The House met at 1:34 p.m.

[The Speaker in the chair.]

Routine Business

Introductions by Members

Hon. Ravi Parmar: It was about a year ago that I stood in this House and joined in celebrating Mr. Highlands Bob McMinn’s 100th birthday. It was an incredible celebration, May 10.

I am pleased to update the House that Bob McMinn is living life in the Highlands. He didn’t have his licence removed, but he made the decision not to drive anymore. Anyone who’s been out to the Highlands knows that the roads there are a little windy. He just celebrated his 101st birthday a couple of weeks ago. This guy is beloved in my community, and I hope the House will join me in wishing him a very happy birthday.

[1:35 p.m.]

Kiel Giddens: Joining us in the gallery today are members of the Electrical Contractors Association of B.C. I come from a family of electricians, but I was the odd person out, getting into politics.

These are people that literally power our province. I want to welcome Matt MacInnis, their president and CEO; their board chair, Derek

Joining us in the gallery today are members of the Electrical Contractors Association of B.C. I come from a family of electricians, but I was the odd person out, getting into politics. These are people that literally power our province.

I want to welcome Matt McInnis, their president and CEO; their board chair, Derek Fettback; vice-president of Western Pacific Enterprises and the treasurer of ECABC, Don Bayda, from F&M Installations.

Will the House please make them very welcome?

Hon. Josie Osborne: I’m so pleased today to be able to welcome two constituents from my community of New Westminster to the House. Laura Kwong is New Westminster’s DPAC chair. She’s here this afternoon with her daughter, and they’re doing a little bit of a deep dive into our democracy, which I think is just awesome. I really appreciate the work that Laura does and that the DPAC does to advocate for education in our community.

Would the House please join me in making them feel very welcome.

Reann Gasper: It is a privilege of mine today to welcome members of my Abbotsford-Mission constituency staff. I have Candis, Chelsa and Sean Mark. These are the people who carry the day-to-day weight of public service with grace, strength and compassion. I am so proud to call them my staff.

Would the House join me in recognizing and welcoming them today.

Hon. Jodie Wickens: Today in the House is one of my absolute favourite constituents. He also happens to be one of the reasons I’m standing here in this role today.

Fin Donnelly is a beloved leader in our community. He was a fantastic city councillor, a fantastic Member of Parliament, a fantastic MLA and a testament to lifelong public service. He’s still working tirelessly for our community, for a better future, for our environment, for our children.

I am honoured to fill his shoes. It’s a bit of tradesies. I asked him to run; he asked me to run. I hear it’s his birthday tomorrow.

Happy birthday, Fin.

I also hear that the staff did a really good job of making sure all of the pencils were well sharpened in the Legislature today.

Would the whole House please help me in giving Fin Donnelly a very warm welcome.

Gavin Dew: It’s a pleasure to welcome to the House Blair Ireland, the mayor of the district of Lake Country and vice-chair of the district of Central Okanagan, along with Lake Country CAO Paul Gipps.

A pleasure to have you guys here today. Good to meet with you. Thank you for coming.

Hon. Josie Osborne: I’m delighted to have three visitors from my riding of Mid Island–Pacific Rim here today. Joining us are Alberni District Teachers Union president, Ryan Dvorak; vice-president, Wendy Arnett; and then from even a little bit further out in Ucluelet, Marc Garand, who is the president of the Ucluelet-Tofino Teachers Union. I’m just delighted to have them here and have them representing their members’ interests. I’m so grateful to them for all of their support of our public education system.

Would the House please join me in making them feel very welcome.

Lynne Block: Today at the Legislature, we had the welcome of members of the Telus leadership team as part of their Kits for Kids initiative, including Jill Schnarr, Judy Sihota, Dee Brown, Tyler Mooney and Marissa Nobao. Alongside volunteers and board members, they’re helping pack and deliver 930 backpacks filled with school supplies to families in need across B.C., part of Telus’s Day of Giving and their long-standing commitment to community as B.C.’s hometown team.

Thank you, Telus.

Tributes

Mike Trask

Hon. Spencer Chandra Herbert: I rise with some sadness to report to the House the passing of an incredible fossil hunter here in British Columbia, Mike Trask up in Courtenay.

[1:40 p.m.]

For those that don’t know, Mike and his daughter discovered our provincial fossil, which at the time was identified as an elasmosaur, but I’m pleased to share, on behalf of his family, that in fact it is a new genus. It is not an elasmosaur. It’s a specific plesiosaur. So his discovery with his daughter outlives him, and in fact, it has been named a Traskosaura Sandre, named after

But I’m pleased to share on behalf of his family that in fact, it is a new genus. It is not an elasmosaur. It’s a specific plesiosaur. So his discovery with his daughter outlives him. In fact, it has been named Traskasaura sandrae, named after Mike Trask himself because of his incredible contribution to paleontology in this province.

For those that want to get to know his discovery even better, I’d urge them to go up to the Courtenay and District Museum and Palaeontology Centre. You’ll probably get a chance to meet his twin brother, Pat Trask, who is also an incredible fossil hunter and somebody who’s given so much to this province in terms of our knowledge.

Please, hon. Speaker, if you mind, on behalf of the House, to acknowledge the passing of Mike Trask and his incredible contribution to this province.

Introductions by Members

Jody Toor: I am honoured to introduce my community staff that works with me at my Langley office, Isabella Stockfisch and Sean Mark, along with — I have introduced them earlier as well — three important people, my husband, Charn Toor, and my two daughters, Nya and Jaya, in the chamber. Can the House please make them feel welcome?

Harwinder Sandhu: As we know, we’re always excited to welcome guests. But many of us also carry a memory of loved ones who are no longer with us — for me, my dad, and also my late husband, Sammy, father of my two daughters.

But that said, while this moment is emotional, at the same time, I’m excited to welcome his parents: Manjit Singh Gill, a millwright who served in Mackenzie sawmill for over 52 years; and his mother, Paramjit Gill — besides raising three kids, she also worked at a local Greek restaurant — with their daughter, Anoop Gill, Sammy’s only sister. She was born and raised in Mackenzie, and we shared many cherished memories.

Despite living in B.C. for decades — their ancestors came here over a century ago — work kept them busy, and life. So it is their first time being in the gallery today. They are also joined by my daughters Manreet and Jasreen and my son, Avishaan. Would the House please give them a big round of applause and make them feel very welcome.

Donegal Wilson: It’s not often that I get the chance to welcome someone from my own riding of Boundary-Similkameen, but I’m pleased to do so today. In the gallery today, I have Emily Walbeck from the Princeton parent advisory council.

I had the pleasure of meeting her knocking on doors during my campaign. She’s very passionate about advocating for the students in Princeton. I appreciate that she’s come today. I want to thank all the volunteers and parents that are here today at the Legislature for their rally. Please make her feel welcome.

Lorne Doerkson: I’m certainly proud to make three introductions from my community. The first two individuals are from Esk'etemc. That is the incredible First Nation just southwest of Williams Lake. David DeRose and Calvin Dubre are here. They are here advocating not only for their community but for parents and children in their education program.

With them today is George Hobi. He is a member and one of the founding members, I suppose, of Concerned Parents of Williams Lake and I welcome them all here today. They are here for the rally as well and here to advocate on behalf of our parents and children in our communities. Thank you very much, gentlemen. It’s been a pleasure.

Bruce Banman: I also have three introductions to make. It is my absolute pleasure to introduce Drs. Chris Vallée and Melissa Carr from the acupuncturists of British Columbia, here to talk with us about concerns that they have, and we look forward to that conversation.

Also, for those of you that have been around for a long time, Mr. Speaker, like yourself, in the Legislature since 2008….

Interjection.

Bruce Banman: Thank you — 2005. So it’s even longer than I figured.

We actually have Mur Meadows here, who formerly was in the dining room downstairs, a resident here, and actually, also, an all-around actor extraordinaire. So please, will the House welcome them with warm applause.

[1:45 p.m.]

Ian Paton: I want to welcome my wife

Ian Paton: I want to welcome my wife Pam, who’s here today for a couple of days to join me. We brought along our two really good friends from Tsawwassen, Scott and Michelle Harris. They’re famous for Harris Nursery in Tsawwassen and Ladner, an expert on everything to do with the nursery business.

I want to thank Pam. She works hard at her full-time job, and then she looks after our farm when I’m not here, and then she rides her horse every afternoon. I grow hay to feed her horse.

There are three reasons she married me: I had a farm, I grow hay for horses, and my brother is a horse veterinarian. So please make Pam feel welcome.

Bryan Tepper: I’ve got two things today. One, I would like to welcome Alex Staggert. Every time I go to a Richmond event, I seem to see him there, a dedicated community advocate. He works on community-focused change: the drug crisis, housing inequality, environmental concerns and government accountability. He strives to implement sustainable solutions that enhance the well-being and resilience of the local communities. So if we could give him a big hand.

Personally for myself, today is my wedding anniversary. I’m not an overly romantic fellow. My wife isn’t here today. She’s on the road, but I will say: “It could have been worse.”

Misty Van Popta: It begs the question for whom.

Today in the House, I’ve got both of my constituency assistants: Leda, who I’ve introduced here before. New to my office is Ashley McDougall. She’s a recent grad from the University of Fraser Valley, I believe arts, political science major and maybe economics? Yup, I got the thumbs up.

Both of them make me look good on a daily basis, and I really appreciate their work. If the House could just say thanks that they’re here.

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I just want to give a shout-out to Telus who are here on the premises today doing their Kits for Kids. I was able to go out at lunchtime and stuff some backpacks with Jill Schnarr and Jaggi Sahota. Telus just does such a great job of engaging the community with their volunteer work. I really just want to congratulate them for that and thank them very much.

Members’ Statements

National AccessAbility Week

Dana Lajeunesse: It’s my pleasure to speak today in recognition of National Accessibility Week, which takes place from May 25 to 31. This week is a time to reflect and celebrate and to acknowledge the work and leadership of people with disabilities, as well as the contributions of those advancing inclusion in our communities.

Having faced barriers myself, I know there’s still much work to be done to build a province that works for everyone. This is why our government is committed to advancing accessibility and inclusion.

As Parliamentary Secretary for Accessibility, I’m proud to support this work, refreshing our three-year accessibility plan and developing B.C.’s first accessibility standards under the Accessible B.C. Act, in partnership with our provincial accessibility committee, which is led by an incredible group with diverse lived experience.

Our efforts are guided by the UN convention on the rights of persons with disabilities and the principle: “Nothing about us without us.” This ensures people with disabilities help shape laws and policies that affect them.

[1:50 p.m.]

Everyone benefits when our communities are accessible, and ensuring inclusion is a shared responsibility. As we mark this important week, I encourage all members to be champions for accessibility.

This ensures people with disabilities help shape laws and policies that affect them. Everyone benefits when our communities are accessible — and ensuring inclusion is a shared responsibility.

As we mark this important week, I encourage all members to be champions for accessibility. Let’s build a province where every child can play, every person can connect and every space is open to all.

Kassidy Rutledge
and Special Olympics

Kristina Loewen: Today I rise to honour a special athlete and to highlight the Special Olympics in B.C. I’m honoured to recognize Kassidy Rutledge, an incredible Special Olympics athlete whose strength, determination and spirit inspire us all. Kassidy exemplifies the true meaning of perseverance and sportsmanship, proving that no challenge is too great when faced with passion and heart.

Kassidy made a mark at the 2025 Canadian Powerlifting Union championships in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. Kassidy completed a perfect nine-for-nine performance, claiming the national championship title in the 63 kilogram category.

Kassidy competes in both Special Olympics and mainstream competitions. In March, she won a national title and earned a spot at the International Powerlifting Federation world championships, which is being held this coming November in Romania.

Her dedication to her sport and her unwavering positivity reminds us that ability is limitless when fuelled by courage and hard work. Kassidy began her Special Olympics journey at only 11 years old. She started in swimming, but she has participated since in almost every sport Special Olympics offers. She also participates in social sports like bocce.

Last February, she went to the nationals for snowshoeing. Next, Kassidy will compete in the provincial games in Prince George this July. Her goal is to represent Canada at the Special Olympics World Games in Santiago, Chile in 2028.

Here are some quick facts about our Special Olympics programs in Kelowna. Three years ago, our local committee unanimously decided to be the first community to make sport free for the athletes. At a net programming cost of over $165,000, they have been able to sustain their free-sports initiative via an aggressive fundraising program and with the help of some fantastic local philanthropists.

Kelowna hopes that by showing the rest of the country that providing free sport to our underserved population is achievable, eventually sport will be free for all Special Olympics athletes nationwide. Currently, Kelowna has 221 athletes, 16 sports and over 100 coaches and program volunteers.

I wish I could post a photo on the screens right now of Kassidy, because she is as adorable as she is strong and tenacious.

Kassidy, you are a shining example of what it means to be a champion, both on and off the field.

Let’s celebrate Kassidy and all Special Olympic athletes who continue to break barriers and inspire greatness.

Celebrate BC Event in Coquitlam

Jennifer Blatherwick: As British Columbians, there is a great deal that unites us, most notably our collective commitment to this great province we all call home. On August 4, B.C. Day, the first annual Celebrate B.C. event will take place in Coquitlam Town Centre Park, on the traditional territory of the kʷikʷəƛ̓əm First Nation.

The one-day festival will be hosted by the kʷikʷəƛ̓əm and SUCCESS, a multiservice agency that is renowned for assisting newcomers in all stages of their lives.

We will honour Indigenous and settler histories and will bring together British Columbians from all regions to celebrate who we are and our shared future through music, art, a regional showcase and B.C.’s largest salmon barbecue. This vibrant event will be a tribute to the rich cultural fabric, natural beauty and diverse communities that define our province.

A heritage walk exhibit will highlight the many cultures that make our province so unique. Celebrate B.C. will also serve as an expression of our collective aspiration, the spirit of collaboration, reconciliation and the pride that unites us.

As members of this House know, an event of this magnitude does not come together without a great deal of collaboration. We would like to acknowledge the kʷikʷəƛ̓əm people, who are helping spearhead this event and are demonstrating the meaning of the word “partnership.”

[1:55 p.m.]

On a personal note, I cannot lift up highly enough the members of the kʷikʷəƛ̓əm Nation, who are small in number but enormous in heart, both in their compassion and dedication to the community and in spreading the teachings of their culture to all of us who are willing to open our hearts to it.

And what better time to celebrate who we are as British Columbians. This B.C. Day, you are invited to join us at Celebrate B.C. Let’s come together, not only in celebration but in recognition.

but in spreading the teachings of their culture to all of us who are willing to open our hearts to it.

What a better time to celebrate who we are as British Columbians. This B.C. Day you are invited to join us at Celebrate B.C. Let’s come together not only in celebration but in recognition of all of those who have shaped this land and continue to build its future.

Kiwanis Village West
Affordable Housing Initiative

Lynne Block: I rise today to share news of a truly transformative initiative in affordable housing in West Vancouver: Kiwanis village west. This project is the latest achievement by the Kiwanis North Shore Housing Society, a trusted community pillar since 1953. Founded by the Kiwanis Club of West Vancouver, the society has spent over 70 years providing below-market rental housing for individuals, families and seniors, fostering inclusive, healthy communities across the north shore.

Starting with their first site between 21st Street and 22nd Street, Kiwanis has grown that original village and vision into Kiwanis Garden Village. It is now home to 303 rental units and an adult day centre. Across the north shore, Kiwanis operates 744 apartments in eight buildings, all managed by dedicated volunteers, a board and a team of caring professionals.

Building on this legacy, construction began in 2023 on Kiwanis village west, a new 156-unit, purpose-built rental project. These modern, affordable homes, ranging from studios to three bedrooms, will be offered at approximately 75 percent of market rent, with priority given to our first responders, school staff and municipal workers. I’m proud to share that although completion was expected in March 2026, the project is ahead of schedule, with first occupancy now anticipated by December 1 of this year. More than just housing, Kiwanis village west will include landscape gardens, outdoor spaces and a community hub, fostering connection and well-being among residents.

This progress is a testament to what’s possible when a committed non-profit works hand in hand with local government. The partnership with the district of West Vancouver has been essential to bringing this vision to life. I want to commend Executive Director Stefan Baune, the board and the entire Kiwanis team for their vision, hard work and steadfast dedication to building homes and building community.

