PODCAST: Iain Black

“We’re paralyzed. Our economy is falling over on its side…. that’s the horror of the position we’ve been put into by the government.” Iain Black has so many concerns with how the province of BC is being governed, he’s jumped back into the political fray to do something about it.A BC Conservative leadership candidate, Black is a former BC Liberal cabinet minister and CEO of the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade. He also led multiple private companies in the tech sector. “I’m an experienced CEO. I take over companies, I restructure them, I build executive teams… leadership development and growing teams is my expertise.”All of which makes him well-suited to lead the Conservative party, become premier, and tackle the challenges facing the province, he argues. We caught up with Black while he was campaigning on Vancouver Island. He pulled over to speak with us from his car.—Fran[Upgrade to paid]‘The province is broke’According to Black, there are a lot of complex problems that need solving: a bloated executive-heavy health sector with frontline staffing shortages, “tragic souls” needing mandatory mental health and addictions care, a “mis-hit” on values between what the majority believe and what government is delivering, unaffordable housing, and layers of regulations strangling the housing and resource development sectors. “You’ve got an entire generation of voters stepping back and saying, ‘Whatever this is, it’s not working for me.’”Add to that, a historic $13.3 billion deficit, a tripling of the provincial debt in nine years, and more. “The financial situation and the financial management of this province is absolutely at a crisis.”The swing from a $5 billion surplus in 2022 to a $13 billion deficit this year is especially concerning because you can’t point to anything taxpayers got for that, says Black.“Show me the bridges, hospitals, the schools, the roads, show me something that we got for this money… there’s nothing there.”The fix won’t be simple, easy or quick, but it will involve spending cuts and restructuring how government does things, including rolling back the regulatory burden on businesses and getting certification in place for professional firms serving housing and the “dirt” sectors like mining, oil and gas, forestry, agriculture, to speed up permitting.Mining permits take years or even decades, and it takes five years to build a mid-sized apartment complex in Surrey, Vancouver or Victoria, he says.“The permitting process is killing us right now.”Podcast preview: Secret BC NDP deals hurt reconciliationThe ‘shadow’ that looms over nearly everythingAlong with the dire fiscal situation, Black says DRIPA and the way the BC NDP government is implementing reconciliation, looms over nearly everything. “A shadow is being thrown over them by the current urgency around where the heck are we at with First Nations,” says Black. “And a great deal of push back is now building resentment towards the NDP government for bringing us to this place where we clearly don’t need to be.”The whole reconciliation file is “continuing to dominate the psyche of every British Columbian.” He says it’s the number one issue that people bring up as he travels the province.Much of the angst and uncertainty tracks back to the way government has made decisions around rights and title and the involvement of Indigenous communities with economic development, Black says. “By the authorship of [Premier] David Eby and the NDP, we have a crisis on our hands with respect to our relationship with First Nations.”At a time when the economy needs billions of dollars of new investment, he says government policy has created an environment where British Columbia is now “largely uninvestable.”Because of this, and the huge uncertainty it has fuelled over private property rights (on top of the Cowichan Tribes court decision), the damage is already done, he says. We really don’t have a choice, DRIPA has to be repealed. The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act was passed in 2019 with all-party support, but Black argues the way it has been implemented by the BC NDP has proven unworkable.The fallout of repealing the law will be immense, but there’s no alternative, he says, because “we’re paralyzed. Our economy is falling over on its side…. that’s the horror of the position we’ve been put into by the government.” [Upgrade to paid]Secretly enshrining Haida title is ‘beyond unethical’The BC and federal governments’ secret actions to enshrine the Haida land title agreement into the Constitution is one such move, according to Black.“What really bothered me was the quiet, sneaky way that the government got that deal enshrined into the Constitution, which means that any subsequent government cannot undo that decision.” Regardless of the contents of the agreement, or whether you vote Conservative, Liberal or NDP, it is anti-democratic to take away powers from a future government, Black says. “And to do so secretly, without debate in the Legislative Assembly… it’s beyond unethical. I think it’s immoral.”‘It’s deceitful’Different governments bring in different policies, and voters can decide every four years “whether they’re with you or not,” but, the current government is undercutting that democratic process by demonstrating a disturbing “pattern of secrecy,” says Black.He cites the shifting narrative by BC NDP officials on what they knew when about the Federal government-Musqueam agreement. “At the beginning of the day, you had our provincial government saying, ‘No, we knew nothing about it. This is a surprise to us. Boy, let’s look into this.’ And within even an hour or so, they immediately backtracked and said, ‘Actually, we did know about it, and the agreement did involve Premier Eby, and it was actually signed in his own riding in his backyard.’“It’s deceitful,” says Black.“What I struggle with is this denial [by government] that there is this type of an agenda in place, but then one deal after another, one situation after another, one negotiation after another, we learn about it after the fact. “The deals themselves are not put in front of the Legislative Assembly—which is the people's representatives—to decide, to debate whether something is being done the right way, and whether that outcome is what was good for British Columbia and the 5.7 million people who live here,” says Black.“If you want to have a debate about a good idea being right or wrong. Let’s have that debate, but this is just, it’s sneaky and dishonest, and the people have lost the trust on the government on this point, and I think deservedly so. “These chickens are coming home to roost right now for the NDP.”Podcast producers: Rob Shaw and Zach ProulxFor more BC politics, check out NorthernBeat.caFeedback to [email protected] This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit northernbeatnews.substack.com/subscribe