File Photo (Image Credit: CFJC Today)

By Kamloops-South Thompson MLA Todd Stone

Sound Off

SOUND OFF: Time for a real plan to deliver a safer B.C.

Sep 15, 2023 | 10:36 AM

PEOPLE DESERVE TO FEEL SAFE in their communities. But unfortunately, due to rising crime and overlapping crises, this is not the case for so many people across our province. For years, we have been forced to deal with the negative repercussions of the NDP’s catch-and-release justice system and its ineffective approaches to mental health and addictions.

It’s clear that something needs to change, and soon. That’s why our BC United leader Kevin Falcon recently announced his ‘Safer B.C.’ plan — a roadmap of concrete actions a BC United government would immediately take to restore public safety, close David Eby’s revolving door of justice, and put the interests of law-abiding British Columbians first.

The plan is designed specifically to address the issues facing our province right now. It would include aggressively working to fill the 500 police vacancies across the province, as well as ensuring police agencies can attract and retain officers. BC United would also end the NDP’s failed drug decriminalization experiment — which has only served to put more people at risk — focusing instead on a compassionate and evidence-based recovery approach to mental health and addictions, as articulated in our ‘Better is Possible’ mental health and addictions plan.

Additionally, our plan would implement alternative sentencing and rehabilitation, giving individuals facing sentencing the choice between traditional incarceration and secure treatment. This initiative would include constructing new facilities and repurposing existing prison spaces to make it possible to offer addiction and mental health services within BC Correctional institutions. The central objective of this measure is to ensure people do not get released into the public with unresolved addiction or mental health challenges — protecting them as well as the wider community.

In contrast to David Eby and the NDP’s approach, BC United would take all crimes seriously. This means ensuring consequences for all crimes, including shoplifting, bike theft, hate crimes and vandalism. Not all crimes require jail time, but they should all have consequences.

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The consequences should be particularly serious when people’s lives are put at risk or lost due to illegal activity, which is why our Safer B.C. plan would include pursuing civil consequences for drug dealers who sell lethal drugs that result in death by overdose. Drug dealers deserve severe repercussions for preying on vulnerable British Columbians and selling fatal drugs like fentanyl, carfentanil and W-18. It’s time to make sure they are held accountable for the harm they have caused to so many people in our province.

No matter where you live in B.C., whether it’s downtown Kamloops, Fort St. John, or the heart of Vancouver, you should be able to feel comfortable in your neighbourhood and have confidence that government is working to keep you safe. However, over the last six years, we have watched that sense of security erode under the leadership of the NDP government and that is simply unacceptable.

British Columbians deserve a government that fights every day to create a safer B.C.

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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.