5X Festival and
Punjabi Arts and Culture

Jessie Sunner: I rise today to recognize an organization that has brought extraordinary diversity, creativity and cultural richness to British Columbia’s art scene for the past 20 years: 5X. Founded in 2004 and originally named the Vancouver International Bhangra Celebration, 5X has been at the forefront of supporting emerging Punjabi artists, reshaping arts and culture in British Columbia, and making waves across the globe.

I also have a personal connection to 5X as ten years ago I volunteered with what was then known as VIBC. Back then we were organizing community bhangra competitions and panel events in Vancouver, and today that seed has grown into the 5X Fest, a full-scale cultural movement that merges music, art, fashion and film. 5X has become a creative force that has launched careers, brought Punjabi culture to the international stage and made Surrey a hub for the South Asian arts.

The impact of 5X goes far beyond culture; it’s economic. In a time when we’re talking about diversification and taking control of our own economy, we must also talk about the creative economy. Artists like Inderpal Moga, Intense and my very own constituent Jainni Nethan are all building global music brands from right here in B.C. Not only are they putting Punjabi music on the world stage, they are generating millions in economic activity through music production, streaming, tours, merchandise and branding. This is a home-grown industry, and it is future-facing.

For too long, the arts were seen as either a risk or a luxury, especially in immigrant households, but 5X has changed that. It’s made culture a career, it’s made Surrey a creative capital, and it’s shown the world that our language, our sounds and our stories are not just relevant, they’re in demand.

[2:00 p.m.]

I invite all members in this House to come visit Surrey on June 14 to experience the 5X Fest for themselves and see what a future rooted in culture and driven by youth truly looks like.

members in this House to come visit Surrey on June 14 to experience the 5X Fest for themselves and see what a future rooted in culture and driven by youth truly looks like.

Anti-Racism Awareness Week

Teresa Wat: As a former Minister Responsible for Multiculturalism, and as someone who proudly represents one the most diverse constituencies in B.C., I rise today with both urgency and hope as we mark Anti-Racism Awareness Week. This week is not just symbolic; it is a result of years of advocacy, including my call way back in 2021 for an annual anti-racism education day on May 29. The call was driven by the heartbreaking rise in racism and hate during the pandemic, particularly anti-Asian hate. It surged by over 700 percent in Vancouver alone amid the pandemic.

But these acts of hatred do not exist in isolation. We have seen increasing incidents of racism against Indigenous and South Asian communities, and we must not ignore the surge of antisemitism, what many historians rightly call the oldest and most enduring form of hate in this world. This historic hatred has taken on new and dangerous forms, and it must be named, confronted and condemned without hesitation.

Fighting racism isn’t a partisan cause; it’s a human one. It’s about standing shoulder to shoulder with every British Columbian, no matter their faith, their background or their language, and saying: “You belong, and we will fight for you.”

British Columbians have told us they want action. Over 11,000 people signed our petition, and over 170 organizations came out to support the proclamation of anti-racism education day in 2011. They want a province where their children can walk safely, can speak freely and live without fear of discrimination. Let’s listen, let’s lead, and let’s commit, not just this week but every day, to the work of ending hatred in all forms.

The Speaker: A reminder to all members: when you are making two-minute statements, please follow the time limit. It is a two-minute statement, not longer than two minutes. Keep it within the time limit. Thank you so much.

Oral Questions

Government Policies on
Substance Use and Supportive Housing

John Rustad: A Globe and Mail exposé over the weekend laid bare the devastating reality on Victoria’s Pandora Avenue, where addiction, death and chaos are spiralling out of control under this NDP government. Even Victoria police, like detachment Insp. Conor King, a strong supporter of harm reduction, now admits it’s worse than ever.

The Premier said safe supply and supportive housing would save lives. Instead, he’s created taxpayer-funded sites where drug use is rampant, crime is routine and people have no hope for recovery.

Will this Premier end this failed experiment and replace it with treatment-focused housing that bans these deadly drugs and restores law and order to communities like Victoria?

Hon. Ravi Kahlon: I want to thank the Leader of the Official Opposition for his question.

We know that when communities have challenges, and when they face encampments, the best solution, the best way to address them, is through housing. In the case of Pandora, the members should be aware that last year we had over 100 people in the encampment there. Because of the supportive housing that we brought on, because of the fact that we scaled up so many housing options, we now still have 19 people.

I appreciate that 19 people is still too many. That’s why we’re going to continue to work with the local government. We’re going to continue to work with our partners. In fact, after the situation around a paramedic facing violence last year, we put together a table where police, health officials, Ministry of Housing, local government officials, all of our not-for-profit partners meet monthly to talk about what we can do to address the challenges that every individual is facing in that community.

[2:05 p.m.]

We know the supportive housing works. I know the Leader of the Opposition started his question with some doubt that supportive housing maybe doesn’t work. It works. It saves lives. It gets a lot of people out of the streets, out of the encampments, and helps them reconnect with family, helps them reconnect with employment. We’re going to continue to scale that up to support communities throughout the province.

housing works. I know the Leader of the Opposition started his question with some doubt that supportive housing maybe doesn’t work. It works. It saves lives. It gets a lot of people out of the streets and out of the encampments and helps them reconnect with family, helps them reconnect with employment.

We’re going to continue to scale that up to support communities throughout the province.

The Speaker: Member, supplemental.

John Rustad: Well, an interesting response from the minister considering that residents are smoking and injecting fentanyl in taxpayer-funded housing units and B.C. Housing is confirming it. Police are constantly called to these buildings for standoffs, trafficking and weapons. Just last week, they seized a kilo of fentanyl, a loaded handgun and $40,000 in cash from one of the Premier’s so-called supportive housing sites. Yet the NDP still claims, as the minister just did now, that this is helping people and moving them towards recovery.

Will this NDP government stop destroying lives, be straight up with British Columbians, admit its policy has failed and shut down these drug dens?

Hon. Ravi Kahlon: Surely, the Leader of the Opposition isn’t talking about closing down supportive housing throughout the province. Surely, he understands that by doing that you’re putting people’s lives at risk. If he needs advice or if he needs some guidance on how important supportive housing is, he should just turn around and talk to his Housing critic, who as the mayor of Surrey was a strong advocate for more supportive housing. In fact, told other mayors about the value that it provides a community.

I praise the critic for Housing for her leadership when she was the mayor of Surrey, because she understood what supportive housing meant. It made a huge difference in her community. It’s making a huge difference for people in other communities.

As for the arrest, as I said earlier, we have a table where police, our not-for-profit providers, all of our health officials, everyone sits together. When challenges arise, we work with our officials to be able to take steps to address that, and that’s what’s happened in this case. We don’t want to see people that are preying on vulnerable people in supportive housing, outside of supportive housing, on our streets, and we’ll continue to work with law enforcement to ensure that doesn’t happen.

Government Action on
Drug Trafficking and
Border Security

Elenore Sturko: This is a side of the House that does believe in housing, but allowing rampant drug use and setting up situations that are ripe for exploitation by drug traffickers isn’t supportive.

The government has scoffed at recent warnings from U.S. officials about fentanyl production in British Columbia, calling it “trade war rhetoric.” But Canada’s own intelligence reports confirm that foreign government-backed gangs are using B.C. to traffic drugs to the U.S. and beyond.

A B.C. man was just charged exporting enough fentanyl out of Vancouver to kill 750,000 people. Last fall, the RCMP pulled 54 kilograms of fentanyl and 390 kilograms of crystal meth out of a super lab in Falkland. It’s only one of 47 such labs that the NDP have busted in the last six years under this NDP government.

Organized crime, cross-border smuggling and chemical super labs are a national security threat. Will the Premier continue to hide behind trade war rhetoric as an excuse for his inaction or will he finally admit that the explosion in drug production is also a provincial security threat?

Hon. Garry Begg: Thank you to the member opposite for the question. This government is working very hard to fight illegal drug manufacturers, and the Premier, our Premier, has been leading the charge here and in the nation’s capital. This is yet another example of the B.C. Conservatives parroting the talking points of Donald Trump. They don’t apply here. We’ve been working with provinces across the country…

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members, Shhh.

Hon. Garry Begg: …to stand up to Trump and his tariffs.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members. Members will come to order. Members.

Hon. Garry Begg: Meanwhile B.C. Conservatives continue to ignore the goal of Canada being the 51st state. We’re not for that.

[2:10 p.m.]

We’ve opposed all of their actions, we’ve matched their tariffs, removed alcohol from B.C. liquor stores. In some ways, over there, even...

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members, minister has the floor.

Minister, continue.

Hon. Garry Begg: …do not condemn Trump’s tariffs. That’s what we do. We condemn them.

We’re focused on getting people with addictions the treatments that they need.

The Speaker: Members, the minister has the floor. Minister, continue.

Hon. Garry Begg: …do not condemn Trump’s tariffs. That’s what we do; we condemn them. We’re focused on getting people with addictions the treatments that they need.

The Speaker: Member, supplemental.

Elenore Sturko: There we have it again: a prime example of a member of this government conflating the crisis that we have, the national security threat, with some type of trade war rhetoric.

But the reality is — and this minister should know — that the 2024 Criminal Intelligence Service Canada report shows that the number of crime groups producing fentanyl nearly doubled in one year between ’23 and ’24 right here in British Columbia. Meanwhile, the city of Delta confirmed that less than 1 percent of shipping containers at B.C. ports are ever physically searched. It’s no wonder that the FBI’s director says that traffickers bypass the U.S. straight for Vancouver.

We campaign, on this side, to establish a B.C. port police agency and to send the bill to the federal government. Will the Premier adopt our proposal or keep misleading British Columbians about the scale of this national security threat?

Hon. Garry Begg: The FBI director, Kash Patel, is blaming Canada for all of their woes.

The reality is data from the U.S. border and customs authority says these are facts.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members.

Hon. Garry Begg: You may not be interested in them, but they’re important in this House. So 6.3 kilograms of fentanyl were seized at the Canadian border in April, nearly 300…

Interjections.

The Speaker: Shhh, shhh. Members.

Hon. Garry Begg: …kilograms intercepted from Mexico. Do the math. It’s not coming from Canada. B.C. Conservatives are again calling for a public inquiry…

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members.

Hon. Garry Begg: …into decriminalization and for the province to develop a fentanyl strategy.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Minister, hold on.

Hon. Garry Begg: One member opposite has also called for fentanyl trafficking to the U.S. to be declared a national security scandal; it’s not. Get accustomed to the facts: 6.3 kilograms of fentanyl from Canada to Mexico, nearly…

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members. Member for Surrey-Cloverdale.

Hon. Garry Begg: …300 kilograms intercepted from Mexico.

Government Action on
Reconciliation and
Legislative Commitments

Rob Botterell: DRIPA, the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act, was created to provide a framework for reconciliation. It ensures better informed policy-making and helps address harms from where the government has historically failed to cooperate with Indigenous governments.

However, the First Nations Leadership Council, as well as many other First Nations and local councils, have shared fundamental concerns regarding this government’s tendency to repeatedly ignore its DRIPA commitments. DRIPA must be respected at every opportunity, not simply when it is convenient for this government. To the Premier: how do you expect First Nations to trust that you are committed to reconciliation when you continuously fall short of your commitments to DRIPA?

Hon. Christine Boyle: Thank you for the question and the opportunity to talk about what, I agree, is an incredibly important piece of legislation that was passed unanimously in this House and that continues to be a focus and priority for this government. B.C. was the first jurisdiction in Canada to pass legislation to adopt the internationally recognized standards of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. These are, as articulated by the UN, the minimum standards for the survival, dignity and well-being of Indigenous people.

We continue to do work in partnership with First Nations and Indigenous people across this province, guided by the Declaration Act action plan, an action plan that was co-developed and that we report out on annually in terms of the progress.

[2:15 p.m.]

I’m happy to report out on a bit of that progress now — in addition to a report that will be coming forward to this table soon — a great number of actions that we have seen improve the lives of Indigenous people and continue to be work we take on. I look forward to outlining more of it.

The Speaker: Member, supplemental.

Rob Botterell: This government has displayed a troubling pattern of neglecting public consultation, beyond just its

as people and continue to be work we take on, and I look forward to outlining more of it.

The Speaker: Member, supplemental?

Government Consultation with Stakeholders

Rob Botterell: This government has displayed a troubling pattern of neglecting public consultation beyond just its failure to consult First Nations. This month alone, the UBCM and local governments have said they were not consulted on significant municipal issues. Environmental organizations have said they were not consulted on fast-tracked energy projects. It would seem that the only voices this government cares to listen to are the ones that agree with them.

To the Premier: how is this government ensuring that all interested stakeholders are meaningfully consulted, including those who might disagree with them?

Hon. Christine Boyle: Again, I appreciate the question. Engagement and consultation are important pieces of how we do all of our work here, because we know that’s how we get to success, is in partnership, and it continues to be a clear commitment of this government that partnership is the way that we get things done in this province.

That includes working with local governments and my colleague for Housing and Municipal Affairs, as well as across government. We do that work in our local ridings, as well as in our ministries.

It is the same, that reconciliation work is a cross-government commitment, and so it not only falls under my ministry but each ministry of this government doing relational work, building partnerships to see things move forward that benefit all British Columbians. That’s work we will continue to be committed to.

Community Safety and Involuntary
Care for Mental Health Issues

Claire Rattée: British Columbians with serious mental illness are being released from involuntary psychiatric care with no follow-up, oversight or access to psychiatric support. This government admits that they have no ability to track them or even know how many there are.

After the Lapu-Lapu Day tragedy, it was revealed that the suspect was one of those people on extended leave from involuntary psychiatric care. How is this anything but a catastrophic failure of care and accountability?

When is this government going to put public safety first and stop releasing potentially dangerous psychiatric patients without proper care?

Hon. Josie Osborne: Thank you to the member for the question. Clearly, this is an issue that everyone in this House takes extremely seriously, because we know that people need supports at every stage of a recovery journey, and that includes whether it is substance use issues or serious mental illnesses.

One of the questions the member raises is around people who are released from a designated facility under extended leave, for example, and they are each attached to teams. Health authorities have the responsibility to ensure that those people continue to receive those supports from those teams, and they do exactly that. As part of that, they do track patients who are on extended leave, and I would be happy to tell the member more about exactly how many there are and for how long and when they are recalled to involuntary care early.

We are going to continue to build out a seamless system of mental health care and supports for people experiencing illnesses, experiencing substance use issues, everything from early intervention to treatment and recovery and aftercare.

The Speaker: Member, supplemental?

Claire Rattée: Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

I don’t know how that is possible when there was an article that was published this weekend stating that the government did say that that is not being tracked. We don’t know how many people are on extended leave right now from involuntary psychiatric care, so something is not adding up there. I would be very interested to know what those numbers are and how you can provide supports to somebody when you’re not tracking how many there are or who they are, because you can’t fix what you refuse to measure.

Mental health care in B.C. is a broken system that’s been propped up by slogans and platitudes, and people are being discharged into communities that have no resources to support them. We are seeing the lowest mental health care worker to population ratio across all of the provinces and no solution in sight.

When will this government take responsibility for the risks that they have created, for the patients that they have abandoned, and fix this system before more lives are lost?

[2:20 p.m.]

Hon. Josie Osborne: Unfortunately, I have to reject the premise that the member is putting forward,

because it is absolutely not true. I’m very happy to correct the record on this issue.

The numbers of people who are released on extended leave do change on a daily basis, but as I’ve already said, health authorities do track this. So I can affirm to the member and to the rest of this

Unfortunately, I have to reject the premise that the member is putting forward because it’s absolutely not true. I’m very happy to correct the record on this issue.

The numbers of people who are released on extended leave do change on a daily basis, but as I’ve already said, health authorities do track this. So I can affirm to the member and to the rest of this House, for example, that on May 20, 2025, there were 5,915 people on extended leave in B.C. This includes 910 in Island Health, 1,829 in Fraser Health, 652 in Interior Health, 322 in Northern Health, and 2,202 in Vancouver Coastal,.

Every single one of these people matters, and getting them the care that they deserve matters. That is why those numbers are tracked by health authorities. That is why those people have teams that are assigned to support them to ensure that they have access to what they need and why we will continue to do everything that we can to support these people.

Education Funding

Lynne Block: Parents, teachers, support staff from all over B.C. are protesting on the lawns of the B.C. Legislature today. Some are in the gallery. They want to know why this government continues to underfund B.C.’s education system. They want to know why, in 2025, in communities like Surrey, firefighters have to fundraise for printer paper and paper towels.

