes, spending, deficits and debt. It is here that Budget 2025 perhaps deserves the harshest critique, for this NDP Finance Minister is selling British Columbians a bill of goods that just doesn’t add up. This government loves to claim it’s helping people with affordability, yet it has systematically increased the cost burden on average families and job creators through higher taxes and fees. Bill 5 does not address that.

At the same time, it has presided over an explosion in spending, with no corresponding improvement in outcomes to show for it. The result? We are now staring at a record deficit of $10.9 billion this year and a staggering $31 billion in cumulative deficits over the next three years. And this Bill 5 does not address this.

If the province’s debt is set to balloon by over $75 billion in just a few years, nearly doubling our total debt and driving our debt-to-GDP ratio from about 23 percent up to 34 percent by 2027, these are not just numbers. These are our children. These are my grandchildren who will have to pay for this.

I’m going to leave the 202 pages left, because I just want to zero in on a couple more things.

[5:30 p.m.]

This legislation in Bill 5 introduces tax changes that raise further concerns. Tax hikes on used electric vehicles undermine EV adoption and affordability. That’s the first huge red flag.

[Lorne Doerkson in the chair.]

A tax cut for the film industry comes at a time when many British Columbians are struggling to make ends meet. That’s another red flag.

I was, for a while, in the film industry, and I’ve got friends who are still there. The reality is we already give a lot of tax cuts to the film industry. We do. Where the money is, is digital media, not in the film industry. So giving more tax cuts is not going to increase funding for this bill.

Then we want to go and increase taxes on Metro Vancouver parking…. Oh, my goodness. These residents come home; they want to get into their rental house, which they’re paying way too much money for, and they now have to pay for their parking outside. Because most of the people I’m meeting right now are struggling. Some of them are taking two or three jobs — Uber drivers at night. I don’t think that this legislation introduces tax changes that do anything for the common people, the people of B.C.

I would just like to finish up.

British Columbia is a terrific, wonderful province that my family…. We all immigrated here. It is being held back by poor governance. Bill 5 is emblematic of that. Let us reject this inadequate budget. We have to. It’s not on a solid foundation. So to predicate budget measures upon this is, again, trying to build on a very quicksand foundation. Let us reject these inadequate budget measures and work together, all parties, to implement a plan that truly meets the moment. The people of B.C. expect and deserve nothing less.

Bryan Tepper: Hon. members, today we stand to debate Bill 5, the Budget Measures Implementation Act, a piece of legislation that is meant to give life to the tax changes and fiscal priorities of this government’s budget.

But as we scrutinize this bill, we must ask: does it address the urgent needs of British Columbians? Does it provide a path forward for a province grappling with crises in affordability, health care, education and fiscal stability? Or does it, like so much of the government’s agenda, fall short, proving once again that the real downgrade in British Columbia is not just our credit rating, but the leadership of this Premier and this Finance Minister?

Let me begin with the context in which this bill was tabled. We learned that when the Minister of Finance presented the budget that underpins this act, she was already expecting not one but two credit downgrades. Two credit downgrades are not a minor inconvenience. They are a flashing red warning sign about the fiscal health of our province.

Let’s be clear about what this means for British Columbians. First, two credit downgrades mean that fixing our broken health care system just got more expensive. Hospitals are stretched to the breaking point. Wait times are ballooning, and rural communities are losing access to care. Borrowing to invest in health care will now cost us more because this government has mismanaged our finances.

Second, two credit downgrades mean that eliminating portable classrooms in schools, whether in Surrey, Chilliwack or Sooke, will be harder to achieve. Our kids deserve modern, safe learning environments, not temporary structures that signal neglect. But with higher borrowing costs, those portables are likely to stay.

[5:35 p.m.]

Third, and perhaps most alarmingly, two credit downgrades means that British Columbia’s deficit just got bigger. Moody’s, one of the agencies that downgraded our credit rating, now projects this government’s deficit to hit $14.3 billion — that’s billion with a “b” — and I would wager to guess that maybe it’s going to be larger than that. And what’s worse, neither Moody’s nor the other credit rating agency expects this government to balance the budget anytime soon. In fact, they’re already anticipating another downgrade.

This is a government spiralling into a fiscal mess of its own making. And yet, what does Bill 5 offer?

