COLLINS: October election campaign is getting fired up

WE’VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT THE OCTOBER PROVINCIAL ELECTION campaign for some time now, and it seems a bit strange that the election is only three-and-a-half months away.

This election is critical. The vote will show us a direction British Columbians want to take us. We will decide whether or not we want to go in the direction the NDP is taking us — a future of huge spending and big promises — or the more realistic proposals of BC United and the Conservative Party.

The problem facing all parties is trying to determine how much they can commit to spending without promising the moon and creating a deficit situation that will burden future generations —those who will actually have to pay the freight for all these promises. Although the NDP has made a lot of promises, the other parties have made their own promises — promises they can never fulfil either.

This campaign is also a little weird because a number of key ridings have yet to nominate candidates. Local council member Bill Sarai, who only weeks ago was considered the shoo-in NDP candidate for his party in Kamloops Centre, has pulled out of the race for a variety of reasons. The party — remember this is the party of the government in power — has no candidate yet in Kamloops-North Thompson. That leaves very little time to get a campaign together, along with a team to run that campaign. And despite the fall from grace of BC United, two of that party’s strongest MLAs, in fact two of the strongest MLAs in the province of any party, are right here. Peter Milobar and Todd Stone are going to be tough to beat.