Can the Education Minister tell these parents, teachers, support staff who are here today why it’s acceptable that on her watch, schools have to fundraise for basic supplies?

Hon. Lisa Beare: I want to begin by thanking all the parents from across the province and any of the partner organizations who are outside rallying today. It is absolutely important to hear voices from all across the province about our education system. Particularly, we share their goals of having a supportive, inclusive education system for all.

Interjection.

The Speaker: Members.

Hon. Lisa Beare: I know that there are some boards across this province who are facing budget challenges this year — not all, but there are some boards. We have an incredibly difficult fiscal situation for every single family.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members. Members, please be quiet. Enough.

Minister.

Hon. Lisa Beare: Every single family, every single non-profit, every single level of government, every single business are facing the challenges of increased inflation and the threats south of our border.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members, how many times does the Chair have to remind members that you have asked a question. Let the minister answer. You may not agree with the answer. Just wait for your turn to ask the next question.

Please, the minister will have the floor.

Hon. Lisa Beare: Thank you, Speaker.

You know what? I wanted to provide a really good answer for the members, but they’re clearly not interested in hearing. So you know what I will provide? A quote from the member opposite who just asked the question.

When she was on CBC radio recently getting interviewed and asked repeatedly if she would increase and if the B.C. Conservatives would increase funding to education, do you know what the member said? “Well, yes, no. You know what? Not necessarily add but change how we do education. We’re going to do learning pods. We’re not going to necessarily have people in the classrooms. We’re going to do it with technology so that students, not all of them, have to be with one teacher, 30 of them in a classroom.”

That’s their solution.

We’re going to continue to provide funding year after year, increase funding for education, because that’s our values.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Shhh.

Member, supplemental.

Lynne Block: Thank you to the member for reminding me of some of the reasons that I got into education in the first place.

Best practices. Best practices we’re not doing right now. So that’s what I would like to have in the future: best practices from around the world coming here. I would ask, then, if the minister would like to thank the people in person, perhaps this afternoon, because they are here.

[2:25 p.m.]

For supportive, inclusive education, yes, we have seen an increase in inflation, but we haven’t kept up with inflation. That’s why we are underfunded in education right now.

to thank the people in person, perhaps, this afternoon, because they are here, for supportive, inclusive education. Yes, we have seen an increase in inflation, but we haven’t kept up with inflation. That’s why we are underfunding in education right now.

To the Minister of Education…. One of numerous concerned parents has contacted my office, one from Burnaby just this week, regarding the Burnaby school district’s $4.2 million budget shortfall that is leading to a number of different educational cuts. She said she reached out to her MLA, the member for Burnaby North, about the elimination of the multi-age cluster class, a program which has nearly 100 students, for classes specifically for neurodiverse and highly capable learners who need counselling, language support and much more.

She never heard back from her MLA or the ministry. Why is the NDP Education Minister, and this Premier, leaving vulnerable students in Burnaby and B.C. behind? It’s going to come back and bite us in the future.

Hon. Lisa Beare: I thank the member for the question. I have met the rally organizers already at lunch today. I got to spend time over the lunch hour with them. We had a long conversation about the concerns they want to bring forward and what changes they’d like to see in education, so thank you for that.

I think it’s really important to note that we have continued to increase supports, especially supports for diverse learners in our classrooms. In fact, we have more than doubled funding to support kids in need who need that extra support. I met with the Burnaby school board last week and had a long conversation with them as well — spent an hour with them — about the challenges that they are facing in Burnaby.

These are incredibly difficult fiscal times. We are seeing the effects of inflation all across the globe. In fact, the threats south of the border are significant as well. We wake up in the morning and the world is one way, and with the stroke of a pen, two hours later, the world is completely different. We as a government are going to continue to increase funding year after year because that’s what we believe in.

Trevor Halford: We’re hearing from the minister that the reason Surrey is treated once again like a second-class city, the reason that she cannot give increased funding, is because of south of the border. That is the line of rhetoric we’re getting from this Education Minister today. Sad and desperate.

Front-line workers — they’re burning out. Programs — they’re getting cut. Buses for kids with disabilities gone. Band programs gone. What we’re seeing: students moving to shifts now. Hybrid learning, learning centres wiped out. All under this NDP government watch. Not even to mention the highest number of portables we’ve ever had in the city of Surrey after this government campaign, not once, not twice, to get rid of them all. We’ve got the highest now ever.

Why does this minister continue to fail the kids in Surrey, the parents in Surrey, the teachers in Surrey because she just doesn’t understand that she needs to properly fund Surrey?

Hon. Lisa Beare: I want to make sure that we send a very clear message that we value the education system. We have increased per-pupil funding from $9,000, when we formed government in 2017, to over $13,600. Every single student in Surrey receives that per-pupil funding. Every single student across the province is treated as a priority as we ensure that we are creating environments where kids can thrive.

I know that Surrey school board is facing a challenging budget this year, and it’s really unfortunate that….

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members.

[2:30 p.m.]

Hon. Lisa Beare: It’s really unfortunate that the members opposite want to bury their head and pretend like there is an increased inflation globally across the province and that we don’t have a threat across….

Interjections.

The Speaker: Shhh.

Member for Surrey-Cloverdale.

Hon. Lisa Beare: The official critic was asked if she would give more money, and she said: “No,

members opposite want to bury their head and pretend like there is an increased inflation globally across the province and that we don’t have a threat across….

Interjection.

The Speaker: Shhh, Member for Surrey-Cloverdale.

Hon. Lisa Beare: The official critic was asked if she would give more money and she said, “No, you know, I’m going to do things differently. I’m going to increase classroom sizes.” So no, the B.C. Conservatives don’t have a leg to stand on here.

In fact, the Leader of the Opposition, when he was in government, he fought the teachers all the way to the Supreme Court. He closed 256 schools, including…

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members. Shhh.

Hon. Lisa Beare: …selling off 21 properties in Surrey. That is not what we do as a government. We continue to increase student education.

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members. Members.

Hon. Lisa Beare: We continue to increase funding. I absolutely will continue to work with districts like Surrey. I meet regularly with the board chair, meet regularly with parents, with union partners, because we value the public education system, and we’re going to continue to invest.

Peter Milobar: Talk about a government that is completely out of touch with their own commitments. It was this Premier that campaigned on education assistance for every K-to-3 classroom. Let’s look at how that’s going.

In Kamloops, they’ve had to cut 80 support staff positions this week or last week because of funding shortfalls from this government. Campbell River is having to make cuts. Nanaimo is having to make cuts. Burnaby is having to make cuts. Surrey is having to make cuts. The list goes on and on and on.

If this was one district having a financial issue, I could understand the minister trying to deflect away and blame the President of the United States for funding issues in education in B.C. But Vancouver is having issues. In fact, Vancouver is no longer a living-wage-designated employer. They are a school district. All under this NDP’s watch.

The simple reality is — the minister can try to spin it any way she wants — outcomes are worse, supports are being cut across this province to the point we know firefighters are having to fundraise for school districts, and the minister seems to think that’s acceptable.

When will this government properly listen to the parents that are out on the lawn, the teachers that are out on the lawn, the school districts that are out on the lawn, and recognize that they have created a fundamental mess within the school districts from K to 12 in British Columbia and actually start living up to their actual commitments and deliver what parents are demanding?

Hon. Lisa Beare: I absolutely listen, which is why I just spent the lunch hour with those families, with those parents, with those partners, because we all have a shared goal of ensuring that we’re providing the best education system to our kids that we can.

Boards across the province, some of them are facing some difficult financial challenges and are making those tough decisions at the local level. That is a conversation those boards are having with their families in their local districts. I think it is so important to continue to recognize the challenges that we face. I know the official opposition doesn’t want to accept that, but we have been in a difficult fiscal time, an incredibly challenging, difficult environment. We protected….

Interjections.

The Speaker: Members. Members, let the minister conclude. Members.

Members, let her conclude please.

Please conclude

Hon. Lisa Beare: Globally fiscal challenging times. We made the very important decision as a government to protect core funding for education. In fact, our budget increased by $300 million. That is our values. We are going to continue to work with our partners. We are going to continue to support education.

[End of question period.]

Speaker’s Statement

Accessibility and MLA Use
of Cell Phone in the House

The Speaker: Members, before we continue, I just want to clarify some of the concerns raised by many members during the question period.

One member from Burnaby East was holding her phone. She has an issue with hearing, and she was reading the text, voice to text, which she’s allowed. That’s the only reason she was holding that phone in front of her. Okay? Thank you.

[2:35 p.m.]

Petitions

Scott McInnis: I just have a petition to present on behalf of residents and business owners in the town of Golden.

Petitions

Scott McInnis: I have a petition to present on behalf of residents and business owners in the town of Golden.

Tabling Documents

Hon. Niki Sharma: I am honoured to present the annual report of the Labour Relations Board for the year ending December 31, 2024.

I have the honour to present the InBC Investment Corp’s annual legislative report for the year 2023-2024.

Reports from Committees

Amna Shah: I rise to present the report of the Select Standing Committee on Private Bills and Private Members’ Bills on Bill M202, intituled Eligibility to Hold Public Office Act. The committee reports the bill complete with amendment.

Orders of the Day

Hon. Mike Farnworth: I call Motion 32 on the order paper.

Government Motions on Notice

Hon. Mike Farnworth: I move Motion 32, of which notice has been given in my name on the order paper, which appoints a special committee to review provisions of the human rights code.

[That a Special Committee to Review Provisions of the Human Rights Code be appointed to review sections 47.01 to 47.24 of the Human Rights Code (R.S.B.C. 1996, c. 210), pursuant to section 50.1 of the Act.

That the Special Committee have the powers of a Select Standing Committee and in addition be empowered to:

a.appoint of its number one or more subcommittees and to refer to such subcommittees any of the matters referred to the Special Committee and to delegate to the subcommittees all or any of its powers except the power to report directly to the House;

b.sit during a period in which the House is adjourned, during the recess after prorogation until the next following Session and during any sitting of the House;

c.conduct consultations by any means the Special Committee considers appropriate;

d.adjourn from place to place as may be convenient; and,

e.retain personnel as required to assist the Special Committee.

That the Special Committee report to the House within one year of its appointment, and that during a period of adjournment, the Special Committee deposit its reports with the Clerk of the Legislative Assembly, and upon resumption of the sittings of the House, or in the next following Session, as the case may be, the Chair present all reports to the House.

That the Special Committee be composed of the following Members: Jennifer Blatherwick (Convener), Rohini Arora, Dana Lajeunesse, Scott McInnis and Teresa Wat.]

The Speaker: Members, the question is the adoption of the motion.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mike Farnworth: I call Motion 33 on the order paper.

I move Motion 33, of which notice has been given in my name on the order paper, regarding one change to the membership of the Select Standing Committee on Private Bills and Private Members’ Bills.

[That Nina Krieger replace Dana Lajeunesse as a member of the Select Standing Committee on Private Bills and Private Members’ Bills.]

The Speaker: You have heard the question.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mike Farnworth: I call Motion 34 on the order paper.

I move Motion 34, of which notice has been given in my name on the order paper, regarding one change to the membership of the Special Committee to Review the Lobbyists Transparency Act.

[That Susie Chant replace Paul Choi as a member of the Special Committee to Review the Lobbyists Transparency Act.]

The Speaker: The question is the adoption of the motion.

Motion approved.

Hon. Mike Farnworth: In this chamber, I call the estimates for the Ministry of Finance; in the Douglas Fir Room, I call committee stage on Bill 15; and in the Birch Room, Section C, I call committee stage on Bill 14.

[Lorne Doerkson in the chair.]

[2:40 p.m.]

The House in Committee, Section B.

The committee met at 2:41 p.m.

[Lorne Doerkson in the chair.]

Committee of Supply

Estimates: Ministry of Finance
(continued)

The Chair: Thank you very much, Members. We’ll call this chamber back to order, and we will call on the minister to move the vote.

On Vote 26: ministry operations, $426,950,000 (continued).

Hon. Brenda Bailey: If you’d like me to begin where we left off with the member’s question, or would the member like to…? No? Okay. Thank you very much.

I’ll begin by offering good afternoon to the critic opposite and to yourself, Chair, and to welcome my team who will be supporting me today in estimates.

As we left estimates on the last day of this House, the member had just asked a question in regards to timing of when we began the work to do efficiencies, and I’ll respond to that question now.

As the member mentioned, the Premier issued mandate letters to ministers on January 16, 2025. The Minister of Finance’s mandate letter includes the following:

“In order to protect key services that British Columbians rely on, work with your ministerial colleagues to review all existing government programs and initiatives to ensure programs remain relevant, are efficient, grow the economy and help keep costs low for British Columbians. This is important in the context of provincial budget constraints, proposed American tariffs and other global threats to B.C. families.

“Put B.C. on a clear path to balanced budgets and maintain the province’s debt-to-GDP ratio as among the best in Canada.”

This is the work that is underway now. As part of Budget 2025, tabled on March 4, government is taking initial steps by limiting new spending to critical services, putting a hiring freeze in place, implementing program reviews and introducing initial expenditure management targets through administrative and operating efficiencies. The initial expenditure management target is $300 million in ’25-26, with future targets at $600 million annually in the fiscal plan.

Government is taking a measured approach to expenditure management, starting with administrative and operational efficiencies and a review of government programs. The work will take successive budgets, but we are committed to doing the hard and necessary work to ensure we can protect the critical services that people rely on, while managing our finances carefully and finding ways to strengthen and grow the economy.

As part of the usual financial reporting process, fiscal updates for the ’24-25 fiscal year will be shared as part of public accounts later this summer, and updates on the ’25-26 fiscal year will be shared as part of our first quarterly report in September 2025.

The Chair: Thank you, Minister, for starting us off on the budget estimates of the Ministry of Finance today.

[2:45 p.m.]

Peter Milobar: To be clear, I thank the minister for that answer, but that really didn’t get to the core of what I was asking. My last couple sentences were: “Surely after five months of looking at non-essentials, ministries have reported back as to what they feel they are going to cut

Peter Milobar: To be clear, I thank the minister for that answer, but that really didn’t get to the core of what I was asking.

My last couple of sentences were that surely after five months of looking at non-essentials, the ministries have reported back as to what they feel they are going to cut in this fiscal for expenditures. Is there not a dollar figure yet, five months post–mandate letter, of non-essential-spending savings that this government has actually found?

The minister, frankly, just repeated the same statement over and over about the $1.5 billion over three years with no clear path, roadmap or understanding of where exactly any cuts — and they would be cuts — are coming.

I’ll come back to that after we deal with the Crowns though, because I did commit to the minister that we would start on Monday with Crowns and with GCPE and work our way through and then follow that up with lotteries after however long GCPE may take.

First, a fairly general question around GCPE. Could the minister please share with us her view of the mandate and the role of GCPE in terms of service or provision of conduct for both the government and the public at large?

The Chair: Just for those joining us in the gallery, what’s happening here is the Finance Minister is changing out a team of experts to help answer the question that has just been introduced by the member for Kamloops Centre, who is the critic of the Finance Ministry.

[2:50 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Thank you to the member for waiting while we switched into a different team for this line of questioning.

The role of GCPE is really to perform the important role of communicating to the public on issues about programs and services and priorities of government. They do that in a number of different ways, through communication, but they also create content.

They handle media relations, they take care of advertising, and they also take care of multi-language delivery and more.

Peter Milobar: Is it the minister’s view, then, that GCPE should be what would be commonly considered as non-partisan, non-political, but more information-based, more informative to the public as to what government is doing without the extra editorialization or what would be more in line with coming out of a caucus or the political staff side of the equation?

In other words, does she consider GCPE to be political staff or to be more Public Service Agency information staff?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: They’re considered part of the public service.

Peter Milobar: I assume that they would also, then, operate and be charged with handling any of the social media platforms, like on X or on Instagram — those that would push that information out. There’s one in particular on X which is called B.C. Government News. When you scroll through it, it seems to be pushing out information from other government agencies or government programs, emergency information, those types of things.

Could the minister, then, explain why, on that particular site, it seems that from time to time, the only actual politician that they ever seem to actually retweet would be the Premier from his own personal X account, which he uses in elections? He uses the same account for very much NDP-caucus-related announcements versus just letting government communications do non-partisan government communications instead.