To address this crisis, let’s take a closer look at the measures in this legislation. This bill is how tax changes are implemented in British Columbia, and it reflects the priorities, or lack thereof, of this government.

One of the most baffling changes is a new tax hike on used electric vehicles. Yes, you heard that right. At a time when this government claims to champion climate action and encourage more people to drive electric vehicles, they’ve decided to make those vehicles more expensive to own. This isn’t a tax targeting Elon Musk’s Teslas. It applies to all used EVs, hitting middle-class families who are making the fiscal choice to buy used.

How does this square with their rhetoric? It doesn’t. It’s a contradiction that undermines their own stated goals. Not that I’m complaining. The middle class shouldn’t have been subsidizing Teslas or any other electric vehicles to people that would be purchasing the vehicles without the bloated subsidies anyway. And this Premier providing the subsidies to billionaires….

Now, to be fair, this bill does include one tax cut: a tax break to the film industry. On its face, this might seem like a positive step. British Columbia’s film industry is a vital part of our economy, and we support its success. Having met with the film industry in the past, I’ve seen the amount of investment they’ve made, hoping and waiting for these tax breaks to match the rest of the film industry around North America.

But the timing and context of this tax cut raises serious questions. For years, this government refused to act on this issue. So why now? Could it have something to do with the fact that the former head of DigiBC is now the Finance Minister? On the very same day that British Columbia received two credit downgrades, this minister decided to hand her former employer a $45 million tax break.

Meanwhile, British Columbians are struggling and $200 away from being able to pay their bills. This is not leadership. This is cronyism.

Deputy Speaker: Member, I just want…. Exercise some caution with respect to those personal attacks, please.

Bryan Tepper: All right.

But let’s be clear. These tax breaks to the film industry should....

Deputy Speaker: Excuse me, Member. Sorry.

Minister of Tourism.

Point of Order

Hon. Spencer Chandra Herbert: Point of order, hon. Speaker.

This member, that member, that member and that member have all launched personal attacks on the Finance Minister. They’ve been called out on it, and they keep doing it.

So I just wonder when they’re going to rewrite their scripts to stop making negative personal attacks, which are not truthful, and stop attacking people personally. It’s gross. It’s not how we do business here, and they need to learn this.

That’s my point of order. The rules are very clear about what you can and cannot say, and they’ve been breaking those rules.

[5:40 p.m.]

Deputy Speaker: Thank you very much, Minister of Tourism.

I would ask if the member would consider retracting those comments.

Bryan Tepper: I would withdraw and retract.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you.

Debate Continued

Bryan Tepper: So let’s be clear. These tax breaks to the film industry should have been in place long ago. This Premier let the industry almost die before the politics brought it to match the rest of the film industry.

And then there’s the tax increase on parking in Metro Vancouver. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never been stopped on the street by a constituent saying: “You know what? Parking is just too affordable in B.C.” No one is saying that.

Yet this government, which hands out $1,000-a-day paycheques, has decided that ordinary British Columbians who are scraping by — again, $200 short of making ends meet — need to pay more to park their cars. This is a government completely out of touch with the realities facing our citizens.

Let me turn to the broader picture, because Bill 5 cannot be separated from the budget it seeks to implement. As my colleague from Kamloops Centre has pointed out, this budget is already outdated. On March 4, the government presented a budget that was fundamentally altered. Why? Because it is a $3 billion revenue hole, and this government hasn’t made a single adjustment to the expense side to account for it.

The withdrawal of the carbon tax was definitely needed. However, we do need our updates on how we’re going to deal with that as a province. In my friend’s words: “We’re debating a document that isn’t even an accurate financial document.” That’s what we’re dealing with here: a budget with no financial accuracy, tabled on the backdrop of two debt downgrades.

This year’s Budget Implementation Act is unusually thin. I personally haven’t seen one in the past, having been told this from the other members here — that most of the years, we have an inch-thick act that we’re producing at this time, filled with routine tax rate updates and changes that keep our fiscal system running.

This year it’s about, probably, less than a quarter-inch thick, and it is predominantly about the film industry.

Again, I’m very excited about the film industry. We on this side of the House fully support the film industry bringing money into our country. We bring in actors, directors, writers, producers. They stay in our hotels. They purchase our goods. They bring things home, from our country, back to, predominantly, the United States.

