Anyone who can read a spreadsheet should be “terrified” of the Green Party’s spending plans, Vancouver-Quilchena Liberal candidate Andrew Wilkinson said May 2 at an all-party debate at Vancity Theatre, before the debate even started.
And once it got going, he said the Greens were at least transparent about their taxation and spending plans, whereas he said the NDP budgeting is full of unfunded spending promises – a point Green Party Leader Andrew Weaver agreed with.
The live-streamed debate, sponsored by Business in Vancouver, featured Wilkinson (minister of Advanced Education), Weaver and NDP finance critic Carole James addressing four key issues of interest to B.C. business: housing, taxes and spending, energy and resources and the technology sector.
Housing
On housing, economists have criticized the Liberal government’s $700 million BC Homeowner, Mortgage and Equity Partnership – which offers first-time homeowners repayable down payments, interest free for five years – for pushing people who should not otherwise qualify into essentially entering second mortgages from the start.
Wilkinson defended his government’s housing policies, saying they have had the intended effect of cooling the overheated housing market in Vancouver. He pointed to a recent example of a young couple, who are on the junior faculty at the University of BC, who could not afford to live here, but recently bought a home, thanks to the plan. He added the Liberals plan to create "thousands" of new student housing units to ease pressure on the rental market.
But Weaver said the homeowners program was “handouts to people buying homes” and characterized it as “vote buying in the lead-up to an election.”
“It is fiscally irresponsible for this government to claim it is on the fiscal high road and at the same time incentivize those who could not otherwise qualify for a mortgage,” Weaver said. “It’s just reckless.”
The NDP’s plan on housing is to offer $400 renter rebates and build 114,000 new affordable housing units over 10 years.
Asked how an NDP government would ensure those units make it to market, James said it would leverage federal and municipal funding, and work with the co-op and rental housing associations to build a range of housing options, from micro-housing to co-op housing, and set up land banks, where people could buy a house, but which would stay in the public land bank.
“You then have mobility in the system, because part of the struggle right now is there is no mobility for people,” James said. “They get into housing and they have to stay because there’s nothing else affordable for them to go to.”
Banning natural gas
Earlier this week, the Liberals announced they would amend the Vancouver Charter to prevent the City of Vancouver from effectively banning natural gas for new development as part of its Renewable City Strategy.
The city enacted the new policies last week. Wilkinson was asked why the Liberals waited until Saturday to announce its plans, when the Renewable City Strategy has been looming for months.
Wilkinson answered that the restaurant industry and FortisBC came to the Liberals to ask them to do something about the ban.
When pressed by Wilkinson to state whether an NDP government would also reverse the city’s ban on natural gas, James responded: “The city said there is no ban on natural gas and that’s part of the issue here.”
That is partly true. The city’s policy would still allow “renewable natural gas” made from methane sources like landfills.
Currently, the amount of renewable natural gas produced in B.C. accounts for less than 1% of the total gas production in B.C. To supply Vancouver alone with 100% renewable natural gas, FortisBC has estimated 100 landfills would need to be tapped.
Taxation
On taxation, James was asked how B.C. will be able to attract and retain businesses, when the NDP would be raising corporate taxes by one per cent at a time when the U.S – which also does not have carbon taxes – is planning drastic cuts to their corporate tax rates.
Even with a one per cent increase, B.C. will still be competitive with other western provinces, James said. She added it’s also not just tax rates that are important for companies in B.C.
“Companies that I talk to will also talk about lifestyle, they’ll talk about infrastructure in communities, they’ll talk about good schools for their employees” she said. “They’ll talk about how important it is to have health care in a community. Those are critical to being able to attract employees.”
Both Wilkinson and Weaver took the NDP to task for spending promises that they say are not fully costed.
The NDP has vowed to halve MSP premiums in first year and then phase them out. But they have not said how they will make up the lost revenue. MSP currently brings in about $2.5 billion yearly.
The Green Party would replace MSP premiums with a progressive health care premium like Ontario, with higher income earners paying more, and lower earners paying less.
“We recognize that that system retains the money that is there, but takes it in a progressive system,” Weaver said. “Our plan actually saves the B.C. taxpayer hundreds of millions of dollars because we no longer need to have the debt collection.”
Wilkinson said the Greens have at least stated how they will replace the MSP revenue, whereas the NDP haven’t.
When added up with some of the other NDP promises, Wilkinson said, “suddenly we have a $6 billion hole in their operating budget, yet they say they won’t raise taxes. This is preposterous.
“The Green Party, to their credit, at least put things on the table and have extensive spending plans, but they do attempt to account for them in tax increases that they’re proposing.”
