I commend Tim McEwan for his articulate and cogent defense of the sales tax harmonization. But that change won't help Prince George. Our economy has one, and only one, major problem.
Our mayor and bureaucracy are about as anti-small business as it is possible to get. The socialists in Sweden would be envious. Small business creates about 85 per cent of all new jobs across Canada. When the government is hostile to small business the economy can only go in one direction.
Prince George still has the highest per capita income economy in B.C. and we have benefited from considerable senior government largesse. However we still have the fastest shrinking economy in B.C. plus the fastest shrinking phone book in B.C. We have already lost one MLA due to the contraction of our population.
What happens when small business is hammered by the government? You have a loss of small business establishments, a loss of employment, businesses don't purchase other goods and services from other local suppliers, you have family stress, reduced property values, tax increases, people leaving to find employment elsewhere etc. It's a vicious spiral with no end in sight.
The first politician in the modern era to take on the bureaucrats was Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, the Iron Lady of Britain, and in doing so she turned around the economy of the U.K. So the problem of snake politics is not unique to Prince George. In fact, wherever you see problems in the world you also see snake politics - it's the nature of the beast.
Our local bureaucracy clearly articulated their anti-social agenda last year by publicly suggesting that it was intolerable for city staff to be subjected to oversight by city council. In my opinion this agenda of city staff amounts to a silent coup hidden in plain sight.
I had high hopes for the four new councillors. The battle was always for their hearts and minds, but the mayor and his staff were just too cunning for those four new councillors. What the economy of Prince George needs the most is a mayor who is hell-bent on taking on the bureaucracy. Everything else will naturally fall into place, and our economy will soar.
I look forward to Tim McEwan's spirited defense of our dysfunctional local bureaucracy and their record on the economy.
D'Arcy Gabriele
Prince George