So they’re helping our economy, and tax breaks that match the rest of the film industry are a fantastic thing. We need more going on here. We have the space. We have the expertise. We, in my personal belief, have the greatest film industry, probably, in the world, running out of our province.

So that’s it. At a time when British Columbians are crying out for relief, for action, for a government that will address the crisis in affordability, health care and education, this is what we get: a thin bill that prioritizes tax breaks over the needs of the public. The taxes that are involved in it target our poor and middle-class people.

[5:45 p.m.]

British Columbia does deserve better. We need a government that doesn’t just pay lip service to taking action but actually delivers results. We need a government with a real plan to address the crisis that this government has created. A crisis in affordability, where, again, families are $200 away from paying their bills. A crisis in health care, where wait times grow and rural hospitals close. A crisis in education, where kids learn in portables instead of proper classrooms.

We need a government that makes life more affordable, that invests wisely and that restores fiscal responsibility. This budget and Bill 5 fail to do that. They fail to address the urgent needs of British Columbians.

I will mention that even in question period, when questioned about it, we often hear the answer about record spending. But with that record spending, we don’t see the results. So — I’ll use the word — bragging about how much money this government is putting in to show their commitment to certain industries doesn’t really show us a commitment to certain industries. What it has shown us is a lack of fiscal management.

This government fails to provide a vision for a stronger, more prosperous province. They fail to demonstrate the leadership the British Columbians deserve. The real downgrade is not just our credit rating. It’s the failure for the people of B.C.

Ladies and gentlemen, let’s unpack this mess that is Bill 5. Did those right-wing rogues really go and obliterate industry as we know it? Were they the ones who shoved green energy down our throats, strangling British Columbia’s ability to hold its own on the world stage or, dare I suggest, might the real villain be our illustrious NDP government?

The Premier and his friends are sitting pretty while the province crumbles. These aren’t policies. They’re fantasies dressed up as governance. They’ve left entire nations in shambles. Yet here we stand today with the self-proclaimed wrecking crew of B.C. having the gall, the absolute chutzpah, to point their fingers at us Conservatives and cry that we’re the ones endangering this fine province.

They’ve got some nerve. I’ll give you that. After running the show into the ground, record deficits and debts, a debt that’s accumulated faster than every government prior to this one, they think they can pin this on us. Perhaps they think we’re hiding the American President in our caucus room. Or could he be here right now? Do they see him in the room with us? Well, if he is, perhaps you should have addressed the threat in this budget or in this bill.

This government’s talk of the American President and playing wedge politics, trying to divide people, has caused division in this province. I myself have received emails and phone calls with words that would not be allowed in this room and should not be allowed, probably, anywhere. This...

Deputy Speaker: Member, perhaps we could get back to Bill 5.

[5:50 p.m.]

Bryan Tepper: All right. Enough with the fairy tales about far-right boogeymen lurking around every corner. We drop the act. Bill 5 has done nothing to address this. It’s time to wake up and smell the reality check. The grand experiment has flopped, and it has flopped hard.

How about trying something that actually works for a change? Instead of this budget, this Bill 5, we roll out some good ol’ free market magic, slash the suffocating taxes, crank up our competitive edge, help industry to get it roaring again, and, hey, while we’re at it, let’s bring back those glorious plastic straws.

Quit clutching your pearls and face the facts. This has been botched beyond belief. This budget makes no mention of tariffs, and there is nothing to do with them in this bill as well. However, you would think it would, as they are a great threat to our economy. Our forestry, our mining, our oil and gas, our agriculture are all facing devastating threat of tariffs — not addressed in, again, either the budget or this bill.

Without a hint or mention of these tariffs, we end up with an avalanche of deficit becoming a mountain of debt. We’re at about $28,000 in debt for every man, woman and child in this province. We have someone in this very House that just brought a little bundle of joy into this province. And the Premier’s gift? This beautiful child owes the province $28,000, and that goes up every day.

My own children are getting to an age where they have to make their own way in this province. I have to face the fact that they will probably be forced to leave the area they grew up because of the unaffordability that we now have. With them facing that same debt, how are they ever going to be able to provide anything for themselves while still owing more and more every day to a province running up debt at an unprecedented rate?

