Prince George-Peace River-Northern Rockies MP Bob Zimmer's winter 2017/18 newsletter has arrived for those area residents with the misfortune of having him as a Member of Parliament.
"Your Voice in Ottawa," as he proudly proclaims, summed up his year in a letter listing all of the meetings he attended.
As Chair of the Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics Committee, Zimmer went to Washington to talk to his American counterparts about "shared security concerns."
No word on how Canadian security has been enhanced as the result of these meetings.
He also attended the Senate hearings about the Equifax security breach, which affected up to 100,000 Canadians.
No word on how those Canadians will be helped or how such a breach might be prevented in the future.
Zimmer is "pleased" to co-chair to Parliamentary Outdoor Caucus with three other MPs.
No word on if they actually met this year or, if they did, what came out of those meetings to benefits Canadians.
Zimmer also attended the 52nd National Prayer Breakfast in Ottawa. He has chaired a weekly prayer breakfast since 2015. No word - from on high or here on Earth - how these breakfasts benefit Canadians or constituents.
He also chairs the B.C. Conservative caucus weekly meetings and provincial stakeholder meetings twice a year. No word on how these meetings benefit Canadians or constituents.
The letter finally ends with Zimmer informing everyone how much Christmas means to him, extensively quoting the second chapter of Luke about the birth of Jesus Christ. For fans of Peanuts, that's the Linus "lights, please" speech in A Charlie Brown Christmas.
Inside the newsletter, there is a photo page of Zimmer out and about, celebrating Austria Day on Parliament Hill, welcoming a Rotary exchange student to Fort St. John, touring Lakeland Mills in Prince George and celebrating the 90th birthday of a Dawson Creek resident.
Zimmer made two statements in the House of Commons this year and the newsletter includes the text of both speeches in full. The first is a thank you to the City of Fort St. John for deploying crews to assist in battling the Cariboo Wildfires. In the second, made last month, Zimmer informed his Parliamentary colleagues that Christmas is his favourite time of year, how Jesus is "a savior for all the world" and wrapped with the Linus speech.
The backside of the newsletter features contact information for his four offices - Prince George, Fort St. John, Dawson Creek and Ottawa - under the headline "How Can We Help?"
Here's the short answer to Zimmer's question: try being a working MP like Todd Doherty.
The 2017 synopsis for the Cariboo-Prince George Conservative MP looks like this:
He unveiled Bill C-211, a private member's bill seeking a national framework to assist military and first responders suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. Staff Sgt. Kent MacNeill from the Prince George RCMP detachment bravely stepped forward, with Doherty at his side, to share his personal PTSD story and express his support for Doherty's bill. MPs from all parties in the House spoke in favour of the motion, it passed third meeting in June and was sent to the Senate, where it sits at second reading.
Doherty praised the federal Liberals for reopening the Veterans Affairs office in Prince George but noted the poor level of staff resources.
He spoke out constantly in the spring and early summer about the lack of action from the Justin Trudeau government on the softwood lumber file.
In May, for the second year in a row, he completed all 24 hours of the Relay For Life to raise money and awareness in the fight against cancer.
In June, Doherty saved the life of a passenger on a flight to Prince George, performing chest compressions on a man he knew who had collapsed. The flight returned to Vancouver where the man needed to be revived twice with a defibrillator but eventually recovered.
Once the Cariboo wildfires started, Doherty was a fixture at the Prince George evacuee centre and then spent many days in Williams Lake, helping evacuees returning home to damaged or destroyed rural properties. He was there when Trudeau made a brief visit to Williams Lake. He and Zimmer (no mention in his newsletter) also took their new boss, Conservative leader Andrew Scheer, on a discreet tour of Prince George and the evacuation centre at the height of the fires, when there were more than 10,000 displaced people in the city.
Scheer recognized Doherty's hard work by naming him to the Conservative shadow cabinet, maintaining his roles as fisheries critic and Asia-Pacific Gateway critic. Zimmer was not named to the shadow cabinet.
Early this month, Doherty received a public service award from the Ontario Psychological Association for his efforts to help PTSD sufferers. "You are truly a political superstar whose innate sense of caring for others shines through in all that you do," OPA chief executive officer Janet Kasperski said in a letter to Doherty.
To be fair, Zimmer did get an award this year, too. In his newsletter, there's a picture of him accepting the Alaska Highway News People's Choice Award for Fort St. John's Best Politician.
If our friends in the Peace saw the work done by the fellow Conservative MP Zimmer shares an office with in Prince George, chances are they'd ask for the award back.
