Image Credit: CFJC Today / James Peters

By James Peters

Election 2020

“I don’t feel I have to answer for three decades ago”: Horgan cancer care promise deja vu for Kamloops voters

Oct 17, 2020 | 11:34 AM

KAMLOOPS — NDP Leader John Horgan says he doesn’t feel he needs to answer for the decisions of a past NDP government.

The comment came as Horgan appeared at Thompson Rivers University Saturday morning (Oct. 17), along with local candidates Sadie Hunter (Kamloops-North Thompson), Anna Thomas (Kamloops-South Thompson) and Aaron Sumexheltza (Fraser-Nicola). Horgan was in Kamloops to detail his party’s 10-year cancer care strategy.

The plan includes cancer care centres in Nanaimo and Kamloops. But Kamloops residents have heard commitments for cancer care centres before, including from former NDP leader Mike Harcourt before his government was elected in 1991.

The cancer care centre for Kamloops was eventually scrapped, forcing cancer patients in Kamloops and the surrounding area to travel to Kelowna for sometimes daily treatments.

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Among those who have had to make that four-hour round trip from Kamloops is city councillor and cancer survivor Dale Bass, who appeared at the TRU event.

“What [the commute] does to you is, it takes you away from your family — and you need them. You need them when you’re fighting cancer,” said Bass. “It takes you from your friends… it takes you from your home. It puts you into a stressful situation that you don’t need when you’re fighting cancer.”

The B.C. Liberals have also pledged to expand cancer care in Kamloops during this election campaign.

“To hear, actually, both parties talking about Kamloops getting a cancer facility is really great,” said Bass, “because this is what it would have meant for me: get up when I have to get up with my husband, have breakfast, get in the car, drive 15 minutes to the hospital, get my treatment — which is about 10 minutes — go back home with my husband, be surrounded by my family and my kids and my dog in my own home. Not as much stress, not as much fear.”

As for skepticism about his promise in the context of Harcourt’s broken promise 29 years ago, Horgan said he’s focused on the present.

“I can’t speak for 30 years ago; I can speak for right now. For the past three-and-a-half years, we have been delivering healthcare services right here in Kamloops. By making sure that the [Royal Inland Hospital Patient Care Tower] was going to be constructed, by making sure that the Urgent Primary Care Centre was here to connect patients to the providers that they need.”

“I talked to [B.C. Liberal Leader Andrew Wilkinson] just this week in two election debates about the choices that they made with respect to longterm care and the catastrophic consequences of those. Mr. Wilkinson said he didn’t need to answer for three years ago, so forgive me if I don’t feel I have to answer for three decades ago.”

British Columbians go to the polls Oct. 24.