This Premier has racked up more debt than every government in the history of the province, and he seems intent on setting new records every day. How does this bill help that? There is nothing in this bill that is helping the youth of this province.

We need to look forward. This isn’t about today. This isn’t about tomorrow. This is about the future of everyone. We have retirees that struggle with prices going up every single day. Tax is increasing. We have people in the prime earning years of their lives. More and more of that money that they need to create a comfortable future for them and for their children…. Because in this province, in this country, we all feel a duty for our future generations.

How does this bill help that? This bill, and this budget it supports, represents a missed opportunity to put British Columbians first.

[5:55 p.m.]

Again, with my own family, how do I look at my children and say that this is the best we have? If you have to leave, there’s nothing we can do about it.

The other provinces seem more intent on keeping their budgets balanced, moving towards that. They have more opportunity in industry. Without economic growth in this province…. And this bill, again, does nothing to help the economic growth, economic stability of this province.

We have…. I was going to say record numbers of mills closing, but I don’t know the record. We have sawmills closing throughout the province. I believe Merritt had five sawmills at one point, and I believe they’re all shut now. How does a young man growing up in Merritt start his life without the opportunities that those jobs present?

The forestry jobs that we’re losing support the Lower Mainland of British Columbia as well. These resources — the mines, the oil and gas industry, the forestry industry — are supplying the jobs and the surrounding industries that we all, within my riding and within the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, rely on. We have a government creating more government jobs than the private sector jobs that are being completed. It’s obviously unsustainable.

How, again, are our children going to do anything when we do not have the tax base to support the government jobs, to support the nurses, to support the doctors, to support the police and firemen? Because we don’t have any development in this province. We have no industry. We have no manufacturing. If that’s the case, we have no choice but to say goodbye to the one in two youths in this province that are thinking about leaving at this point.

Let’s demand better. Let’s demand a government that listens, that acts and that delivers.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you, Member.

I definitely want to hear about Bill 5 this afternoon. Hopefully, we can draw our attention to that bill.

Ward Stamer: Today I rise in this Legislature, not just as an MLA and an opposition critic but as a voice for the countless families, students, educators, seniors and citizens who have been left behind by this government’s cynical and hollow Budget 2025.

Bill 5, the Budget Measures Implementation Act, is more than just a legislative formality. It is the machinery that enables this government to carry out the reckless agenda buried inside their latest budget. Make no mistake. This budget is not just a disappointment; it’s a betrayal — a betrayal of public trust, a betrayal of promises and a betrayal to the people.

This bill rubber-stamps the continuation of deficit spending that British Columbians can’t afford and future generations shouldn’t have to inherit. It amends the Balanced Budget and Ministerial Accountability Act to extend the government’s ability to run deficits until 2028. In doing so, it openly concedes that this government has no intention of returning to responsible fiscal management — none. They’ve given up on even pretending to balance these books.

This should feel familiar, because we’ve been here before. Some of us remember the original fudge-it budgets, all the way back in 1990. That’s not just a slogan; it’s a stain on our provincial’s fiscal history — a time when the NDP cooked the books, misled the public and left behind a mess that took years to clean up.

[6:00 p.m.]

Fast-forward to today, and we see the same old pattern emerging: shifting numbers; promises made and broken; fiscal projections based on hope, not evidence; a ballooning deficit of nearly $14 billion this year alone, with no credible plan to reverse the course. Buried in the fine print of Bill 5, a quiet amendment to let the NDP keep running deficits year after year after year, with no consequence, no accountability and no transparency.

This isn’t budgeting. This is improvisation. This is governance by gimmick. It’s the Premier saying, “Trust us,” while hiding the truth. It’s the Finance Minister admitting there’s no plan to balance this budget but still asking British Columbians to believe in the illusion of stability.

When that illusion cracks, who pays the price? The very people this government claims to stand for: working families, kids in overcrowded classrooms, seniors on wait-lists and vulnerable communities pushed further to their margins.

This is not just a budget problem; this is a leadership problem. What Budget 2025 and Bill 5 truly reveal is that this government has forgotten who they serve. They’re not here to protect the public purse. They’re not here to deliver measurable results. They are here to survive politically, and they’re using public dollars to paper away their failures.

