View from Victoria - Lytton 5 years later & Eby's brutal poll numbers

0:00Spring is here, and the shopping list is long. Time to make a lows run. Buy three bags, get three free, stay green, one cubic foot garden soil. Plus, right now, members can earn four times the points on an eligible purchase. Start spring off strong with these deals and more. Our best lineup is here at Loves. Balance the $3.25, while supplies last. Soil offer excludes a last-gen Hawaii. LoLT program subject to terms and conditions. See Loves.com slash terms for details. Subject to change, point booster subject to exclusions, and more terms apply. Got bomb Palmer from the Vancouver Sun, back with us this morning. Good morning, Vaughn. Hey, good morning, Simmy. Good to be back. Yeah, nice to have you. Sounds great. Oh, he did, didn't he? Yeah. Also, I wanted to ask you, we were talking earlier about freedom of information legislation. That stuff in Ontario is pretty interesting, isn't it? Yeah. Doug Ford is basically slamming the door on access to his stuff, his cabinet ministers, stuff, and all that. And the thing to know about this is right from the beginning, access to information, has

1:04excluded one of the things that is fundamental to our system, which is cabinet secrecy, cabinet internal discussions at the cabinet table, they're confident, the confidential, because they're based on the principle that cabinet has collective responsibility. They meet behind closed doors. They look at all their options. They debate, but at the end of the day, they all agree with the outcome. That's government policy. And if a minister doesn't agree, the minister is expected to resign. Doesn't happen very often, does once in a while. So that is already protected. So what they're protecting here, Simmy, is pretty much everything else that has the premier's name in it, or a cabinet minister's name in it, the premier's use of his phone, all of that. The phone thing is important here in BC, because that's one of the things that triggered John Horgan's decision to bring in a $10 application fee in BC.

2:11Horgan said he was being harassed by the opposition. They were requesting screen captures from his smartphone. So they would know what he was looking at, and what he was researching, and who he was communicating with. Horgan said, you know, all you're going to discover is that I'm checking my heart rate and my and scrabble and that sort of thing, and probably a little Star Trek trivia. But anyway, they wanted it, and no, he said you couldn't have it. And he said the other thing he was doing was he was bringing in a $10 fee to discourage frivolous applications. It worked. Access to information requests in British Columbia have dropped off since then. Any request, public requests, opposition requests, the $10 fee is considered part of it, although, you know, there will always be a debate about there being other factors as well. Right. Okay. So interesting. Now, I wanted to ask you about here in BC, the auditor general's report yesterday on what, and we've all wondered about this, right?

3:12Like, what has gone on in making and helping lit and to rebuild? Why is it taking so long? That's a pretty depressing story. Now, five years ago, and this report only comes up to a year ago, so March of 2025, the auditor general had to cut off the inquiry at some point and start putting together what she found. So Richard Parish, the auditor general, she had news conference yesterday, and she laid out a very sad story. I mean, the explanation is pretty depressing. She said the problem starts with the fact that the entire village was destroyed, including all of its records and everything. And the provincial government legislation that existed at that time expected the community to lead the way in its own recovery, and there was nothing there. Even at the simplest level, they couldn't do matching funding with existing matching

4:13funding programs, see me, because they didn't have any money. And they really couldn't even research land titles or bylaws because all those records were destroyed. But the auditor general found that the province and the federal government did pour a lot of money into the community for the first two years. There are no records of how most of it was spent. That was the level of chaos and disruption there. The other, so the first thing you have is the village is destroyed. The second thing you have is that the provincial ability to respond, it took the province a long time to realize that the province was going to have to insert itself into the process and run the thing as much as they could because the village just didn't have the capacity at all to do anything. The third factor, which is really depressing when you read it, is the relationship with the local First Nation. So this is one of the first things to me that happened in the era where we had this

5:18UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. So it was passed in 2019 and in 2021, Litton is destroyed by fire. And Litton is entirely within the traditional territory of the N. LaCatma First Nation. The auditor general says there was an opportunity there and initially governments seemed to be taking it. She means the federal and provincial government. To work with the First Nation, to rebuild a local relationship around that, but it kind of fell apart. I read the report and you know when you get to the end of the report, Sammy, the auditor general has a letter from the N. LaCatma accusing the auditor general, really you're missing an opportunity to get into this of saying that she really didn't have the power to look at whether or not the federal and provincial governments have kept their commitments. There's a lot in that report, Sammy, about problems that were created.

