Years ago, Rafe Mair wrote that W.A.C. Bennett, if he were alive in 2009, would have been a member of the NDP, in those days a party firmly positioned on the left. Although he railed theatrically against socialists throughout his political career, Bennett knew that public ownership of near-monopolies was sensible.
The Social Credit Premier of BC for 20 years created public corporations:
- BC Ferries,
- BC Rail, and
- BC Hydro.
Bennett believed the crown corporations were created to serve current and future citizens of British Columbia, not the interests of shareholders in far-off places.
Gordon Campbell took the opposite view. So did John Horgan. David Eby seems to as well since BC Hydro intends to buy additional private power worth $300 million annually. That would be on top of current purchases of private power, which averaged almost $1.5 billion annually in the last three fiscal years.
Today, retail electricity prices in British Columbia are well below the North American average. That is because publicly owned generating facilities like those on the Peace and Columbia rivers provide energy at a small fraction of the cost of private power. Were those dams owned by private companies blessed with inflation-escalating contracts, electricity would likely cost each household at least $1,000 extra per year. Commercial operations and light industries would pay even more.
Energy producers selling to BC Hydro enjoy an almost zero-risk business. Since major private producers are owned outside of British Columbia, they are large exporters of cash and effective privatizers of public dollars.
David Eby’s government wants to expand private power. W.A.C. Bennett would protest angrily.
Categories: BC Hydro
in-sights.ca 
That is funny, WAC voting NDP, but then Rafe Mair “converted” in the end.
el gordo certainly did a good job of destroying the things WAC built, B.C. Hydro, and lets not forget what happened with B.C. Rail and all the “scandals” around that. Wonder where that cabinet minister is today along with her two side kicks.
The best one was the contract given to the guy who was not unaquainted with el gordo. That was some nice gift for a guy in a one person office. We all had to have the new gizmos installed.
Translink is certainly eating up enough money. The Broadway Line is such a gift to land owners along that stretch adn to the developers who will build in the area. In the meantime had that money been used to educate more medical personell and provide affordable housing for seniors, the disabled, low income families, life would be so much better in this province
For those of us watching the inquiry into the burning of the Winter SRO all that wasted money on the Broadway Line would have provided adequate housing for many along with more rehab spaces for the addicted.
I’m sure the death rate for people sitting in a traffic jam is much lower than for people without a doctor, without a decent place to live, or addicted to fent.
Do wonder sometimes where some of the players are these days
We have spent all this money on various vanity projects but the children coming to Surrey won’t have decent class rooms, oh right they aren’t friends of those in power and don’t vote. Children who are in portables, its not good for them. I’ve always wondered how many of the addicted went to school in portables or lived in homes which did not have enough money to provide the basics. I do recall Christie Clark deducting nickel for nickel the child support money the child received from the cheque the custodial parent received leaving an adult and child living on $1200 a month. Christy announced the province needed the money. How much did the B.C. Lieberals rack in: $14M a year. Hell, they spent more on advertising.
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I need to point out that a good part of the reason that we have ‘cheap’ hydro power in BC is that the social and environmental costs of our major generating stations, or any of them I expect, were ignored, swept under the carpet, downloaded onto the citizenry, and considered externalities. And they are definitely not that. We are paying and paying and more fore the damage done.
Site C is a case in point. BC Hydro did not even do a cost benefit comparison for the 2013 or 2017 hearings into the dam project.
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The left wing and Socialism is dead in the western world and has been for some time.
Be it Canada’s NDP or the UK’s labour party ; the US Democrats have never been left wing!
Corporate power is the party of the day!
TB
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Add in bloated bureaucracies (Translink?) who then insert private profit through contracting to, say, Coast Mountain Bus, and voilà extra chunks of change not necessarily related to the provision of public services.
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Agreed. Public ownership only works when well-managed and fully transparent. Unfortunately, people in political circles see public agencies as a gift that keeps on giving. One of the most disappointing things about the BC NDP is its dedication to keeping public business opaque.
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The sad fact is, TransLink doesn’t really have any experts (they fired those in 2015 when the two top transit planners in Canada opined that there was not nearly enough ridership potential on Broadway to warrant a subway), instead they have career bureaucrats protecting their six figured salaries!
Even the current American CEO is not a transit expert but he is a professional spin doctor.
In 2021 i sent off an email to the MTA to get some background on the new TransLink CEO Kevin Quinn and this is what I received.
“you are about to get a new CEO of Translink in the person of Kevin Quinn. this is a good news/bad news situation. good news is we are rid of him, bad news you are getting him.
Mr Quinn may be the nicest yes man you will ever meet. he is very personable and friendly but have yet to actually see him in 6yrs have an opinion of his own. and if he has any use for light rail he has kept it well hidden.
hopefully you will have better luck than Baltimore, ridership is off (before pandemic) 2% year over year since he took over.”
Hardly reassuring.
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