I stand here today to say we see the spin. British Columbians see the spin. They see their kids learning in portables. Now they call them “additions.” They see the lack of new schools. They see education assistants promised but never hired, and now we hear they’re laid off. They see the cost of everything going up and the support they need disappearing. They remember what the fudge-it budget years were like, and they’re beginning to realize those years are back.

Well, we in the Conservative Party of British Columbia will not sit quietly as history repeats itself. We will stand up, we will speak out, and we will fight. We’ll fight for fiscal responsibility and sanity, for responsible governance and for the people who are being ignored by this tired, out-of-touch government.

If we want to truly understand the cost of this government’s broken budget, we need only to look at what’s happening in our schools. This NDP government has failed an entire generation of British Columbians, not in the abstract but in classrooms, portables and hallways right across this province. Nowhere is their betrayal more visible than in the education system, and no one feels it more acutely than our children, our teachers and our parents.

Back to Bill 5 and Budget 2025. The government boasted of an additional $370 million in three years in K-to-12 education. But let’s be clear. This is not new money. This is barely enough to keep up with inflation and contractual salary obligations. As the B.C. Teachers Federation put it: “This increase is modest and, at best, might prevent cuts.”

There is nothing transformative here, there is nothing bold and certainly nothing that fulfils the promises this government made loudly just mere months ago. Remember when Premier Eby promised an education assistant in every kindergarten to grade 3 classroom? British Columbians remember it. Parents remember it. Teachers certainly remember it. But when it came to fund it in Budget 2025 — silence. The money simply isn’t there. No line item. No rollout. Just another promise filed away in the growing folder of B.C. NDP broken promises.

And what about mental health supports? The NDP promised counsellors in every school. In 2023, they said they’d be a cornerstone of their education policy. Yet in 2025, two years later, there’s no sign of funding, no framework, just talk. More delay. And in the meantime, more kids are falling through the cracks. Our youngest learners, the ones who need help the most, are being let down.

Let’s talk about the portables. Again, nothing in Bill 5 on this. Let’s talk about the absolute scandal that’s unfolding in Surrey, a scandal they continue to ignore.

In 2017, the NDP promised to eliminate portables in Surrey by 2020. That was their commitment. It was clear, it was ambitious, and it was made in good faith. And so voters believed.

[6:05 p.m.]

At the time, Surrey had 250 portables; today it’s over 360. And according to the Surrey board of education, that number could surpass 400 by next year. That is not progress. That is regression. And this is a crisis.

Surrey is home to some of the fastest-growing neighbourhoods in Canada. Families are moving in. Communities are expanding. And instead of building, this government is stacking portables on top of each other, literally double-deck portables.

That’s what it’s come to: students in modular metal boxes trucking down through the rain just to use a washroom in the main building, gymnasiums turned into classrooms, library spaces shuttered so a class can squeeze in. This is not innovation; it’s desperation.

And what is the government’s response? “We’re working on it. It’s in the capital plan.” Well, it’s certainly not in this plan. It’s certainly not in Budget 2025. We’ve built six schools in six years.

This district is growing by thousands of students annually. That’s not a plan; it’s a shrug. Even the Surrey PAC advisory council, in a rare and unified letter to teachers and staff, said: “Schools across Surrey are operating at 158 percent capacity. Extended secondary school schedules are band-aid solutions, taking up spaces used to play.”

Fifteen years — that’s as long as it’s taken to identify the need for a new school and actually opening the doors. Fifteen years now — that’s longer than a child’s entire K-to-12 education. For many students, it means spending every single year in a portable — excuse me, an addition — from kindergarten to graduation. A government that allows this to happen is not building for the future; it’s barely maintaining the present, and British Columbians are right to be furious.

This government has lost the confidence of the parents, they’ve lost the confidence of the teachers, they’ve lost the confidence of the school boards, and they’ve lost the confidence of the people of B.C. They’ve certainly lost the moral authority to claim they’re champions of public education.

Let’s not forget what the B.C. School Trustees Association recently quoted: “The ever-increasing financial pressures on boards of education still exist.” School district 73, back in my riding and the Kamloops Centre member’s riding, announced 77 cuts, full-time, between teachers and support staff because they don’t have the money from this government.