[2:55 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The Premier, of course, is the head of government, and he is retweeted in that role as head of government as he makes public appearances, for example.

Peter Milobar: Well, that answer, frankly, doesn’t hold up. There was, in particular, filming with the NDP caucus around Holi. That video was retweeted by B.C. Government News on X, directly from the Premier’s account. Yet, interestingly enough, the government communications arm on Instagram used a more generic government acknowledgement of the celebration — not one of the NDP caucus being filmed, one would assume, hopefully, by caucus funds and not by GCPE funds, because that offer certainly wasn’t offered to the opposition to make those types of videos.

Can the minister explain in more certainty, then, how it is that what would be seen as directly from the Premier’s personal account, picking and choosing, again, the only politician…?

It would be understandable, frankly, if they retweeted the Minister of Emergency Management in the time of an emergency, but they haven’t done that. They do it with the Premier with targeted messages infrequently, but it still happens. One would have to assume B.C. Government News, which is run by GCPE with communication experts, would understand what they are doing, whoever is in charge of that account with the ability to actually hit retweet or like, and why that is happening.

[3:00 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: To the member opposite, we’re looking into what happened in that particular circumstance. In respect of the time that we have together, I suggest we move on with questionings, and as this information comes forward, I’ll return to it, if that’s agreeable.

Peter Milobar: Well, if that’s being looked into, perhaps then GCPE can also be looked into — whether or not GCPE filmed the Holi video, had any input into the Holi video and shoot, if there was any funding there, if there was any help in advising, creating, writing — I’m trying to cover off everything so there are no loopholes here — and whether or not it was 100 percent done by the NDP caucus or if, in fact, it was created and developed and paid for in any way, shape or form by GCPE.

I ask that, I guess, as a simpler follow-up. I appreciate, though, that it will get answered with the other as well.

Just to make sure we’re 100 percent clear, the former head of GCPE is now the Premier’s chief of staff. Is that correct?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: That is correct.

Peter Milobar: Just how much involvement has GCPE started to inject themselves in terms of being involved in inquiries coming through to ministries and ministers in terms of responses back to MLAs? There seems to be a bit of a reach, a bit of a creep of expanded roles of GCPE. That’s a little concerning. Has there been a change?

[3:05 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: To the member, GCPE’s role is to advise ministers on public-facing statements.

Peter Milobar: Well, that’s interesting. I thought GCPE, based on previous answers by the minister, was supposed to be non-partisan, non-political. It sounds like advising ministers on public-facing statements is advising on how best to word policy and direction, not clean up grammar and punctuation to push out a press release.

It seems that GCPE is now guiding how things will be talked about in the public and advising the minister on how they should be structuring their statement on ministerial issues. That seems to me a bit of a reach into the realm of partisan. How does the minister square that circle of advising ministers on public-facing statements?

Advising is not taking the minister’s statement and creating a communication document out of it. Advising is advising the minister on what to say. That’s what the word “advising” would I think be broadly understood as in the general public. Can we get more clarity and certainty around the language that’s being used today?

[3:10 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Of course, the role of all

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Of course, the role of all public servants in this place is to provide advice to government, to provide advice to ministers. What to do with that advice remains the purview of the minister, as it has always been.

I want to specifically give an example of advice that one might get from GCPE. For example, if you’re communicating on a particular project, a housing project that might be opening in an area, GCPE might have particular insight on how to reach the community that is being targeted by that particular program. It might be an in-language piece of advice about how to reach people. It might be about how to communicate in a disparate media landscape. There are many different types of advice that we receive from GCPE.

Peter Milobar: Does GCPE make any determinations whether or not ministers or agencies of the government should meet with MLAs or not?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I just want to be very clear of the choice of words that the member opposite has used.

I understand the member to have asked, “Does GCPE determine?” And the answer is no. Any advice that a minister may receive from any public servant, the decision, whatever that might be, rests entirely with the minister.

Peter Milobar: Well, that’s interesting. The reason I’m asking these questions is we have a government communications arm that was formerly run by the now Premier’s chief of staff. We have what seems to be an ever-escalating politicization of a group that is supposed to be non-political.

I’ve asked these questions in advance because, in Kamloops, we have a long-standing issue that’s been going back, I’ve been advocating for, now, a better part of a year and a half. And I don’t expect the Finance Minister to weigh in about ophthalmology services within Kamloops and Interior Health, but neither would I expect GCPE.

After the election, on December 10, myself and Kamloops–North Thompson MLA sent off a request to meet with Interior Health — the president and CEO of Interior Health — to talk about ophthalmology that is supposed to be covered off by Interior Health, not by the Ministry of Health, but by Interior Health.

It’s back and forth from my office and Interior Health over the course of a couple of months, trying to what appeared to be set up a meeting. One date fell apart for various reasons by one party and the other, and then the next one did as well. That can happen.

[3:15 p.m.]

Then lo and behold, two months later, almost to the day, on February 13 — an auspicious day, it’s actually my birthday — we got an interesting reply back from Interior Health. And this is from the executive assistant to the president and CEO. It’s not a typo. It’s not a cut and paste error. They didn’t accidentally say “minister” instead of “ministry” or “ministry” instead of “minister.” As to waiting for the meeting. And it says…. It’s very short. This is the whole response: “I appreciate your patience and wanted to let you know I haven’t forgotten about you. We are just waiting on direction.

cut-and-paste error. They didn’t accidentally say “minister” instead of “ministry” or “ministry” instead of “minister” — as to waiting for the meeting.

It says…. It’s very short. This is the whole response: “I appreciate your patience and wanted to let you know I haven’t forgotten about you. We are just waiting on direction from GCPE regarding MLA meeting requests.” That’s at an Interior Health level. That’s not at a minister’s level.

Can the minister explain why GCPE is dipping their toes into things like health authorities and providing direction as to whether or not meeting requests should happen or not around health issues going on in opposition MLAs’ ridings?

[3:20 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: MLA requests sometimes come through GCPE, and they’re sorted to a health authority for casework or advocacy. GCPE essentially acts as a pass-through, and there is no decision-making power there. So any instruction or decision-making would be flowing through from the MO, not from GCPE.

With your approval, hon. Chair, I have a response to the previous question the member asked that we paused on, if I may.

As part of the general supports that GCPE provides, it is a normal course of action that their digital team would provide coverage of events attended by the Premier or other members of cabinet — non-partisan events. They maybe capture things like Holi and other days of significance that are culturally relevant. It would be possible and common for GCPE to provide supports that include video and photography for the Premier as well as for ministers. I will highlight that this was also the case before 2017.

Peter Milobar: Well, I always love the chestnut: “This is how other governments did it, so we’re going to keep doing it.” Right is right, and wrong is wrong.

You know, it’s interesting because…. I guess we’ll kind of split the two. I’ll come back to the Holi after, because I don’t want to lose the GCPE and Interior Health.

[3:25 p.m.]

It sounded like the minister is saying that health authorities…. Although GCPE is supposed to be a non-partisan, non-political communication vehicle, GCPE is fully within their bounds of operations to dip their toe in and have things flow through them to advise whether meetings should happen between an Interior Health

non-partisan, non-political communication vehicle. GCPE is fully within their bounds of operations to dip their toe in and have things flow through them to advise whether meetings should happen between an Interior Health president and CEO or other doctors to talk about a very specific thing around ophthalmology services.

I don’t quite understand how that fits the communication model. That sounds like gatekeeping for political expediency. I would point out the GCPE…. Waiting on direction from GCPE was February 13. It’s now — what? — May 26. I have not had a meeting. It doesn’t sound like advising. It sounds like if there was advice, it was: “Don’t have a meeting to talk about health, even though that’s your sole mandate as a health authority.”

If you try to talk to a minister on something like that, the minister would, understandably and rightfully so, tell you to go talk to the health authority. So that’s what we did. Health authority says: “No, no, we’ve got to check with GCPE, the non-partisan, non-political communication arm of government, to see if we can meet with you or not.” No wonder it’s taking forever to get meetings for opposition MLAs, and not just with Health but with every ministry.

I know Interior Health has their own communication arm. Does GCPE manage and oversee health authorities’ communication departments, or are those communication departments independent from GCPE?

[3:30 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: In no way would GCPE have been the final decision-maker in the example that the member has shared but rather a pass-through for information.

In regards to the question on health authorities, health authorities have their own communications team who collaborates with GCPE on supporting the Minister of Health.

Peter Milobar: I’m just trying to understand why GCPE has to get in the middle of any of this, why the minister feels it’s appropriate and won’t give direction to GCPE to back off. These are standard meetings that are supposed to happen. This is a government that keeps talking about trying to fast-track things and move things along quicker and be more efficient. Yet we have GCPE — my understanding is that most of them are not bound by the hiring freeze; not exactly efficiency there — being a gatekeeper to MLAs trying to do their job by just discussing things going on about something as simple as health care.

Not simple, obviously. Health care is a very complicated issue. But it affects everyone in my riding. The fact that they’ve been waiting since December, and it’s now end of May, for a meeting that the GCPE is in the middle of advising on whether or not it’s appropriate for a health authority to meet with a local MLA is ridiculous in the extreme.

Is the minister prepared, while looking for efficiencies, to look for a restructuring of GCPE so that we don’t need maybe as many in GCPE creating firewalls? There could be an efficiency found there in the cost structure of GCPE.

Hon. Brenda Bailey: All of government is engaged in this efficiency review, including GCPE. And I did hear the member opposite say that GCPE is not subject to the hiring freeze of the civil service.

[3:35 p.m.]

That’s not correct. Of course they are. I think we’ll have opportunity to talk about that further.

Peter Milobar: Well, it’s interesting, because when we’ve questioned orders in council of various communications staff that have been

I think we’ll have opportunity to talk about that further.

Peter Milobar: Well, it’s interesting, because when we’ve questioned orders in council of various communications staff that have been hired, the minister’s answer was that they’re exempt from the hiring freeze. Is the minister now saying that those political hires are no longer exempt, and there is now a hiring freeze on political staff, be it in communications or other places?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The way that the hiring freeze works is that if there is a request for an exemption to the hiring freeze, which applies all across the civil service, that exemption goes to the head of the public service for review, and a determination is made based on the impact that not hiring that role would have on government.

We’ve been able to make significant reductions on the percentage of hires across government since bringing in this hiring freeze. I’ll have to get the exact average, but if memory serves, a 6 to 8 percent increase is kind of what we would have seen in a prior year, whereas right now it’s 0.3, less than 1 percent, and it’s our determination to get that to zero or below.

I will share with the member opposite that some of the OICs that the member has seen in regards to GCPE are because when someone moves across government, that is also an OIC. It doesn’t always indicate that it is a new hire. So that’s important to note.

[3:40 p.m.]

I will share with the member some numbers. When we look at GCPE refilling positions that had been left vacant in the lead-up to the election, GCPE’s head count is lower now than last February. It was 310 at the end of April of this year, compared to 315 of last February.

Peter Milobar: The minister has repeatedly referenced that people left GCPE in the election, which is actually a savings for government.

compared to 315 of last February.

Peter Milobar: The minister has repeatedly referenced that people left GCPE in the election, which is actually a savings for government. Is that a normal course of practice leading into any election, or was this an anomaly?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I apologize to the member that I wasn’t more clear when I made that statement. This is the correct information. In the lead-up to the last election, GCPE deliberately held back on hiring, anticipating a reduced communication workload during the writ period; in other words, not filling positions rather than people leaving. It’s attrition, really, that we’re talking about — not filling positions that were vacated by people who left the GCPE permanently, not people on leave. Following the election, GCPE began the process of refilling required positions.

Peter Milobar: It sounds like they got about 98 percent of the way there.

In terms of GCPE, what is the current budget allotted for this year for polling?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The research budget in this year’s budget is $432,000.

Peter Milobar: What is projected, then, for the following two years in the fiscal plan?

[3:45 p.m.]

Claire Rattée: Could I get leave to make an introduction?

Leave granted.

Introductions by Members

Claire Rattée: I just wanted to introduce the Centennial Christian School. There are ten grade 12s here and a few adults and their teacher Joshua. I honestly didn’t think that I would get the opportunity to introduce a school from my riding, so thank you to them for making the trip down here. I was quite excited to see that they were coming today, so if everybody could please welcome them to the Legislature.

The Chair: Welcome to everyone joining us today.

Debate Continued

Hon. Brenda Bailey: That $432,000 is consistent throughout the fiscal plan.

Peter Milobar: Is there any additional money for multi-language polling as well?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: No, that’s all contained in the same budget.

Peter Milobar: It’s interesting. In a time of rising costs across the board, this seems to be the one area — thankfully, I guess — that government is holding the line, because the ’24-25 budget was $432,000 as well.

What type of polling is intended? Last year I had quite a bit of back-and-forth with the minister because it was very targeted polling around Surrey policing. It never was released publicly. In fact, none of the polling ever seems to get released publicly despite the hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on it.

How frequently is the polling being done currently?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I’ve just been alerted to an error that I’d like to correct. There, in fact, was an additional $110,000 spent on multi-language program research this year — sorry, not spent on but planned for.

[3:50 p.m. to 3:55 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The majority of research is through the quarterly omnibus research. This is really about the important goal of listening to British Columbians as they tell us their priorities and their day-to-day challenges, which allows us to work on the programming to address those challenges.

That is also what…. The 110,000 in ‘24-25 was research with multi-language markets, really, on the issues of affordability, housing and health care. I do just want to clarify that we are using language research, which includes not just polling but also in-person and online focus groups.

Peter Milobar: Is the multi-language polling the same polling as what would be considered the mainstream that was part of that $432,000 spend? Or are they a different subset of questions diving into different things that the various ethnic communities that would require those other languages to be properly communicated with…? I don’t take issue with that, of course. You want to communicate with all British Columbians, and language shouldn’t be the barrier. But are the questions and intention of the polling the same, or is it microtargeting into specific populations to see what various populations would think on a topic?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Yes, this is, by and large, the same. The intention of the research is the same, and there may be some shifts in regards to specific wording.

Peter Milobar: Is the polling done in-house, or is it done by way of outside polling firms?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Public opinion research is an important tool for government to go out and talk to people across B.C. GCPE uses third-party firms to provide specialized consultation services to engage British Columbians about changes to policies and programs that people rely on.

Research conducted by GCPE also helps B.C. Stats to develop accurate understanding of people in B.C., including on issues like affordability, where we’ve worked to understand how much people are spending on major costs like housing, food and child care. Vendors used by GCPE were selected through a competitive bid process.

[4:00 p.m.]

Peter Milobar: Again, we’re always flying a little blind on these questions as an opposition, and for the public, because the government never shares any of the polling. They don’t even want to admit if they’re actually in the field polling. They don’t like to talk about what the subject area might be. God forbid the public find out what the results of that poll were in a very clear-to-understand release. One would think GCPE would be able to issue a release.

They don’t even want to admit if they’re actually in the field polling. They don’t like to talk about what the subject area might be. God forbid the public find out what the results of that poll was in a very clear-to-understand release.

One would think GCPE would be able to issue a release. That’s what their business is — and communication. Maybe it’s those five missing people that would be doing those releases. I’m not sure.

The minister has said $432,000, another $110,000 for multi-language, which will be polling that is done very similar to the other, if not the same as the $432,000. That is almost $550,000. It’s $542,000. The minister indicated that it would only be quarterly omnibus polling.

Is the minister saying that we’ll be spending upwards of $125,000 a poll for every quarter, or is there other polling that is actually going to happen for that? I ask that maybe just to speed this along a bit, because last year, the omnibus polling for Surrey policing was $24,400. A large population did outreach into the various communities. The minister made it very clear.

We went through it step by step because there are very diverse communities within Surrey. They wanted to really capture what people were truly feeling about Surrey policing or not. I’m not trying to re-litigate the Surrey policing issue at all. I’m talking about just the sample size of polling. It’s very representative to what it sounds like the minister is saying. The other polling is going to happen. Omnibus, multi-language, everything else. But the minister has now said it’s only going to be done quarterly. Yet we have the same budget as last year.

Interestingly enough, in a week where there’s a whole bunch of contentious confidence votes coming up, the government has the same amount of money budgeted for polling this year, next year and the following year as they typically do in an election year. I’ve canvassed this a few times. Polling always spikes in an election year, conveniently enough. But it does.

