VICTORIA, B.C.: The NDP government is moving a procedural motion to adjust the voting convention of the Legislative Assembly because it cannot get its own amendments to Bill 9 The Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Amendment Act, through committee without bringing them back to the main chamber for a vote. After nearly nine years in power, the NDP can no longer manage the basic mechanics of governance.

“This is a government that has completely lost its way,” said Á’a:líya Warbus, Official Opposition House Leader and MLA for Chilliwack-Cultus Lake. “They can’t move their own amendments, on their own bill, because they do not have the numbers without the Independents MLAs from Penticton-Summerland and Surrey-Cloverdale. So now they are rewriting the standing orders to bail themselves out. That is not governing, that is improvising.”

“This is the same government that rammed Bill 9 through second reading by invoking closure at four o’clock in the morning. Now, weeks later, they still cannot manage their own legislation at committee stage. When a government has to shut down debate in the middle of the night and then rewrite the rules to keep its own bill alive, it is not governing, it is stumbling from one shortcut to the next.”

“Procedural motions are not a substitute for competence. When a government has to silence debate at 4 a.m. and then must bend the conventions of due process to secure its own amendments, that is not strength, that is exhaustion. It is the unmistakable sign of a failing government that has stopped listening, stopped delivering, and run out of ideas.”

“After nine years, sixty per cent of British Columbians agree it is time for a change. Today’s motion is one more reason why.”

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