From their president, Carolyn Broady…. She went on to say that these financial pressures exist today and exist tomorrow. She went on to say that trustees have been advocating for years for capital and deferred maintenance investments, recruitment and retention of teachers and support staff, and supporters for learners with diverse abilities and learners with disabilities. How many more years will we have to ask? Even as this government brags about historical education investments, school districts are left choosing between hiring staff or keeping the lights on.

The $392 million earmarked for prefab school projects may sound impressive until you realize it will create just 6,400 student spaces. Surrey alone needs 10,000, and across 16 districts, it’s a drop in the bucket. We’re not keeping up. We’re falling further behind.

Let’s speak about a group that this government rarely talks about, a group that’s hardly been neglected by the education system in B.C. under this NDP: Métis students. The Métis Nation in British Columbia represents 22,000 K-to-12 learners. Yet their needs, their culture and their rights are consistently ignored in provincial educational planning.

Under Bill 40, passed without consultation with the Métis representatives, local Indigenous nations were given veto power over education matters, but no similar authority or recognition was granted to the Métis. Why?

Funding intended for Indigenous learners is channeled to the First Nations education….

Point of Order

Hon. Spencer Chandra Herbert: I was just hoping the member might speak to Bill 5, as opposed to other legislation.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you for your suggestion, Minister. I felt like it was connected to Bill 5 through the budget, but thank you very much.

I would appreciate hearing about Bill 5 this afternoon, as we have had that conversation a number of times today.

Debate Continued

Ward Stamer: As I have time, let’s talk a little bit about some of the implementations of tax credits that we see in Bill 5.

We’ve talked about that today already, but let’s talk about forestry, if we may.

[6:10 p.m.]

Nothing in this budget or Bill 5 addresses the current need to the forest industry in this province — the forest industry, which is one of the four pillars that built this province. We had agriculture, we had fisheries, we had forestry, and we had mining. Nowhere in this budget, nowhere in Bill 5, in the amendments, does it talk about tax credits for the forest industry. Not a dime.

Back in 2021, we had over 55,700 direct jobs employed in the forest industry. We had a GDP of $4.9 billion and revenues to this province of $1.9 billion, with an annual cut of 52 million cubic metres. Let’s fast-forward three and a half years. In 2024, we had 32 million cubic metres, with a guess of between 30,000 and 35,000 direct jobs, a loss of anywhere between 20,000 and 25,000.

I don’t have the GDP numbers, but I know the revenues were only $501 million. Yet this budget, this Budget 2025 and Bill 5, has no additional credits whatsoever for this industry. Yet it does have increases to revenue from $501 million to $639 million. That’s $138 million more in stumpage, with 2 million cubic metres of less harvesting.

Because in this budget, it doesn’t talk about the guarantee of 45. Now we hear about the drive to 45. What does that mean? We were guaranteed it was going to be 45 million cubic metres this year for the forest industry. Now we’re hearing that it’s the drive for 45. Yet we’ve got an industry that has the highest cost for fibre in North America. What does this government do to try to alleviate the pressures that our industry is feeling right now? Nothing. There’s nothing in this budget. There are no tax incentives. There are no new proposals. There are no jobs and manufacturing fund money available because that was shut down on November 15, 2024.

So my question to the minister would be: where is the help that is needed for these 30,000 to 35,000 families that desperately need this forestry industry to survive?

There is nothing in here. Yet there are tax credits for the film industry, and that is fantastic. If I was working in the film industry, I would be ecstatic about that. But I don’t work in the film industry, and I never did work in the film industry. My career was in the forest industry, like many others in my family.

Again, in this budget, forest revenue is expected to increase because of the overall stumpage rates. That’s what it says. It doesn’t say anything about tax relief. All it says is we’re going to charge more, when this industry needs relief. The Forest Minister mentioned not that long ago about possibly freezing stumpage rates over a period of time. Yet there is nothing in this budget, nothing in Bill 5 to address that.

The Budget Measures Implementation Act is still silent on the reforms that we asked for in our election platform and what we asked in our summation. That was: let’s look at a different stumpage system. Let’s look at a better way of getting more value out of the trees that we harvest. Yet, again, nothing in Bill 5, or in this budget, would address any of those concerns.