Again, I’ll save the minister…. I’m sure it used to happen that way too. It doesn’t make it right, but I’m sure it used to happen that way as well, in the past, with other governments.

At any rate, we’ve only heard that there are going to be four routine, regular check-in omnibus polling quarterly to make sure the government is providing the services people actually need. We have a $542,000 budget, which would be $125,000 to $130,000 a quarter.

Is that the only polling that is going to happen? Why so expensive then, if you can do the whole of Surrey very comprehensively for $24,400?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The omnibus research that occurs is sort of the largest bulk aspect of the research, but there are other pieces of research that occur during the year on a number of different topics as need requires.

Peter Milobar: I always love the interplay of language between opposition and government. Government refuses to call it polling, even though that’s what it is. It’s polling companies phoning people up or contacting them in various ways to get polling. The government calls it research to somehow make it seem less political, I guess.

[4:05 p.m.]

Has there been, or will there be, any polling…? Has there already been polling scheduled, done, completed or in the works on Bills 7, 14 or 15?

15.

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I first want to respond to the member’s quip about the choice of the word “research.” The reason we are using that word is that it’s more comprehensive than the word polling. Research includes polling, but it also includes focus groups, as I previously mentioned. So there is nothing cute there, simply trying to be reflective of the work being done.

In regards to the question, has there been polling on Bills 7, 14 and 15, the answer is no. However, we have done polling on tariff response, and it included gathering information on questions of strengthening the economy and expediting projects.

Peter Milobar: When was the polling on tariffs completed then?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: That particular research was in the field March 11 to 16.

Peter Milobar: That’s a couple of months ago now. So we must know (a) what it cost and (b) will it be released to the public.

[4:10 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The cost of that particular research was $30,000, and it’s generally not the practice of GCPE to release polling while it’s being used to inform cabinet deliberations.

Peter Milobar: Except these are extraordinary times. The government wants us all on the same page. They want us all pushing together. They don’t want opposition to be obstructionists. They want us to be part of Team B.C., part of Team Canada. Things need to be acted on urgently. We need to be moving quickly. We need to have a united front. All that language.

This was a week after the budget got released. There was polling done about tariff response: $30,000. Surrey policing was only $24,000 heading into an election to make sure that the government was doing what they thought would be in the political best interests of the government at the time.

So $30,000 in polling about an issue that this government has made the centre point. We heard it today. According to the Education Minister, K to 12 is being underfunded right now because of the President of the United States and the tariff war.

But we can’t have access to the polling because it’s guiding cabinet decisions — cabinet decisions that should be urgent and being dealt with quickly. I mean we’re not back in this place — in three days — for another several months.

One would think, if the government wanted the opposition to be working with them collaboratively, for the public to get on board with actions needing to be taken by the Finance Minister and the Premier — that having that level of understanding of what the true public sentiment is, not public sentiment for political gain but public sentiment for public good — the polling would be released, especially over two months, almost two and a half months, after it’s already been done.

Surely cabinet has already made their decisions if they’re trying to act urgently and expediently on things. I mean, public mood has probably even changed in that two and a half months. We’ve had the election federally. There’s been ever-shifting sands in the trade war. I don’t quite understand why there’d be a hesitancy to release the polling. And the minister said that GCPE doesn’t release the polling. Well it’s not GCPE’s to own; it’s cabinet.

Can the minister commit today, given the urgency of the fight against the tariff war and the urgency to make sure we’re taking decisive action and the urgency to make sure that we’re all rowing in the same direction, that we’re all in the same team in this chamber…? Can the minister commit today that that $30,000 worth of polling that happened two and a half months ago will actually get released — at a minimum, to the opposition, but certainly, to the public as a whole?

[4:15 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: To the member’s request: no, we’re not going to do that. It’s a long-standing principle to protect cabinet decision-making that advice and recommendations to executive council are not generally released. This, again, is to protect cabinet deliberations.

I will share with the member that I was very pleased to hear him say that these are extraordinary times. He sounded deeply concerned about the threat of tariffs, and I hoped that he would share that with the rest of his party.

Peter Milobar: Well, we are deeply concerned about tariffs. We’ve never said anything otherwise. But we’re also deeply concerned about how the government goes about trying to politicize the issue in terms of partisanship when it comes to any questions we ask in question period, when it comes to any questions we ask in budget estimates and when it comes to questions we ask about polling.

[4:20 p.m.]

Did that polling around tariff response back in early March…? Keeping in mind that we didn’t see anything in terms of legislation for tariff response until Bill 7, which was shortly after that polling, so it wouldn’t have informed that. Did the

we asked about polling. So did that polling around tariff response back in early March…? Keep in mind that we didn’t see anything in terms of legislation for tariff response until Bill 7, which was shortly after that polling, so it wouldn’t have informed that. Did the polling though help inform Bills 14 and 15 when they finally got brought forward to this house just a few weeks ago?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: It’s my view that this is a question that is beyond the probing of estimates of GCPE. GCPE is providing the polling. That’s the work that they do. We’re talking about the estimates and the expenses and timelines and everything of that nature is appropriate. But how the polling is used is beyond the estimates of GCPE in my view.

Peter Milobar: I was wondering when we’d start getting to “these aren’t relevant questions,” even though we have a budget book and a STOB 60 that has $432,000 plus another $110,000 in it. Granted that’s vote 27, and if the minister wants to stick specifically to vote 26, can she then answer when vote 27, vote 28, vote 46, all the other votes that the Ministry is responsible for, will come forward or are we just only going to be dealing with vote 26 and just pretend that there’s no other responsibilities of the Minister of Finance?

[4:25 p.m.]

[Mable Elmore in the chair.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I’m happy to answer questions related to all of my areas of responsibility related to the estimates. The votes that the member asked about will be moved at the end of the week.

Peter Milobar: Has GCPE started, have underway, completed any polling at all, any research from April 30 to today? If so, what were the topics or the themes of it?

[4:30 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: In regards to the member’s question as to whether there has been any polling underway from April 30 to today, the answer is no. There has been none in that time frame.

Peter Milobar: In terms of the overall advertising budget of GCPE, what is…? Independent of the polling/research of $542,000, what is the advertising spend anticipated for this year?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The advertising budget for GCPE for this fiscal is $3.537 million.

Peter Milobar: Thank you, and I’ll just assume that’s going to be similar, moving forward.

Previously, there were massive spends during Canucks games, which obviously haven’t been around for a little while, so no need to worry about that this year.

Given the constraints that the minister is trying to direct every other ministry under, has there been any direction by the minister to GCPE to change that number? It has been two months into the new fiscal. In this day and age of social media and other ways to push out, we certainly don’t necessarily need to have maximum saturation during a hockey game in the playoffs.

[4:35 p.m.]

Has there been any direction by the minister to show that leadership to all the other ministers and ministries and subsets of those ministries that the Minister of Finance, through GCPE, has decided that $3.5 million is too high and that in fact we’re going to cut it back to $3 million or $2.8 million

to all the other ministers and ministries and subsets of those ministries that the Minister of Finance, through GCPE, has decided that $3.5 million is too high and that in fact we’re going to cut it back to $3 million or $2.8 million? Pick a number. Has there been any direction whatsoever?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The direction on financial controls applies to GCPE, as they do to other aspects of government. GCPE is subject to the efficiency review, just as everyone else in government is.

Peter Milobar: GCPE is almost a $33 million budget. We know that they’re staffed at actually 98½ percent of what they would have been last year, so there’s been no constraint there of any shape or form. We know that their polling is at the same dollar value as it was last year. We now know that their advertising is at around the same dollar value as it was last year.

This is a department that’s under direct control of the Minister of Finance, who’s supposed to, by virtue of their mandate letter, be directing all of government to find efficiencies and cost savings and ways to save money. One would think that there would be leadership shown within this ministry to demonstrate to the other ministries that, yes, tough decisions had to be made.

One of the last questions I asked, in fact the last question, that we started today off with an answer to, was around non-essential things and core service reviews and how what one minister might think is essential the Minister of Finance might not and vice versa, and on and on it goes. If there’s not a clear delineation by the person at the top of this review of what should be deemed essential and what’s deemed extra, it’s going to make it pretty tough to identify any actual savings.

Is the minister saying that GCPE, despite the fact they fall directly under her leadership, is being left to their own to figure out whether or not they can find cost savings within their $33 billion budget?

[4:40 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: As the member knows, there are spending controls that have been brought in across government. That includes being applied to GCPE.

The next phase of the work that we are doing in our efficiency review is happening now. It would be premature for me to surmise what the outcomes of that work are because it’s ongoing right now. As I have mentioned to the member on previous occasions, we are going to be reporting back on this. We’ll start to see some information being shared in Q1.

This is important work that we’re doing very carefully. We’re doing it very precisely, and we’re doing it with the objective of protecting core services for British Columbians.

Peter Milobar: Can the minister clarify “being shown in Q1” as in sometime between now and the end of next month or being shown in the Q1 update, which is September 15?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The latter: the Q1 update.

Peter Milobar: So here’s the problem. We’re sure hearing a lot of “just trust us” from this government. It’s not going so well for the Premier right now.

We’re two months into the first quarter. I’ll get into all of this in more detail tomorrow because today’s about the Crowns, but we’re two months into the first quarter. We have a $2 billion hole in revenue blown through the budget that the minister doesn’t even want to acknowledge and keeps saying: “Well, wait until the Q1 update on September 15. We’ll talk about it then.”

We won’t talk about CleanBC till then. We won’t talk about any efficiencies or cuts that may or may not have been made — efficiencies and cuts that, by direction of the mandate letters, should have started well before even the budget was introduced, months before the budget was introduced. We’re now almost five to six months into ministers and ministries supposed to be finding efficiencies, and all we hear is they’re looking at things.

Can the minister not see why it might be problematic for the public to just trust the government yet again when, on something as simple as a $3.5 million advertising budget, an arm of government that is directly under the responsibility of the Minister of Finance, that’s supposed to be responsible for finding literally billions of dollars of savings, has not even been given the direction to rein in advertising spending? Not research and polling so cabinet can make decisions — I’m not even talking about that. I’m talking about advertising.

How can the minister reasonably expect other ministers to be making any meaningful decisions on spending within their ministries if she cannot even direct the advertising arm of the government that she is directly responsible for to make cuts to their budget on advertising?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Hon. Chair, through you to the member, they are misconstruing the work that is underway. I think British Columbians understand that when government is reviewing our spending, we have to do so in a very careful and thoughtful way.

[4:45 p.m.]

That’s what British Columbians will expect from us, and that is exactly what we were doing. Every single ministry is looking at their programs and their budgets to ensure that every dollar is being well spent. We’re looking under every rock. It’s being done very carefully.

I don’t own a magic wand where magically this work can happen. It’s happening through a

exactly what we were doing. Every single ministry is looking at their programs and their budgets to ensure that every dollar is being well spent. We’re looking under every rock. It’s being done very carefully.

I don’t own a magic wand where magically, this work can happen. It’s happening through a thorough process that is occurring in every ministry, my ministry included. My ministry did not go before the other ministries. We’re all doing this work now. This is deeply important. It’s deeply important that it’s done carefully and thoughtfully, and that is exactly what we were doing.

We’re going to be able to report out. Our initial report out will be in the Q1 report, which will be in September.

Peter Milobar: Will that Q1 report, then, include a very detailed breakdown of the cost savings and changes to the individual budgets? Q1 reports don’t typically do that.

Will there be a full accounting, given that there’s been such lack of transparency and willingness to discuss even the most fundamental and basic things like advertising budgets and given that we’re going to have to wait until September 15 to get any clarity, it sounds like?

Is the minister committing today that there will be a full accounting for all those decisions that were made in this Q1 time frame, highlighted and clearly understood within the Q1 update in mid-September?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Hon. Chair, may I request a five- or ten-minute bio break?

The Chair: Certainly. The committee will be in recess for ten minutes.

The committee recessed from 4:47 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

The committee recessed from 4:47 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

[Mable Elmore in the chair.]

The Chair: I’ll call the committee

The committee recessed from 4:47 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

[Mable Elmore in the chair.]

The Chair: I’ll call the committee back to order. We’re in Committee of Supply estimates, continuing for the Ministry of Finance.

Hon. Brenda Bailey: We left off with a question in regards to the Q1 update, which I’ll answer now. The Q1 update will reflect initial government decisions on our spending review, and more will be reflected in Budget ’26.

Peter Milobar: Wow. So this is getting to be quite the budget estimates, on the actual budget where we can’t actually get any answers, because we’re going to talk about a snapshot in time on something that’s completely irrelevant and be told to wait until Q1 update. But now we just heard that the Q1 update will be a brief overview and more detail in next year’s budget. This is a $90-plus billion operation we’re talking about, and we can’t get direct answers.

This is supposed to be all about efficiencies and finding efficiencies and finding things that can be cut that aren’t needed, that are non-essential, because the government says that they don’t want to cut core services to people. Yet we had parents protesting today about cuts to education that the minister and the ministry and the government don’t want to acknowledge is actually happening.

The minister can say there hasn’t been cuts; then she can go and talk to the 80 people in Kamloops that lost their jobs at the Kamloops school district because of a lack of funding for that school district. If she thinks that’s not a cut, I don’t know what is.

But we’re going to protect the GCPE advertising budget at all costs it sounds like. Six months — no decision has been made on a $3½ million advertising budget, of all things. The minister mentioned earlier that GCPE provides oversight and guidance to things like health authority communication departments. So we have health authorities that have their own large communication departments that interconnect with GCPE.

One would have to assume that the same would hold true for universities, for ICBC, for any B.C. lotteries which have come up after GCPE today, for any of those agencies. Has the minister, in conjunction with GCPE — as part of the efficiency reviews that were supposed to be well underway at this point — taken any look at the overall size of communication departments across government not just within GCPE but all of those ones that GCPE interacts with?

And have any decisions been started to be made about the overall size of the communication arms of all things government in British Columbia, be it at a health authority level, be it at GCPE — which it sounds like the two interconnect? And the minister shook her head saying no, but when I was asking questions about Interior Health, that was very clearly what she was saying. So it shouldn’t have changed operation with GCPE in the course of two hours, given that the head of GCPE is here currently.

What efficiencies is the minister looking for within GCPE and their $33 million budget? Or are they hands-off and there will be no cost savings at GCPE? Because the minister has indicated they’re going to have the same amount of money to spend next year when it relates to polling as they have this year. That was the same as last year. So no change there.

No change in advertising. We must make sure we have a full ad buy on any popular sporting event, apparently, to tell something that the government is doing, to try to convince people things aren’t as bad in B.C. as they might be otherwise.

[5:05 p.m.]

What efficiencies within GCPE is the minister looking for? I’m not even asking about other ministries. I’m asking about Vote 27, which is directly under the control of the Minister of Finance, 100 percent. And the overall efficiency review is supposed to be overseen by the Minister of Finance — for all of government. What leadership is being shown with the minister through GCPE to the rest

100 percent. And the overall efficiency review is supposed to be overseen by the Minister of Finance for all of government. What leadership is being shown with the minister through GCPE to the rest of government when it comes to this efficiency review or is there going to be no cost savings whatsoever to be found in GCPE?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The member has chosen to wrongly characterize what is going on in terms of our efficiency review and how it’s being reflected in the estimates that we’re debating today. So I will be very clear.

We’re discussing the estimates from the budget, Budget ‘25. It includes $300 million of what we expect to be the initial results of an efficiency review. We are not able to share with the member decisions made on the efficiency review because they haven’t been made yet. The work is going on right now across government, including in everything that I’m responsible for. It’s that simple.

We’re talking about the budget, Budget ‘25, and it’s reflected in the budget as $300 million of savings. The work that we’re doing right now is reviewing every single ministry to look at where we can find savings. We expect to reach that $300 million mark, and it’s my hope we go further. That work is ongoing. It must happen at some moment in time. It has to happen at some moment in time, and there will inherently be time when we don’t have the specific results from it because we’re in the middle of doing it.

That’s simply where we are. This is important work. It’s being done carefully. It’s being done thoroughly. It’s being done with prioritizing the core services for British Columbians, and that’s the work that we’re undergoing.

Peter Milobar: I’m going to need some clarification on that because, I think, the impression, certainly through the media, certainly that I’ve had, certainly that the public has had, is that whenever the minister has talked about $300 million of savings in this year’s budget, it’s already been accounted for. So is the minister saying that if they do not find $300 million worth of savings, we actually have an $11.2 billion deficit based on the budget that was released on March 4?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Not at all. The $300 million is the initial savings that we have booked for the work that we are doing right now that will lead to that number or more. That is the work that is going on right now.