6:22The village is destroyed. The entire site is toxic, but it is also a place where the local First Nation needs archaeological evidence because in the long run, it will use that to recreate its own history and if it chooses to make a land claim, that will be needed. Well, you ended up with a clash between trying to clean up the site and trying to preserve the archaeological record and people wanting to rebuild and being told they would have to pay for an archaeological check over of their entire site and the main company doing that was an indigenous company and the tab was $20,000 and some say it was $40,000 and there's one case where it was $82,000. It was a recipe for, as I said, it's a very depressing story when you read it. It's not surprising that I think the local people there will be frustrated and of course

7:25that report is now a year old and there are still problems up there, still things that haven't been sorted out, areas outside, litten that aren't covered, that were also damaged. The First Nation is not happy, it's man-o-man. I think of those politicians, Sammy, that got there right away, John Horton, Justin Trudeau. We got your back. No, we didn't. No, we didn't. And Premier got asked about it yesterday at his news conference and he said, well, you know, we're going to learn our lessons from this and we've already changed the legislation and we'll do better the next time. You sort of hope so, but as I said, I only read this, read through this once and then went through the auditor general's news conference yesterday, transcript. You don't come away feeling very good about how we do stuff in British Columbia. America leads the world in medicine development, it matters. We get new medicines first, nearly three years faster, five million Americans go to work because we make medicines here at home and not relying on other countries keeps us safe.

8:31But China is racing to overtake us. Will we let them or will we choose to stay ahead? When America leads, America cures. Let's tell Washington to keep us in the lead. And how at AmericaCures.com, paid for by Pharma. X-Sema is unpredictable, but you can flair less with Epglyce, a once-monthly treatment for moderate to superior X-Sema. After an initial four-month or longer dosing phase, about four and ten people taking Epglyce achieved itch relief and glare are almost glare skin at 16 weeks and most of those people maintain skin that's still more glare at one year with monthly dosing. Epglyce, Libri Kizumap, LBKZ, a 250 milligram per two milliliter injection is a prescription medicine used to treat adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds or 40 kilograms with moderate to severe X-Sema. Also called a topic dermatitis that is not well controlled with prescription therapies used on the skin or topicals or who cannot use topical therapies. Epglyce can be used with or without topical corticosteroids. Don't use if you're allergic to Epglyce. A allergic reaction can occur that can be severe. I-problems can occur.

9:31Tell your doctor if you have new or worsening eye problems. You should not receive a live vaccine when treated with Epglyce. Before starting Epglyce, tell your doctor if you have a parasitic infection. Ask your doctor about Epglyce and visit Epglyce.lily.com or call 1-800-LilyRX or 1-105-4-5-5-9-7-9. Bucking with Vom Palmer from the Vancouver Sun, Nevon also out this morning is that new poll on premieres or approval ratings across the country, and there's not great news for David Eby on that poll. It was time a year ago, David Eby was doing pretty good in that poll. He was, I think, 53 percent approval rating, industry, March of 2025, now that was in the wake of elbows up and standing up to Donald Trump and all that stuff, and Eby had just been elected the previous November, so he was doing pretty well, man, as he dropped down the pack. What have you got here? 37 percent approval rating for David Eby in the Angus Reed poll, and this is a poll that new Democrats have often cited in the past when David Eby and John Horton had good

10:33numbers. So we can cite it to just the same when it's not great. The only premier in the country that's a lot more on popular than David Eby is leaving office, so that's let go and Quebec, and Doug Ford is down at 31 percent, Eby 37 percent. That's not great, so he's what, nine points behind Daniel Smith and the most popular premier in Canada remains a new Democrat, Web Canoe, Manitoba, and by far it was 61 percent. 61 percent. Yeah, no, it is. I'm, whatever, you know, we use to always joke about this, do these premieres that are really popular and other promises him and he spare time to try running British Columbia as well, but it might be a nice idea to put a call through to him and just, what's the secret? He's been premier one year less time than Eby, so he took over in 2023, so he's been around a while, still doing pretty well.