If I may, talking to Bill 5…. Let’s talk about the new programs. Why aren’t there any other additional programs in here, even in the mining sector?

This government talks about all these mines that are ready to go. Yet unfortunately, we don’t see anything coming online in the foreseeable future. We certainly don’t see any benefit through this budget to either incentivize that to happen, or, again, to grow our revenues in this province.

[The bells were rung.]

Mr. Speaker, I can continue?

When we talk about cost savings….

Deputy Speaker: Just one sec, Member.

Ward Stamer: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Deputy Speaker: Thank you, Member.

Ward Stamer: When we talk about cost savings in this industry, we talk about all the other additional costs that are occurring. We’ve got incredible amounts of bureaucracy. We’ve got too much red tape. It’s taking too long for us to be able to have cutting permits, have logging plans.

[6:15 p.m.]

The BCTS only achieved just over half of their targets last year in bringing 20 percent of the cut to the industry, which was promised. Quite frankly, the last three years have been the same. They’ve been approximately 50 percent of what they were supposed to be bringing to the market.

Many forest industries are continuing to make investments in this industry. Just the other day, the minister made the comment that because of some of the monies that were available in the past, that has been incentivizing companies to reinvest, and that’s true. It’s very true. On the manufacturing fund, through the jobs innovation, a total of $97 million of taxpayers’ dollars over the years has been granted to the forest industry, which has incentivized private industry and public to be able to invest $650 million.

So, yes, I would argue that’s great. That was great news, and that has incentivized many companies. But I wouldn’t want to be under the illusion that companies made money last year, because I know they didn’t. The only reason they’re investing in this industry is because of faith, because of the fact that they have pride in this industry, and they want it to continue to be a staple and a backbone in this economy.

But, quite frankly, I wouldn’t want to guess how much money they lost last year and how much money they’re going to lose this year, the way things are going with Budget 2025 and Bill 5. The reality is we had mills closing before there was any threat of tariffs.

Make no mistake, we are in a trade war. We have no idea what it’s going to actually accomplish or not accomplish against pressure on our economies. We know that we need to be strong, but at the same time, we should be looking at ways of bolstering our own economies. We’re not doing anything in this in Bill 5. There’s no reference at all to any support whatsoever.

If one of those mills do go down, where’s the additional support needed for those families? There’s nothing in here either. I know the minister says that this is a moment in time, that special day when it was all created — like, it was all created in just one day — but now there are no adjustments. Yet we have Bill 5, which makes adjustments, but no adjustments to the numbers. No adjustments to the overall debt.

When we talked about the carbon tax, and what we are going to be doing: are we going to actually be tacking that onto the 10.9 or we’re not? Well, there was no answer from that side.

That isn’t fiscal management. That’s just working behind the scenes. That’s pretending everything’s going to be all right. Well, it’s not going to be all right — not by a long shot.

I went through the entire Bill 5 back to front, and I didn’t find, really, a whole lot of relief for any of us. This whole stack of amendments that we can go on about for days and days doesn’t address the serious issues that are occurring in this province today.

We can pretend that there was that moment in time, that one special day when everything was all rosy and this is how we’re going to set things up, but I would suggest after two consecutive downgradings through Moody’s in our overall rate structure for the province that not only has the budget been readjusted because of additional inflation pressures on interest to our debt, but I would suggest that most of these numbers probably aren’t even true today. But they were in that one moment of time.

We’re at a crossroads. We’re in a time and place where people have to make serious decisions in their family. Some of our seniors are making decisions today on whether they pay for their heat and their rent or put food on the table. Again, nothing in Bill 5 or this budget addresses the challenges that our seniors are going through right now — and our marginalized citizens. Nothing at all.

As we move forward with these amendments to Bill 5, I hope we have the opportunity to continue to have these discussions and be able to determine exactly what this government is doing. Because on any given day, it’s hard to really try to understand what they are doing. Every time we turn around, it’s getting worse.

[6:20 p.m.]

When we look at some of the rural challenges, at our school districts that are shutting down our after-school programs, cutting library hours or eliminating field trips, that’s putting incredible pressure not only on the students but on their parents, because now their parents are having to come up with the additional funds that were originally supplied and provided for by this Education Ministry.

