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By Doug Collins

ONE MAN'S OPINION

COLLINS: Do you believe in miracles?

Oct 26, 2022 | 5:01 AM

OUR NEW PREMIER-TO-BE is going to give us a miracle.

David Eby has unveiled a 100-day plan, apparently to get B.C. on the road to prosperity. Eby promises to “lay the groundwork” for a number of priorities relating to affordable housing, safety and health care, among others.

Laying the groundwork, in political jargon, often means “we’re going to tell you about these things, but we’re not going to do anything with them until close to election time, and then we’ll do a bit more if you re-elect us.”

I don’t have any problems with Eby’s ideas. Housing has been a big priority, and he’s looking at partnerships to make this happen. He wants to help the medical crisis by fast-tracking certification of doctors who were trained in other countries so they can practice here. About time. I’ve been advocating that for years. I don’t want to see some man or woman driving a cab or working retail when they could be saving lives.

The premier-in-waiting says he has plans to work on community safety, mostly by dealing with drug addiction, recovery facilities, homelessness, and other issues to “break the cycle that people are involved in.”

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Now we all know that it will be a big challenge to get moving on all this in 100 days. Much of it is just hollow talk at this stage. There is no price tag attached to most of these ideas, and surely there isn’t a lot of money left on the tree. Promises are great but the miracle doesn’t happen until something occurs.

And don’t forget the promises made that have been broken. If my memory serves me correctly, just before the last election, the premier rode into town and promised a cancer clinic in four years. Pretty sure that promise went into the round filing cabinet as soon as the election was over. And until we see a lot more detail, we don’t know what Mr. Eby has planned to deal with the huge issues of the economy, overworked nurses, worker shortages, and so much more.

If Eby puts some flesh to any of these promises within the next 100 days, it will indeed be a miracle. And then we’ll ask, “if you could do this in 100 days, what the hell was your government doing for the past 1,600-plus days since it came to power?”

During that time, Eby was the Attorney General, adding the duties of Minister of Housing a couple of years ago. Community safety and housing were some of his major areas of responsibility but in the next 100 days he is going to fix all of what went wrong since 2017.

All eyes will be on the Legislature the next three months to see if we’re heading to the promised land, or just to more promises.

I’m Doug Collins and that’s One Man’s Opinion.

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Editor’s Note: This opinion piece reflects the views of its author, and does not necessarily represent the views of CFJC Today or Pattison Media.