Weaver said the Liberals' surplus budget is largely due to a windfall in taxes from an overheated housing market, but said the Liberals refused to use that windfall to address housing affordability.
And when Wilkinson pointed to record job growth in B.C. under a Liberal government, James said four out of five of those new jobs were low-paying jobs paying less than $15 per hour – something the NDP would address by raising the minimum wage.
Softwood lumber war
Candidates were asked what they would do about softwood lumber duties and other trade issues. Weaver said that is a federal responsibility, so it would simply have to cooperate with Ottawa.
He added there is a problem with the way B.C.’s timber licensing works, concentrating most public timber in the hands of just five large companies, some of which have mills in the U.S.
“It is in their interest to actually take our wood, shut down our mills, and keep those mills going in Washington (state),” he said.
“We need to ensure that, when we assign timber licences, there is attached to that a requirement that you’re not going to ship those logs to mill it in the U.S. and close your mills in B.C.”
The Liberals have been accused of being asleep at the switch on the softwood lumber file. But Wilkinson said his government had been working with Ottawa and the U.S. on a deal under the Obama administration that would have settled the softwood dispute by setting a quota system that would have cut lumber exports from B.C. by a third, so it was rejected.
“We do not accept quota programs, “he said. “We do market based programs in terms of exports.”
James said her leader, John Horgan, would immediately go to Washington to “stand up” for the B.C. forestry sector while Ottawa tries to negotiate a resolution to the latest softwood lumber dispute.
Both Wilkinson and Weaver scoffed at the idea of Horgan having any kind of influence on the Donald Trump administration.
“The idea that you jump on a plane and go to Washington and meet Mr. Trump is laughable,” Wilkinson said. “He’d be one of those goofballs at the fence at the White House having their photo taken.”
He added that Horgan has been north of Cache Creek only once in the campaign “because he has no interest in the resource industries.”
Carbon taxes
Candidates were asked how B.C. can maintain its competitiveness if carbon taxes go up here, while the U.S. is lowering business taxes.
Wilkinson said B.C. has the highest carbon tax in the country and that a Liberal government will only raise them once the rest of the country is in line.
The Green Party would immediately start raising the carbon tax annually by $10 per tonne until it hit $70. Weaver added that, far from harming the economy, B.C.'s carbon tax has led to “the innovation of a whole sector of our economy.”
“We want it to be ($70) because we want B.C. to benefit from the opportunities that this challenge offers,” he said.
James said an NDP government would implement the recommendations of the Liberal government’s Climate Leadership Team, which were "completely ignored by Christy Clark.”
“We’ve endorsed that report and we will act on it,” she said, adding that lower income people will get rebates, as carbon taxes rise.
“So we address the affordability issue for families and we address the climate change issue,” James said.
Both Wilkinson and Weaver pounced on the NDP's plan for carbon tax increses, pointing out that the NDP ran on a campaign in 2009 to eliminate the carbon tax altogether.
“The reason why I’m in politics is precisely because of your cynical ax the tax campaign,” Weaver said.
Tech support
One of the problems for tech companies in B.C. is accessing later stage funding. Asked how the Green Party would address the concern, Weaver said the problem was not later stage funding but earlier stage funding. He said the Greens would match federal funding through the Industrial Research Assistance Program
Candidates were asked how to ensure more of the $100 million BC Tech Fund, which is managed by Toronto headquartered Kensington Capital Partners, ends up invested in B.C. Of the three investments made so far, two have gone to B.C. firms and one to a Toronto company.
James criticized the Liberal government's technology procurement policies in general, and said the NDP would encourage consortium bids from B.C. tech companies on government contracts.
Wilkinson said procurement had nothing to do with what James had been asked. He said venture capital is by nature “patient capital,” of which there had been a “dearth” in B.C. He said Kensington Capital is working with local venture capitalists but said it take venture capital investing takes several years. He said the NDP didn’t seem to understand how venture capital investing works.
“They don’t care about capital,” he said. “They think companies don’t need capital because government will provide everything.”
Weaver said B.C.’s tech sector has flourished “despite” anything the Liberal government has done, and said the NDP has no policy for the tech sector.
"The tech sector is scared of an NDP government," Weaver said. "They're scared of the fact that you don't have a costed platform, they're scared of the fact that there's big loopholes, they're scared of the fact that you make policy up on the fly," Weaver said.
He said three Green candidates are tech CEOs, and said the problem was too much “red tape” for B.C. startups trying to access financing.
“We have these good ideas dying on the lab bench because we have these people filling out these forms trying to get that first $50,000,” Weaver said.