Peter Milobar: So to be clear then, the minister’s path to a balanced budget goal is to take a $10.9 billion deficit and reduce it to $10.6 billion.

[5:10 p.m.-5:15 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: To get back to the question of the fiscal review that’s underway, the first lens that we have applied is one of expenditure controls. Those began in February — things like salaries, travel, professional services, office supplies, business expenses, office leases, tenant improvements and more. So that’s the initial sort of lens by which we began this work of efficiency review.

The part that we’re in now are the program reviews. I’m not going to be pushed into a situation of presupposing what the outcomes of those reviews are going to be. We’re doing the reviews right now. It’s important work, and it’s being done with a very careful lens. I’m very encouraged by the work, and all ministries are deeply involved in it. They’ve all received specific instruction from the Premier that they must work with the Minister of Finance on finding efficiencies, and that’s the work that we’re doing.

I want to make two corrections to the member, who incorrectly stated two things in his last question. It is not true that GCPE provides oversight. That’s why I shook my head. They do not provide oversight to, for example, the Ministry of Health, the communications team. And also, Education has not been cut. There was a $370 million increase in the last budget to Education.

Peter Milobar: This is incredible. I walked the minister through, with GCPE actually being a roadblock to me getting a meeting with Interior Health. And the minister said very clearly that GCPE coordinates with the ministry, Interior Health and all the health authorities around direction they should or shouldn’t be taking on matters of communication.

We’ll pull the Blues up, and I’m paraphrasing a little, but if the minister wants to really get into parsing versus what the theme and the context of what she was saying is, it’s going to be a long few days. Frankly, it took eight minutes to get a non-answer.

The question was about the…. I’m not even asking where the $300 million is coming from. I’m asking for clarification on the $300 million. The question was…. There is currently booked — which we know is a flawed number anyways, but I’ll get into that tomorrow — a $10.9 billion deficit.

The question was: if the $300 million of savings is not found, does that mean we have an $11.2 billion deficit? The minister said no. So I said that then means you need to find the $300 million in savings to get us down to a $10.6 billion deficit.

[5:20 p.m.]

Is that the goal of finding $300 million? If not, I don’t understand how the government math is working these days, with their moments in time, on a document that apparently is completely out of date and inaccurate.

deficit. Is that the goal of finding $300 million? If not, I don’t understand how the government math is working these days with their moments in time on a document that apparently is completely out of date and inaccurate.

The Chair: Just a reminder, questions and answers through the Chair.

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Thank you, hon. Chair. Through you to the member, the $10.9 billion deficit assumes the $300 million in savings.

I do continue to push back on your choice of language in reflecting my language. I was very specific, when we talked about the GCPE, that it’s a collaborative approach, that it’s flow-through information from the MO. When you choose to use words that are different than what I’ve said, I’m going to respond to that. I did not say that there was a control. That is not correct. I’m not going to have words put in my mouth, so the correction stands.

Peter Milobar: Direct from IHA: “We are just waiting on direction from GCPE regarding MLA meeting requests.” The minister can try to spin it any way she wants. GCPE has created roadblocks for MLAs to try to get meetings with health authorities. Plain and simple. It’s in writing from a health authority. Surely they understand the difference between their own internal communications department and GCPE, because they spelt out the initials in bold letters. That’s not an autocorrect. That’s not a spell-check. It’s not a cut-and-paste error.

If I sound agitated about it, it’s because it’s about health care in my riding, and I’ve been waiting since December for a meeting that GCPE apparently hasn’t approved.

Now, the minister a little while ago, when I asked about the $10.9 billion, if $300 million is not found, said, “No, no, it wouldn’t go to $11.2 billion, but it also won’t drop it to $10.6 billion,” which means the $300 million of savings must have already been accounted for in various line items in this budget.

Why is the minister refusing to say where those $300 million in savings that have currently been identified in the budget and have already made up the $10.9 billion deficit are? Why can we not find out from the minister where those $300 million of efficiencies have already been found in this year’s budget, given that it’s not going to change what the projected deficit is?

[5:25 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The $300 million in expenditure management is a target that we expect to achieve in the category of discretionary and administrative spending. It represents half of a percent of ministry budgets.

[5:30 p.m.]

This is a multi-step play, and it’s a separate thing than the efficiency reviews that are underway across ministry.

Peter Milobar: Except the minister has indicated that the efficiency reviews are targeting $300 million this year, $600 million next year and $600 million the next year

the efficiency reviews that are underway across ministry.

Peter Milobar: Except the Minister has indicated that the efficiency review reviews are targeting $300 million this year, $600 million next year and $600 million next year. Is the minister now saying that that efficiency review will target dollars other than that? And if so what is the dollar figure that is being targeted?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I will just refer the member to page 20 of Budget 2025 on the top right corner where it really speaks to what we’re talking about right now: the two components of the expender management and program review. The expenditure management targets total $1.5 billion — $300 million, $600 million and $600 million — to be achieved through management of administrative and discretionary spending while still protecting frontline services people rely on. Expenditure management will continue through ‘25-26 fiscal year and beyond.

The second component is the Ministry of Finance will also be working with ministries to review all existing government programs and initiatives, to optimize resources by ensuring programs remain relevant, are efficient and sustainable, grow the economy and help keep costs low for British Columbians. That’s the efficiency review component that we are involved in now, and that work is underway. As I’ve mentioned and the member is tired of hearing me say, we’ll have initial results on that in Q1 reporting and further results shown in Budget ‘26.

Peter Milobar: I do not understand then how we have a budget document that has already accounted for $300 million in cost efficiencies. Because the $10.9 billion deficit will not change, the $300 million needs to have been found, which means the government would have already had to have budgeted in those various areas to not expend that money, because that money does not exist in this budget for expenditure.

Can the minister provide us with a reconciliation of where that $300 million was found in the creation of this fiscal plan? It doesn’t exist in the book. It doesn’t need to be found; it’s already been found. Yet the minister is unwilling to say where, other than non-essential — travel. Well, which ministries and how much? Because when we’ve asked the other ministers, they said we have to wait until Q1. But Q1 is irrelevant to this. It doesn’t exist in this book.

[5:35 p.m.]

The $300 million has already been removed from spending, according to the minister, or it would impact the deficit situation, positively or negatively, once it was found. It’s been found already. It was found before this went to the King’s Printer.

Can the minister provide to this House, as is required, for us to properly do our jobs during budget estimates

once it was found. It’s been found already. It was found before this went to the King’s Printer.

Can the minister provide to this House, as is required for us to properly do our jobs during budget estimates — otherwise, it is a point of privilege — the accounting of the $300 million, of where exactly those savings were found and a detailed itemized list of it?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I think the member is struggling with what a budget is. A budget is a plan. It is a future-facing document, not a past-facing document. This plan very clearly includes $300 million in savings that is found through the items that we have already identified to the member. This is a plan. This is the work that is happening now. That is what a budget is. It’s the plan for the year. It’s not a past-facing document; it is a future-facing document.

Peter Milobar: Madam Chair, I am not sure how to proceed. I’m going to need a little advice from the Clerk’s table here. The minister has very clearly said the $300 million has already been found and not in this budget. It will not impact the deficit positively or negatively.

She’s now saying, no, it’s a work in progress. We’re getting literally two different answers on the exact same question from this minister repeatedly. Does the minister want to change her answer, then, as the $300 million relates to the deficit or not?

I’ve asked very clearly: if the $300 million is not found, will it impact the deficit and increase it to $11.2 billion? The minister said no. I then asked: if the $300 million is found, does that mean the deficit drops to $10.6 billion? The minister said, no, it stays at $10.9 because it’s already been found, which means it’s not in the projections for expenditures in this budget document, which means it had to have been removed for it to be called savings.

Otherwise it wasn’t savings, because nothing was removed, in which case, the minister is using completely inappropriate language to describe the $300 million as savings. If it’s the savings of what was otherwise budgeted, where is the detailed itemized list of where those $300 million were saved?

It’s pretty straightforward, and for the minister to suggest that I don’t understand budgeting is frankly absurd. It’s even more absurd, given the evasion of the answers we’re getting on this. It’s a pretty straightforward question.

The minister has made it very clear the $300 million is not part of this budget book but it’s savings. And if it’s savings, that means it has been removed from our projected expenditure to make it into the final book. That is what this government has been touting since budget day — that they found $300 million of savings. It’s actually 0.33 percent of the overall budget, not 0.5.

[5:40 p.m.]

We’re asking where those savings were found. What was cut? What was not approved for expenditure that otherwise was going to be? That is what is called a savings. It’s not just pulling a number out of the air and saying, “Oh, we saved $300 million,” without actually being able to show your work

what was cut, what was not approved for expenditure that otherwise was going to be. That is what is called a savings, not just pulling a number out of the air and saying, “Oh, we saved $300 million,” without actually being able to show your work.

I’m not sure how the minister thinks we can keep proceeding with these snapshot-in-time conversations about forward-looking documents when I’m trying to ask about the creation of this forward-looking document and the snapshot in time that led her to believe there was $300 million worth of savings. Can the minister provide a detailed breakdown of where that $300 million in savings was found in this year’s fiscal plan?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I’m going to tackle this from a different angle and see if we have more luck.

The budget includes an expenditure management target, a savings line, and that is the value of the financial controls that we have put in place. That’s what we’ve been talking about.

The expenditure management controls, for the member, include STOB 50, salaries; STOB 57, travel; STOB 60-61, professional services; STOB 65, office and business expenses; STOB 66, informational advertising; STOB 68, statutory advertising and publications; STOB 73, amortization; STOB 75, tenant improvements; STOB 77, transfer grants; and STOB 80, transfer shared cost arrangements. Those are the STOBs that are identified in the expenditure management.

Peter Milobar: I will wait until I have the Blues for tomorrow and come back to this, because the minister very clearly made some very clear statements about the money already being out of this budget. Frankly, the fact she lists off STOBs is wonderful. I’m asking for how much money out of each of those STOBs, and that’s what the minister doesn’t seem to want to answer. So we’ll wait for that.

There’s really not much point continuing on with GCPE at this point because it appears those answers aren’t forthcoming either.

[5:45 p.m.]

We might as well move on to BCLC, if the minister has them around. I know we might need a few minutes to switch out.

BCLC, if the minister has them around. I know we might need a few minutes to switch out.

I’ve got quite a bit to dive into with BCLC this year, and a lot of it is around the virtual gaming space. I do recognize that GPEB plays a side to it, so I know there will be a little bit of crossover on some of my questions, but there is still a financial mix to all of these themes and questions.

My understanding is that it’s the position of BCLC that they should be the sole provider of e-gaming in British Columbia and that there should be no outside Bet365s, Bet99s, those types of things that we see flooded on commercials right before and after GCPE ads — that we would see those be the only site and not those other out-of-province operations. Is that still the position of BCLC?

[5:50 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The government has not changed its position. We are the only legal provider of online gaming, but we do acknowledge that there is a challenge with illegal gaming in the

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The government has not changed its position. We are the only legal provider of online gaming. But we do acknowledge that there is a challenge with illegal gaming in the B.C. market.

BCLC is concerned about player health and continues to advocate for enforcement measures both provincially and nationally, as well as to promote player education. BCLC also continues to work with the PSSG’s gaming policy enforcement branch to address illegal online gambling.

In 2022, BCLC joined with other regulated provincial organizations to create the Canadian Lottery Coalition to combat illegal online gambling activities through education and through collective legal action. As part of its actions, the coalition intervened in the Ontario reference case on international liquidity, emphasizing fraud and money laundering concerns.

As well, to remain competitive, BCLC is focused on providing excellent player experiences and advertising campaigns which emphasize the risk of gambling on illegal sites and the benefits of keeping profits here in British Columbia.

Peter Milobar: So the government has taken those steps. Is the government taking any steps within B.C. itself to try to protect its overall revenue streams and any leakage that may be happening to people using sites that are not regulated within B.C.?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: There have been efforts in B.C. to protect overall revenue streams, including educating players on the implications and the risks of illegal gambling and the benefits of gambling within British Columbia on the legal site. There is an advertising campaign called “What’s played here stays here.” That’s an example of that work.

Peter Milobar: Has the minister or the Ministry of Finance met with these outside providers in their desire to be allowed to operate within B.C. and have a series of regulations set up so that they could operate here?

[5:55 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I am aware of this request being known to government, the desire to open that opportunity. I have not personally met with any of these folks.

Peter Milobar: So the minister hasn’t personally met with any of the providers. Has her ministry met with them?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I just would like a clarifying question. Is the member specifically referring to during the time that I have been Finance Minister, or would they like me to look back at previous timelines?

Peter Milobar: It’s “has the government in general” but obviously the Finance Ministry or minister. I’m not so worried about the semantics of timeline. It’s if they’ve been meeting with this industry that’s trying to get a toehold in B.C. — that’s currently operating illegally — or not. I’m trying to ascertain if there have been meetings or not that have taken place.

Hon. Brenda Bailey: At the Ministry of Finance, there have been staff-level meetings before the timeline that I was Finance Minister. I’m learning from my team that there have been staff-level meetings.

Peter Milobar: Now, I can totally understand why an industry that would like to set up in B.C. would want to have meetings with government. However, they are at this point…. It’s not a grey area. They’re operating illegally in B.C. at the same time. Have there been any conditions put, moving forward, by the minister or the ministry that any future meetings will only happen if operations cease in B.C. until proper regulations are in place?

[6:00 p.m.]

[Lorne Doerkson in the chair.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I think that there may in fact be times when meeting with folks who are operating in our market illegally could be helpful in regards to reviewing of policies and considerations, particularly those operating in the Ontario market. So I could see a situation where there may be a benefit to have those meetings. But I reiterate that in the Ministry of Finance, we haven’t had any of those meetings in the last six months.

Peter Milobar: Nothing in the last six months, I heard.

What is the order of magnitude this year that lotteries has pegged the revenue drop associated with this type of activity? I notice some gaming revenues are dropping. We’re struggling to be at, or we’re not even at, 2018-2019 revenues.

[6:05 p.m.]

The population of B.C. at that time was almost one million people less than it is now. One would think with population growth, post-COVID enough time frame, everything else, that our in-person sites and our online gaming platforms ourselves, especially going to single-game bets

population of B.C. at that time was almost a million people less than it is now. One would think, with population growth — post COVID, enough time frame, everything else — that our in-person sites and our online gaming platforms, especially going to single-game bets, would see a revenue increase, not be struggling to get back to the 2018-2019 revenue levels.

What is the projected revenue hit overall in B.C. right now that B.C. Lotteries is using as a number?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The member made reference to a decline in revenues from 2018 to now. My understanding is that the revenues in the larger category of gambling, specifically the online component, have actually increased year over year moderately. I’ll share with the member that the fiscal year 2024-25, projected, is $460 million and 2025-26 is $499 million.

Peter Milobar: That’s great. It’s not great for the bricks-and-mortar operators then. That means that their business is even suffering more.

But the question was: what is the projected revenue loss that B.C. Lotteries is feeling the government is not receiving as a result of these out-of-province online operators? We’re at a point where, as the minister says, we’re scraping to find all the pennies and efficiencies, and we can find efficiencies, and we can also find more revenue.

[6:10 p.m.]

What is the lost revenue that B.C. Lotteries is currently charting, or using as a working number, for the impact of these operators?

revenue that B.C. Lotteries is currently charting or using as a working number for the impact of these operators.

[6:15 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Thank you to the member opposite for waiting for an answer on this question. As indicated by how long it took for me to consult on that, it’s a deeply complex question.

I’m going to share with the member some back-of-the-napkin math. Of course these illegal operators don’t open their books to us. They don’t share their data with us. But there has been some work done on estimates of how much money is leaving the province to these illegal operators. Where we’ve come to — and, again, this is not confirmed; this is an estimate — is that we think that it may be as high as $400 million.

To try and figure out what could be done about that, I’ll share that the U.K. has a model where we think they’ve captured about 80 percent of their illegal gambling. So in an imaginary world where we had perfect enforcement and could capture 80 percent, BCLC returns back 54 percent to government, and that number would be $172 million. That’s in a perfect enforcement scenario.