Every available dollar is now going to basic operations. The extras that used to enrich a child’s learning are the first to go. It looks like kids that are sitting on wait-lists for assessments, for learning supports, for mental health counselling…. Wait-lists that this government promised to eliminate are now longer than ever.

There’s a saying in education: “Every year matters.” For a child falling behind in grade 2, for help until grade 4, that is not an option. Those years can never be replaced. This government has forgotten about that.

The consequences go beyond the classroom. School boards, already stretched to the limit, are being forced to make impossible decisions. Do they hire extra education assistants, or do they repair the leaky roof in the gym?

Oh, I’m sorry, that’s probably in another ministry. I lost track now between switching things around. Instead of having it all under one roof, now we’ve siloed it all over the place.

Do they buy new learning materials, or do they pay the rising heating bill for a 50-year-old building? And make no mistake, that’s the average age for the schools in school district 73, the riding that myself and the member for Kamloops Centre represent. Fifty years is the average age of our schools.

And yes, we’re in the same deficit as all the other school districts right now, so far behind in building for capacity. I know one of our schools, Sa-Hali Secondary, is already at 155 percent over capacity. There’s talk of possibly getting a new school going. They’re going to be at 163 percent next year. That is totally unacceptable. Unacceptable.

Because we are speaking on Bill 5 and that ties into Budget 2025…. Budget 2025 is filled with slogans about standing strong for B.C. But it fails to stand up for the very people who need government the most: people with disabilities, low-income families, seniors and rural British Columbians whose communities are left to fend for themselves.

Let’s begin with the disability community, a group this government claims to support but ignores when it comes to dollars behind the words. The Disability Alliance of B.C. reviewed Budget 2025 and called it what it is, a failure. They quote: “Budget 2025’s commitment to standing strong for B.C. fails to lend its strength to the disability community.”

That is a devastating indictment, and it’s a justified one. This is a government who promised to index persons with disabilities rated to inflation. It was a clear commitment rooted in their own poverty reduction strategy. And yet, there’s nothing. Nothing in Bill 5. Nothing in Budget 2025. No indexing. No increase. No relief.

And as the DABC said: “We are disappointed to see that the provincial government’s poverty reduction strategy, which included considerations for indexing PWD rates to inflation and changing the rules around the spousal cap, were not reflected in this year’s budget.” So again, not in Bill 5. Not in Budget 2025. In other words, they promised the most vulnerable people in our province a lifeline, and they walked away.

[The Speaker in the chair.]

They also pointed to so-called investments in B.C. Transit and handyDART. But again, the fine print tells the truth. “On closer inspection, it does not look to be any new funding, rather sustained funding.” That’s the quote. So again, nothi in Bill 5. Nothing in Budget 2025. No expansion, no improvement, just recycled press releases and a government hoping no one will notice.

[6:25 p.m.]

And let’s be honest, people with disabilities do notice. They notice when the costs go up but their support doesn’t. They notice when accessible transit is promised but not delivered. They notice when the budget speech includes lines about inclusion and equity but not a single dollar to back it up.

The DABC summed it up best: “In our view, Budget 2025 does not align with the B.C. government’s aims in their poverty reduction strategy or reflect the rising cost of living that will surely impact low-income people with disabilities.”

This is more than a missed opportunity. It’s a breach of trust and a betrayal, and it doesn’t stop there. Seniors across this province are also being left behind not only by this budget but by a government that refuses to grapple with the growing crisis in elder care.

The Speaker: Noting the hour, Member, to adjourn the debate.

Ward Stamer: Noting the hour, I reserve my right to continue speaking and move adjournment of debate.

Ward Stamer moved adjournment of debate.

Motion approved.

The Speaker: Members, I’ve been listening to the debate throughout the afternoon. The Chair has been very lenient today on the debate at second reading of Bill 5.

The debate resembles debate on the budget motion, a question that is no longer before the House. As always, the rule of relevancy applies. At second reading, members must address the principles and merits of Bill 5, which deals primarily with taxation matters.

Members are put on notice to keep their remarks strictly relevant to the bill. The Chair will be less lenient when the debate resumes at the next sitting.

George Anderson: Section A reports progress on Bill 7 and asks leave to sit again.

Leave granted.

Hon. Jennifer Whiteside moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

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

The House adjourned at 6:27 p.m.