11:34Some of the others, Mo and Holt, okay, Smith, considering what's been going on in Alberta, that's actually a pretty good number for him. It is? Yeah. Doug Ford? Well, I wouldn't be looking to too many examples from him, but there you go. Yeah. I'd say there's left already, so he's not, doesn't really count. Interesting numbers. Okay. I know people will be hearing more about that today, but also what the, yesterday the big press conference that the premier had, and we're going to be talking to the health minister about this later on, has to do with this campaign to attract U.S. healthcare workers to BC. Yeah, the government is citing positive results early on, 400 healthcare workers from the United States, 90 doctors, the rest, mostly nurses and healthcare professionals of one kind or another, and these are all people who've accepted job offers here. So when we first started to get these statements, it was expressions of interest people checking

12:35on websites asking questions, you've now got 400 commitments to come here, and some of the people are here already. We've got asked about of this, of course, interesting. He said two things that I thought were pretty interesting. The first was he said, BC urged American professionals, nurses and doctors to ask around and look and see the differences in the system so you won't be surprised when you arrive here, because the systems are different, and that was one thing. The other thing he said was he thinks that one of the main things that BC hears from the doctors and nurses who agree to come here is the universality of healthcare, that you can prescribe treatment, you can get people treatment, and you don't have to sit and worry that it's going to bankrupt them, that it's covered, and that American doctors and nurses who come here say, that's one of the things they like about our system.

13:38That makes sense, actually, to me, because there are differences in the system. In the past, when we've looked at the differences in the system, and we've looked at Canadians who leave Canada and go to the states to practice medicine, waiting lists is one of the big factors. I hope the doctors and nurses that are coming here have checked that aspect out, because if you can afford the American system, the waiting list situation is very different, as you know. In any event, the health minister, I don't know if you'll ask her this, but she got asked this yesterday at the news conference, does British Columbia government have any stats on Canadians, British Columbians who've chosen to take their credentials across the border and practice in the states? In the past, we've heard stories about that, and the only examples that I've ever run across of anybody that tried to keep stats on it is a second street, it's a think tank

14:42and Saskatchewan, they say they did a search of credentials, and they found there were 10,000 Canadians with licenses or credentials to practice medicine in the United States, and that included 900 from British Columbia. Now, we don't know how many of them are still there, we don't know how many of them have gone, we've certainly heard anecdotal evidence over the years, assuming, you know, of, for example, Canadians who've gone to take their credentials, their training, their Trinity, in Ireland, and then got job offers from the states and gone there, couldn't get a residency in Canada, because even though they're Canadians, because they trained foreign, they're considered foreign, so I expect there's trade back and forth, but welcome to British Columbia, if any health care worker out there's listening, and there was one of them at the news conference

15:43yesterday, and he said he's already cleared the hurdle where he learns to put a U in certain words, who can spell them, so he's, he's learning, I'm sure he's picked up on how smug we all are here too, but that'll come with time, it's great that they're getting some people here. It is good. It is not nothing. Yes, there are still British Columbians that don't have a family doctor, and yes, there are still issues with nurses, and yes, the nurses union said this doesn't even begin to address the shortages, but all true, this is a long, slow struggle that the government's engaged in. It is. Avant, thank you for that. Thanks, Jimmy. Bye-bye. Rinse knows that greatness takes time, but so does laundry, so rinse will take your laundry and hand-deliver it to your door, expertly cleaned, and you can take the time pursuing your passions. Time one spent sorting and waiting, folding and queuing, now spent challenging and innovating, and pushing your way to greatness, so pick up the Irish flute or those calligraphy pens, or that daunting beef-wellington recipe card, and leave the laundry to us.

16:47Rinse, it's time to be great.