The Official BC Liberal government excuse?

Listening to Claude Richmond respond to the recent think tank report on Income Assistance I was left wondering whether the BC Liberal government had adopted an official excuse for all matters pertaining to social policy.

“This does not take into consideration changes made …” Claude Richmond or Rich Coleman or Gordon Campbell or any other Liberal answering question about the latest negative evaluation of BC government social policy all spout the same deficient excuse.

Of course none of the numerous reports critical of government social policy took into consideration whether Gordon Campbell danced nude under the full moon in his back yard. A consideration that has just as much validity regarding dismissing or ignoring the reviews and reports critical of social policies as does the official “changes made” excuse.

The beauty of this Official Liberal Government Excuse is that it can be used anytime and anywhere, since there is always a time lag between the last information gathered for a report and the delivery of the report.

Thus it is that the BC Liberals can continue to bury their head in the sand on matters that their ideology wishes to ignore. Of course the fact the BC Liberals ignore social issues does not change the worsening reality faced by the most vulnerable in our society in dealing with homelessness, mental illness, addiction and poverty.

Mr. Richmond dismissed the report about the inadequacies of current Ministry of Employment and Income Assistance because the government had raised the monthly allowances by $50 + $50. Not only totally ignoring everything else the report had to say, but also ignoring the reality that even with the extra $100 a month it is not possible to survive in the lower mainland on $610 per month.

Not wanting to talk about the fact that, as the report pointed out, expecting people faced with the challenges of survival on $610 a month to conduct a job search and find employment is ludicrous; or any of the pressing issues raised in the numerous negative evaluations of the BC Liberal record of failure to deal with or address the serious social issues facing BC today, the government just labels them “out of date”.

Viewing the Liberal government’s policies from the streets one thing is clear: when Rich Coleman speaks of “not knowing what is happening on the ground” he is describing the Liberal government, not the authors of the reports that the Liberal government ignores.

Rather than continuing to use the same (lame) official excuse the Liberals should just admit they lack any understanding of what the reality on the ground is; admit they lack any knowledge of what is happening on the streets; acknowledge their lack of ideas, vision or leadership with which to address the growing poverty and social challenges faced by the province of BC.

This approach would at least have the novelty of truth.