In regards to regulating, though, that’s work we’re undergoing right now, to ask the question about what would a regulated market look like. We don’t know yet what the result to that research will be, but essentially it asks the question: if this market were regulated, would it be revenue-generating, or would it cannibalize the current offerings through the BCLC? We’re reviewing that now.

Peter Milobar: Well, the minister may want to double-check with her staff as well because it appears, based on lobbyist registries, that perhaps high-level ministry staff are still meeting with the industry as recently as end of February, which would only be a couple of months, not six months.

I’m asking these questions because there are large dollars involved. That net $174 million, $175 million, that’s over half of what the minister says they’re trying to find for savings in the first place. There are also impacts to those brick-and-mortar operators, and I’ll get into that in a little bit.

[6:20 p.m.]

This is my third year as Finance critic. We’ve asked these questions every year. It appears the studying is endless, but the decision-making never seems to happen. Year after year ministers have talked about illegal gaming, but no action.

It appears the studying is endless, but the decision-making never seems to happen. Year after year, ministers have talked about illegal gaming, but no action.

We at least go through trying to take steps around other sorts of illegal activity. Yet here, the government seems, year after year after year, to say: “Well, we’re in discussions. We’re modelling. We’re thinking about it. We’re talking about it.”

The off-province operators want to be regulated. That’s pretty clear. They want in the market legally. BCLC has a difference of opinion on that, and so do bricks-and-mortar operators, which is understandable. I’m simply trying to figure out what direction the province is actually taking on this.

You have high-level meetings that keep taking place with no caveats that will keep meeting with you to talk about a path to regulation. But you have to stop operating in this jurisdiction, if you want to be actually in this jurisdiction, as a show of good faith. So instead, it’s endless meetings. Meanwhile, the operators just keep operating. BCLC sees a drain on their revenues, and ultimately, we see a drain to the bottom line for the taxpayers of British Columbia.

Given the urgency the minister has been talking about with the state of our finances, and given the significant revenue hit this is making — or not, potentially, if it’s regulated — is there a timeline to either bring in regulation or actually cut it off? This never-ending loop of just discussing it and acknowledging and everyone recognizing the problem does nothing to our bottom line.

It does nothing for bricks-and-mortar operators, it does nothing for BCLC’s online gaming operations, and it does nothing for the out-of-province operators operating illegally. They might not like the regulations you bring in, but at least they would have the rules that they’re operating under or not. But if the province is not prepared to regulate it, why do they allow it to keep happening? What is the timeline to have a final determination one way or the other for all of those industries involved that have significant dollars invested?

[6:25 p.m.-6:30 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I first just want to respond. I did speak in error. We do have a result of a lobbyist meeting with Canadian Online Gaming Alliance on March 31 with an executive in the policy and legislative division. My apologies for misspeaking.

The member portrayed that there have been a number of ministers working on this file, accurately so. But I will share that there has been a lot of work along the way and decisions along the way as well. When Ontario made the decision to legalize the illegal gambling space, it provided us an opportunity to do some good evaluation and analysis to help inform our decisions. We continue to watch and work on this, watching how it goes in Ontario, but we do have some initial information that I’m happy to share with the member opposite.

First of all, Ontario actually brings in less on a per capita basis in their online gambling program than we do here in British Columbia. In British Columbia, BCLC brings in $62 per capita, whereas in Ontario, it is $40. It’s also the view of the members here from BCLC that it has had a negative effect on the bricks-and-mortar side of business. It has cannibalized that business in Ontario.

I will also share with the member that some of the work that we have done in the time frame that he has referenced is introduce the program “What plays here stays here” in order to help British Columbians become aware of the importance of decisions they make with their gambling dollars and the implications of those decisions.

I will also share that we do know that Alberta has now announced that they will be opening their market and interestingly, the Finance Minister said it wasn’t a financial decision. We are interested in that. There’s ongoing work right now happening within the ministry on the question of whether regulation would be positive in regards to revenue or negative.

The last thing I want to mention to the member on this particular question is that it’s not only a financial question — it is a revenue question for sure — but also a player health question. British Columbia is considered a world leader in regards to our player health and our programming. We’re award-winning. We’re very proud of that work. And it’s an important consideration for us as well.

Peter Milobar: The minister referenced it impacts bricks-and-mortar operations. So we’ve ascertained the order of magnitude, the back of the napkin guess, that BCLC has around $400 million, which translates to about $174 million net to government. What has been the modeled impact of bricks and mortar with this activity that BCLC has been able to track?

[6:35 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Could I just ask for a quick clarification in regards to the question? Two of us heard it different ways. Is the member asking: what is the impact of illegal gambling in British Columbia on our bricks-and-mortar companies, or is the member…? Yes? Yes. Okay, thank you.

There has been a slight decline in land-based casino revenue, but we haven’t been able to isolate the reason for that decline. I will also share that BCLC actually works with land-based service providers to ensure that there is complementary service and there is cooperation between them.

Peter Milobar: Well, if BCLC’s online portfolio revenues are up — fairly dramatically, actually, by the sounds of it — but overall revenues are down, it’s not a slight drop with bricks and mortar. What is the actual drop in bricks and mortar over the last couple of years then?

[6:40 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: It might be a small number in terms of percentages, 3 percent, but because casino gambling is such a large revenue generator for the province, it’s a big number, $60 million. That’s the decrease year over year, whereas for online gaming, it’s a 4.5 percent increase, but that actually only comes to $20 million. So that’s the difference.

Peter Milobar: Well, I’m kind of jumping around, so I’ll come back to bricks and mortar in a minute, I guess, just try to close out on the online portion.

Basically, I’m coming back to the question around timelines, in terms of what the minister and BCLC’s expectation would be.

[6:45 p.m.]

It seems, on the one hand, we’re asking BCLC to continue to push and maximize their online as well as working with bricks and mortar to make sure those partners are healthy. Yet, at the same time, we’re not providing guidance or certainty that those other operators either will be regulated or won’t be regulated into the market. We’re not providing any certainty to those outside operators whether they will have a path to regulation or not.

are healthy, yet at the same time we’re not providing guidance or certainty that those other operators either will be regulated or won’t be regulated into the market. We’re not providing any certainty to those outside operators whether they will have a path to regulation or not.

We have other Canadian jurisdictions that have been doing this for quite some time. Ontario, namely, I believe, was the first one to do it. So there’s lots of data. There’s been lots of discussion. There’s been meetings even up to the end of March, meetings happening.

What is the timeline for a definitive answer from government of yes or no? And if it’s a no, is finance pushing for the enforcement side, under the guise of protecting revenues for the province, to take further steps to ensure that we’re not regulating? That means there’ll be no more…. There’ll be ways to block it or stop it or action taken. Or is it just going to be this perpetual never, ever decision, and all investors are going to have to be trying to figure out an ever-shifting playing field that doesn’t really have a set of rules and regulations to it for anyone?

[6:50 p.m.]

[6:55 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: There really has been a large amount of work done on this file

Hon. Brenda Bailey: There really has been a large amount of work done on this file to learn about the implications in other markets and what’s happening here. I would say it’s not correct to say that no decision has been made. A decision not to do it is also a decision.

That’s really where we are so far, but it’s a moving landscape. And it’s important that we, through the normal course of business, keep analyzing whether that is the right decision because of the complexity of the market and the changes in the market and of course the additional compulsion of the importance of the additional revenue.

In regards to enforcement, I’ll point out that this is a particularly difficult area to enforce. It’s not just British Columbia that struggles with it. This is true in all markets. Ontario has been struggling with enforcement. Even the U.K., which is really kind of the leader of online gambling and enforcement, hasn’t fully been able to enforce. We’re continuing to look at all the levers that other markets are exploring and that we’re exploring in regards to enforcement.

Peter Milobar: Well, again, I’m not saying work hasn’t been done, but final decisions, though, haven’t been made. That’s the key piece here — that there doesn’t seem to be any indication of a timeline of a defined decision. So the door is wide open, and it leaves a lot of uncertainty to the bricks and mortar, and 14,000 people rely on that. Communities that host rely on the revenues from them. And frankly the out-of-jurisdiction online operators probably would like to know what actually is going to happen or not happen as well.

Not taking definitive action, yeah, might make enforcement hard, but there are lots of things that are hard to enforce. It doesn’t mean we don’t stop trying to enforce them, especially if we’re seeing massive revenue drops and a hit to not just B.C.’s online gaming but also the bricks-and-mortar side of things.

Like I say, I can also understand, though, why the out-of-jurisdiction people want regulation and want to be operating legally in B.C. That’s where that uncertainty piece comes in, and I think everyone is just trying to get certainty. We’re not getting that out of government currently.

In terms of the bricks and mortar, though, as I say, there are upwards of 14,000, probably 25 or so spinoff related jobs, as well, connected to it. What steps has BCLC been looking at or initiating or working in conjunction with the bricks-and-mortar side to try to regain their business so that they are more stable? Because that obviously leads to a lot more community benefit in the communities that they have hosting agreements with as well.

[7:00 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: BCLC has made some significant investments in programs to assist land-based casinos, really for exactly the reasons that the member correctly articulated. They are important to us, and they contribute in many ways, not only in jobs and in the community and also, of course, to funding many important social services.

To share with the member some of the programs that we’ve been investing in to support the land-based casinos, one example is a temporary slot commission program that has allowed an increase in the percentage of slot takes that goes to the casino operators so that they can make investments in their casinos and specifically investments in things like food and beverage and better amenities. One example would be the Gordon Ramsay new food and beverage program at River Rock Casino, for example. I’ll share with the member opposite that last fiscal that was a $15 million program, and it’s expected to be $18.7 million this fiscal.

We also created and launched sportsbooks in casinos. I didn’t know what that meant, so I asked the team, and they explained that it’s essentially sport lounges that have food and beverage offerings as well.

We have three other examples. We’re trialling changes to the mix of games that are on the floors in the land-based casinos. It is about different types and styles, also with a different mix of payouts, also increase in the number of leased products using known IP — things like James Bond games or Wheel of Fortune games, things of that nature. The last one is there’s been regionalized marketing and promotions programs as well.

[7:05 p.m.]

Peter Milobar: What is the host community cut for this year anticipated to be, and how does that compare to last year?

cut for this year anticipated to be and how does that compare to last year?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The numbers for ’23-24 are $94 million, and the numbers for ’24-25 are projected at $86 million.

Peter Milobar: Is the drop…? I’ll have to be refreshed a little bit as my municipal days are a little behind me. I can’t remember if it’s 10 percent directly tied to the ones within each jurisdiction or if it’s cumulative. I’m assuming it’s tied to each jurisdiction, so in Kamloops’s case…. Actually, both happen to be in my new riding, both casinos. I think I might be the only MLA in B.C. that has two casinos in the same riding — at least in the same city.

Anyways, is that drop…? It’s around $6 million, it sounds like. Is it predominantly in one community, or is it spread out evenly across all communities, in terms of where the impact seems to be felt? In other words, are there one or two jurisdictions that are seeing significant declines and others are holding steady or is it a kind of across-the-board decline?

[7:10 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: We have a list of the different casinos and the revenue breakdown. If the member would like, we could share that with the member. Just giving a glance at it, it’s our perspective on first glance that it doesn’t look like there’s any dramatic changes. It looks like it’s evenly distributed across the casinos.

Peter Milobar: Well, that’s good, and I guess that’s bad in a way, too, because it also, one could say, shows a systemic decline, in general, in terms of what’s going on in the bricks-and-mortar locations across B.C., be it a bingo hall or a full-on casino or anything in between.

So that’s the community host grants, but there’s also the First Nations revenue share agreement. What was projected for this year? Also, what was last year? Then, what’s the differential there?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I’ve got some numbers to share with the member in regards to the First Nations revenue sharing in millions. In the years ’21-22, $91.2 million; ’22-23, $113.6 million; ’23-24, $107.5 million; and ’24-25, projected $97 million.

Peter Milobar: Can the minister refresh my memory, then, as to why there is a difference between the host community grants that were received based on the 10 percent? Is it because that’s calculated that the First Nations is taken off, and that’s considered a cost, so the net for hosting is different for the hosting communities, because the net is a higher net for the First Nations calculation? That happens, it gets paid out, and then it gets deducted off, obviously. And the new net that the host communities are based on is minus the payout on the First Nations agreement?

[7:15 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I’ll just explain the two different models that are used for these calculations. The member was first asking about the host community cut. The calculation there is the casino that is within that community…. It’s 10 percent of the gaming revenue, so not other operations but gaming revenue. The model of calculation for the First Nations sharing is 7 percent overall, so all gaming in the province. That includes three revenue sources, which would be online gaming, brick-and-mortar casino and also B.C. Lottery Corp.

Peter Milobar: Thanks for that clarification. I couldn’t remember the exact way it all got brought in. Obviously, it’s still in that $100-million-dollar ballpark, which was always what was projected, I believe, when it first got announced. It was a 20-year projection. I think it was. I’m going off the top of my head. And it was billed as a $2-billion, 20-year commitment. So we’re still in that 97 range. We’re close to the hundred, and obviously that’s just a guesstimate — when it was first brought out.

What are the projections in this fiscal plan, then, over the next couple of years, for that Indigenous side and the possible implications if it continues to drop?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The projections in the fiscal plan ’25-26 are $96 million; ’26-27, $100 million; ’27-28, $103 million.

[7:20 p.m.]

Peter Milobar: Has there been any outreach to the host communities in advance of what seems to be declining host grants, so that, for their planning purposes, they’re aware that there’s going to be a significant change to projected revenues? I’ll only speak for Kamloops, because I know how they budget it. They budget it for the nice-to-do’s, because they know it’s a fluctuating number every year, so it’s never put into anything that’s ongoing.

They’re aware that there’s going to be a significant change to projected revenues. I only speak for Kamloops because I know how they budget it. They budget it for the nice-to-do’s, because they know it’s a fluctuating number every year. So it’s never put into anything that’s ongoing. It’s always one-time projects that otherwise would not happen — things to do in parks and things of that nature.

What type of communication has been done? My view of it might be a little skewed coming from Kamloops because B.C. Lotteries headquarters and city hall share a wall. So you tend to have a little bit more conversation perhaps between staff and that level than maybe their other communities might enjoy. So just getting a sense of what type of communication is happening with those other host communities.

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I understand that the stakeholder engagement team meets regularly with a number of different communities, including UBCM, and we always have a team present at UBCM as well. In addition to that, they meet quarterly with the First Nations Revenue Sharing Partnership. As I said, quarterly.

Peter Milobar: Just going to touch a bit on overall operations of BCLC and where that’s headed. I’m wondering if I could get an updated org overview, I guess, of what the staffing complement and executive complement in Kamloops looks like and what it looks like down in Vancouver — I almost said Richmond, and I remembered that it had moved.

A perennial question that comes out of any politician’s mouth from Kamloops is always around making sure that those executive positions and staffing complement at what is supposed to be the headquarters in Kamloops is still strong. So if we can get a breakdown of the two locations.

[7:25 p.m.-7:30 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: We captured data at ‘22-23, and as of March 31 of that year, there were 1,237 employees: in Kamloops, 596 and in Vancouver, 472.

In ’23-24 and ’24-25, the data capture changed a bit. Rather than capturing by Kamloops or Vancouver, they also captured Kamloops office, Vancouver office, remote worker and mobile worker. Many people became remote workers, but they’re still tied to a desk.

Let me share those numbers first: ‘23-24, 14 percent Kamloops, 13 Vancouver. That’s the same ‘24-25: 14 Kamloops, 13 Vancouver, 56 remote, and then a smaller number mobile. The team has shared with me that it’s their understanding that although workers are identified as remote, they’re still tied to the desk that they were tied to. When they come in, they come into that place. It’s not our expectation that those numbers from ‘22-23 will have shifted even though the capture is now the category of remote.

Additionally, I’ll share with the member that of the executive team, the CEO, the CFO and the chief legal officer all reside in Kamloops. The four other members of the executive team live in the Lower Mainland.

Peter Milobar: With the 56 percent remote now, there’s still physical space. There’s still all of that. What has been the overall operational spend, then, of BCLC in regards to helping tech support and all of that with remote workers versus people physically in those locations, given the physical footprint.

I’ve toured both. Actually, I toured both when the Premier was administering charge at the time and reneged on the rebuild in Kamloops, actually. That’s what that’s what precipitated the tour. At the time, obviously, space and things like that were at a premium. The building hasn’t shrunk. The building’s the same size. There’s got to be an operational cost of that. But there must be some form of an operational cost to have the remote workers as well. There was an operational cost and a footprint in Vancouver. I’m assuming that hasn’t shrunk either.

What has been the overall operational outlook with BCLC as a cost measure going to more of the remote work versus people physically at a desk as opposed to attached to a desk?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Operating costs have not changed with remote workers. They’re offered the same suite of technology and support as they would be were they physically located in the office 100 percent of the time.

[7:35 p.m.]

Peter Milobar: So the 14 percent and 13 percent — is that kind of the bare minimum staffing component that’s needed to be physically in the buildings, is there a plan to either shrink or eventually get that number back up, or is this kind of the mix that’s deemed to be workable moving forward?

to be physically in the buildings? Or is there a plan to either shrink or eventually get that number back up? Or is this kind of the mix that’s deemed to be workable, moving forward?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The 14 and the 13 percent are those people that are in the office 100 percent of the time. The 56 percent are there one or two or three days a week, for example. The BCLC is actually looking at the question of whether there is opportunity to use less space, as part of the efficiency review.

Peter Milobar: In terms of the worker that is remote, how much of that would be made up of the sales reps teams or those that are the ones that would typically be out in the field anyways in terms of connecting with operators or gas stations, corner stores, those types of things, versus the other types of typical office work?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: When I shared with the member numbers from the chart that I was provided, I shared — let’s just use ’24-25 numbers for ease: 14 percent in Kamloops, 13 percent in Vancouver, 56 for remote and then a small number for mobile. It’s actually 17 percent that are mobile, and that 17 percent are the category I believe that the member is speaking of now.

Folks who are working in the field — we call them territory managers. They’re not captured in the 56 percent remote. They’re a different category, referred to in the chart as mobile.

Peter Milobar: Just for the minister’s information, I’m pretty much done with BCLC, then. I will have a few questions on BCFSA and then probably just close the night out with general budgetary questions as well.

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I wonder if we might entertain a 15-minute break at this time.

The Chair: We will do exactly that, Minister.

I would suggest that we make it ten, with 5 minutes of room, but we’ll return in 15 minutes for sure — not 15 with 5 of room.

This committee will sit in recess.

The committee recessed from 7:39 p.m. to 7:55 p.m.

The committee recessed from 7:39 p.m. to 7:55 p.m.

[Lorne Doerkson in the chair.]

The Chair: Thank you, Members. We’ll bring this committee back to order, and I want to thank everybody for being very punctual.

The Chair: Thank you, Members. We’ll bring this committee back to order, and I want to thank everybody for being very punctual.

Peter Milobar: I’d be remiss if I didn’t start off by saying, over the break, Carolina finalized the game at 3-0 with a winning goal by Kamloops’ own Logan Stankoven. So we got to get a little shout-out there for a good old Kamloops kid.

Just a few questions for BCFSA in regards to a couple of general areas. I have had contact over the last little while with some people in the financial advisor side of the world, and they’re wanting title protection in terms of some form of what people call themselves that they actually have some backing in terms of the professionalism and things of that nature. Has there been any work done by BCFSA in looking and expanding some of their oversight and bringing in some of those types of protections around the financial advisor side of the world?

[Mable Elmore in the chair.]

[8:00 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: We have decided not to go the direction of title protection for financial planners at this time.

Peter Milobar: Well, that’s a little troubling, I guess, without more detail to the why. There are a lot of people out there, especially in this growing age of seniors, worried about fraud and being taken advantage of, having snake oil salesmen in their lives, so to speak. The title protection and the fact that we have financial advisers actually asking for this to be layered on….

We have all sorts of legislation that has been heaped upon various industries, be it the real estate industry and others, that they didn’t actually ask for in terms of oversights and changes to how they operate, but they’ve adapted. Here we have a whole sector that is actually kind of wanting to professionalize and make sure that especially seniors are actioning people with confidence, that they’ve met certain parameters and certain credentialing.

I’m just wondering the logic behind such an emphatic statement. You know, everything else even in illegal gaming is still under review and being considered and being talked about and being studied, yet this has been a pretty emphatic answer of: “No, we’re not dealing with title protection for financial advisers.”

Why such a firm line in the sand on something like this when we have such rampant issues, especially related to seniors, but not on these other things? What is the mindset behind this from the minister and BCFSA that this is just a no-go zone, apparently?

[8:05 p.m.-8:10 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Two things in the member’s last question. One was a comment that the whole sector wants this, and I’d provide feedback from our team that there’s an organization that’s quite a loud advocate for this particular direction, but there are also other stakeholders who in fact don’t want this and others who really don’t think title protection is the way to go. There have been concerns expressed by the investor advocates on the implications of title protection in Ontario, for example.

I’ll also share with the member that a number of the folks — in fact, we think the majority of people — who provide financial services as a financial planner are very likely covered under other types of regulations. Most financial planners provide an offering of things to purchase. That’s the revenue model. It’s a commission model. And selling insurance, for example…. They would be regulated by insurance regulators and selling securities through security regulators. So we think that they’re largely captured. Also, it is unclear as to whether or not the goal of investor protection, seniors in particular, would be best served through title protection.

Peter Milobar: I guess that will lead me into some questions on the real estate side of the world where, I would point out, some wanted changes. Some real estate didn’t want changes, and yet the government said: “Well, we’re going to make changes.” Simply because some stakeholders don’t want change and others do, it seems like a strange way of picking winners and losers for government, but that seems to be par for the course these days.

In terms of what’s transpired in the real estate, we had the right of rescission that came in as the market cooled. It has created some problems, we’re hearing from realtors in smaller centres, and then we have others that are saying it’s not long enough. Some are saying it needs to go completely. Others are saying it’s not long enough, because you can’t reasonably contract with a home inspector, even in these conditions, to get in there, do a proper report and report back out by the time the timeline goes.

What discussions have been undertaken with the real estate sector around those timelines, and is there any appetite or discussions with government about either extending or removing those changes that were made in the last couple of years?

[8:15 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: A couple of numbers to share, in regards to rescissions. In 2023, there were 231 rescissions, and in 2024 there are 216 — so not a huge uptake of the tool. And I’ll share with you that the BCFSA has monthly meetings with the BCREA and multiple meetings with real estate boards across the province.

[8:20 p.m.]

Peter Milobar: Thank you for those steps, but I’m assuming BCFSA would’ve had the same conversation as we’ve had with the BCREA. Like I say, some members wanting to see an extension in terms of length of time; others just wanting to see it gone. We’re seeing a dramatic softening of the presale market

I’m assuming BCFSA would’ve had the same conversations we’ve had with the BCREA — like I say, some members wanting to see an extension in terms of length of time, others just wanting to see it gone.

We’re seeing a dramatic softening of the presale market and condo market in Toronto, and other types of housing stock. Experts are saying it’s foreshadowing what’s coming to B.C. by a month or two. We’ve already seen where realtors are being told there are no more posts available for for-sale signs because the market is being flooded with people trying to sell, which would…. All signs point to a buyer’s market, not a seller’s market, and the seller’s market is what kind of drove the policy in the first place.

What work, if any, is being undertaken? Or is the minister saying that there is zero appetite to look at this particular issue, either by extending the days or just removing it completely?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: This was a tool that was designed during a hot real estate market, and as the member has rightly shared, it seems that we’re in a time of a cooler market. Our perspective on that is that the tool then lies dormant.

I would also share that given the numbers of use that we’ve seen — 216 in 2024, for example — it’s our assessment that this really isn’t a thorn in the side of individuals.

Peter Milobar: Well, that’s not what we’ve heard from the real estate industry, and I would suggest, unless they’re saying something completely different in their monthly meetings, that’s not what BCFSA would be hearing either.

The minister is right, it’s a tool, but tools become cumbersome if they’re inappropriately in place when not needed. It seems that if it’s truly meant to try to make adjustments for what’s going on in the market, it was delayed, and it took forever for government to bring it in, and they kind of missed the market by the time it got implemented. Things were already cooling off. Fair enough.

But it sounds like the government…. Regardless of what’s going to happen in the market moving forward, there’s an unwillingness to ever make an adaption to a policy to better reflect. Now that the legislation is in place, it seems it would be much simpler, unless I’m misremembering or not remembering the legislation accurately…. It seems that the times and the length of time can be changed by regulation, not by legislation.

Is that actually the case? Am I remembering things correctly, or is it actually that it takes a legislative change to change the length of time?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Yes, it can be changed by regulation.

Peter Milobar: I’m glad I’m at least recalling things at this late hour accurately. I guess that goes to the premise then….

[8:25 p.m.]

We have a piece of legislation that took quite a while to come in and was predicated on trying to protect buyers in a hot seller’s market where people were putting in sight-unseen, no-condition offers, all those types of things that were going on, trying to outbid each other and the craziness that it was. It seems like forever ago

was predicated on trying to protect buyers in a hot seller’s market where people were putting in sight-unseen, no-condition offers, all those types of things that were going on, trying to outbid each other — the craziness that it was. It seems like forever ago now when you look at the current real estate market and what’s going on, but that was the case.

Fair enough. We didn’t support it; however, it’s in place now. But it’s in place and can be adjusted to much better, in real time now, reflect the market and what’s going on in that market.

The problem is that people do struggle to meet the timelines, not just with the pre-qualification side of things but what happens with the pre-qualifications in terms of making sure that you have your home inspection done so you can actually sign off with your lenders and things like that. It does put added pressure on the whole transaction. That’s what we’re hearing very clearly from the industry.

Again, people can argue whether it should just be extended, stay in place and be extended for more days to give that better window of time so that those types of things can be looked at properly, or just removed completely in the short term while we’re in a buyer’s market as opposed to a seller’s market.

Given that those discussions continue to happen, I guess…. The minister is emphatic. Despite all of these other things that the government says they want to take quick action on and be able to move on and address things going on in our economy, housing, which is one of the key drivers of the overall economy, is one area that, when it comes to this particular government policy, there is zero willingness by the government to take into account what they’re hearing from the industry and make a regulatory change.

This is as simple as signing off on an order in council. That means it would be just as simple if the market heated up again to change it back to what it is or find some happy medium again.

There’s zero appetite for government to intercede in the housing area this way with BCFSA, but they’re willing to tinker with a whole bunch of other things is what I’m hearing.

[8:30 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: This was a tool that was designed not to have to be adjusted. It’s perhaps better thought of as a pressure valve. In a circumstance like the circumstance that it was addressing when the market was very hot, it was a situation where buyers didn’t have time to even have inspections. If they put in an inspection clause, they would lose the chance to purchase. If they put in financing, they would lose the chance to purchase. Under that degree of pressure, this could be employed to help buyers who, under that pressure, made decisions that weren’t correct.

However, in a circumstance where there are more normal circumstances, in a circumstance where you’re able to have a home inspector come in and take the normal amount of time that it might take to bring in a home inspector or set up your financing that isn’t under that same pressure valve, then this wouldn’t come into play. So it becomes dormant in that circumstance and it’s not designed to be tinkered with. It’s designed more to be a pressure valve that can stay in place in markets that are less volatile but be in use when the pressure valve is needed.

Peter Milobar: The outlook for unit sales in the budget seems like it may be incredibly optimistic given what’s happening now. Has there been any look at what is happening right now in terms of that? Either in discussion through BCFSA with the realtor community in general or with the industry in general and the stats that would be provided in terms of the overall projections in the budget for what’s going to happen in housing, especially in that resale sector and not so much the new housing starts but the resale piece within the budget.

Are those still on track or are those severely underwater as is a common phrase within housing in terms of mortgage holders or anything else like that? Are the projections within the budget still holding up or are they significantly or even lower at all?

[8:35 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I’ll share with the member that the BCREA released some data on April 30 on unit resales, and it was a fall of 1.1 percent to 73,650 a year, a modest decrease.

Peter Milobar: Is that then on track with what the government was projecting in the budget and anticipating in the budget, or is it in fact a lower projection than what was being budgeted for?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: The projection in the budget for 2025 residential sales unit percentage change is 13.2 percent to the positive. So yes, it is less than projected in the budget.

Peter Milobar: What does that do, then, to the anticipated tax revenues that would be associated with those sales, particularly the property transfer tax?

[8:40 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: We don’t have a revision on the projections on PTT. We’re collecting that data as part of our Q1, and that information will be available as we do our quarterly update.

Peter Milobar: Man, am I excited for September 15. I tell you, the Q1 update is going to be like Christmas come early for me.

I think it would be safe to say, and maybe the minister could confirm this at least as an assumption…. I know we don’t like to deal with assumptions. However, this is a whole document full of assumptions and projections and calculations. I don’t say that as a shot. That’s sort of how every budget is created. Every government of any political stripe, at least in Canada, the best they can do is educated projections out of what they see markets doing and what economists predict and everything else.

That said, revenues would have been based on that 13.2 percent of sales. That’s now down dramatically. It’s one-tenth, basically, of what it was projected to be, almost 85 percent of what it was projected to be gone. Is it safe to say that if that held through the year then or even for a significant portion of the year, there would be a significant hit to revenues that have been projected based on that 13.2 percent resale prediction?

[8:45 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Yes, the revenue forecast on PTT is based on number of unit sales but, of course, also on price. Those two factors will inform what, in fact, the revenue is in regards to PTT. Like all revenue, we monitor it throughout the year with these variables, and we’ll report back each quarter on the data, which does lag a little bit behind as well.

Peter Milobar: Has the reporting back…? We know that the actual sales are down. What does that forecast look like right now then? Is the average price dramatically different above, below or at least targeted in the same range of what was projected in the budget as well?

Hon. Brenda Bailey: Currently the information that we have is that prices have been trending down. The forecast amount that we have is a 2.4 percent price increase year over year. The first four months of this year, prices have been down 3.6 percent.

Peter Milobar: Sorry, so just to confirm, that’s a negative 3.6 percent?

I’m seeing a nod from the minister.

That’s a 6 percent differential in prices from what was projected to what’s actually happening which is…. I get why the minister would want to say “a bit of a change,” but that’s a pretty significant switch.

I see people starting to jockey, but only one room is here to report yet, so I’ll keep asking another question.

We have much lower home sales, which would impact the property transfer tax. As the minister rightly pointed out, though, you also have to leverage what the average sale price is to figure out if there’s going to be a massive hit to revenues. Instead of 13.2, we’re down to, I think, 1.7 percent, the minister said, and instead of a 2.4 percent increase in price, we’re at a 3.6 percent decrease in price.

That sounds like, the two together, a recipe for a total collapse of what is projected for property transfer tax. Am I misreading that data, or is that not the case that, in fact, when you have both sides of the property transfer tax calculation in decline significantly below what the government was projecting, the end result has no choice but to be significantly lower revenues on that projection?

[8:50 p.m.]

Hon. Brenda Bailey: I don’t agree with the characterization of the words “total collapse.” But it is, of course, true that should the trend of lower number of unit sales and lower price per unit continue, it will, of course, result in a lower outcome than predicted for PTT — if the recent months do become the trend for the whole year, because of course, we’re talking about four months, so far, that’s informing this dialogue.

So with that, I move that the committee rise and report progress and ask leave to sit again.

Leave granted.

[The Speaker in the chair.]

Mable Elmore: Committee of Supply, Section B, reports progress of the estimates of the Ministry of Finance and asks leave to sit again.

Leave granted.

Jennifer Blatherwick: Section A reports progress on Bill 15 and asks leave to sit again.

Leave granted.

George Anderson: Section C reports progress on Bill 14 and asks leave to sit again.

Leave granted.

Point of Order

Janet Routledge: I rise on a point of order.

My point of order is that the member for West Vancouver–Capilano stated during question period today that one of my constituents had tried to contact me as her MLA and that I had not been responsive. I pride myself on being accessible to the members of my community. I’ve met with parents. I have advocated on their behalf with the minister and with the Burnaby school board.

I think a more honourable thing would have been for her to contact me directly if there had been a miscommunication so I could correct the situation. I’m asking that she withdraw her remarks.

The Speaker: Thank you, Member. Thank you for your point of order that you have raised. We will review the records, and we will continue after that.

Hon. Mike Farnworth moved adjournment of the House.

Motion approved.

The Speaker: This House stands adjourned until 10 a.m. tomorrow.

The House adjourned at 8:54 p.m.