338Canada’s latest projection for North Island Riding, taken on September 30, shows the Conservative party of BC having just taken the lead in the popular vote. Nineteen days from the election, they may currently be supported by 47% of the electorate as opposed to 42% for the NDP. The media website uses data from recent polls and the riding’s history. They have covered 13 general elections and, so far, 338Canada claims to have successfully identified the winner in 1,657 electoral districts 89.9% of the time. That said, this is essentially a ‘point in time’ analysis and yesterday showed these two parties virtually tied.
“We know this is going to be a really close election, so we’re rolling up our sleeves and we’re not taking anything for granted,” said Michele Babchuk, the NDP candidate and current MLA for our riding.
“I’ve pulled over on the side of the road right now. I just came out of a meeting with a local group here. We will be in Campbell River today at the campaign office. As soon as I get back, I will be knocking on doors and out with my team. Another group will be on the phones, putting in the hard work, putting up signs, doing some fundraising. I’ve been all over the riding all summer, but this week focused in Campbell River.”
“We’ve heard Mr Rustad talk about not believing in climate science, how the government shouldn’t be involved in helping people with housing. We’ve heard a few conspiracy theories come out, so I am concerned with what this looks like for the North Island.”
Cortes Currents sent a series of questions to Babchuk, the Conservative candidate Anna Kindy and Green candidate Nic Dedeluk. They concerned issues such as extreme weather events, GHG emissions, the housing crisis, food prices, employment and education in our area.
Dedeluk agreed to an interview which will take place later this week.
Kindy’s campaign manager, Richard Martin, emailed “More than ever, British Columbians are struggling to keep up with the rising cost of living as they see jobs, investment and economic opportunity leave our province. Anna owes it to the people of North Island to speak with them about their concerns on the direction of our province and how we can make it better. In the lead up to October 19, her focus is on engaging with voters directly at the doors.”
So far, Babchuk has been the only one to respond in detail.
Cortes Currents: As the number of extreme weather events increases, it’s becoming increasingly clear that we can’t do that much individually. What is the NDP doing to cut emissions?
Michele Babchuk: “You’re packed a lot into this question and we’re certainly seeing unprecedented extreme weather events. We understand the impacts of climate change are arriving a lot faster than predicted. We just delivered over a million dollars of funding for multiple projects across the North Island, including on Cortes with disaster awareness, education and firefighting tanks on Cortes, that was through the regional district. The Cortes Island School wetland restoration projects as well. Since 2017, we’ve invested $369 million in community preparedness and $279 million of that is being provided to local governments and First Nations for approximately 2,100 projects in B. C. We are mitigating and trying to look at all of the implications around climate change and work on climate adaptation projects.”
Cortes Corrents: Overall, how is that translating into reduced emissions?
Michele Babchuk: “One of the other things that we’ve talked about in the past was around Cortesians ability to reduce their carbon footprint and that’s no surprise to me that Cortesians are doing their best, but it is extremely limited on what one individual can do.”
“That’s why we’re taking action to fight pollution. Clean BC is one of the most ambitious climate plans on the continent and it is working to reduce emissions. We worked with the Green Party to develop this plan.”
“We’ve passed the Climate Change and Accountability Act, bringing in a emissions cap for oil and gas industry and attempting to create good jobs and building a clean economy while supporting opportunities for clean energy and tech. So we’ve seen that with rebates for heat pumps, electric vehicles, home efficiency upgrades.”
“Cortesians have talked to me about the electric bike program. We have the strongest economy in Canada. And emissions in BC are down despite of our growing population.
Fact checking Babchuk’s assertions against the 2023 Climate Change Accountabily Report, BC’s per capita emissions and the intensity of emissions both appear to have been declining under the previous BC Liberal regime and continued to improve after the NDP took power. The greatest dip in our gross emissions took place in 2020, the year COVID arrived.
Cortes Currents: What steps are the NDP taking to build more affordable homes for rural areas like Cortes?
Michele Babchuk: “We know we’re having just as hard of a time with housing as the big centres. That’s why Mr. Eby is committed to his housing action plan that’s going to build 300,000 middle income homes across all of BC over the next 10 years.”
“Specifically on Cortes Island, we’ve had conversations in the past about Rainbow Ridge. This project is still being worked on, and I’ve connected Sadhu and the Cortes Housing Society directly with BC Housing. We know we’re still having some challenges around community water systems and island health, which we continue to work on so we can move this much needed and well sought out project ahead for Cortes Island.”
What concerns me more, like I said earlier, is that John Rustad is saying he doesn’t believe that it’s a government’s job to build housing, which was a direction of the Liberal or United government for many years while he was in that caucus. We know that philosophy didn’t work and it left us with unprecedented housing crisis. He is also quoted as saying he would cancel our housing action plan, that the Rainbow Ridge project is actually captured under. So I’m not sure how he thinks that all of that would benefit small communities like Cortes.
Cortes Currents: I’ve heard that we started going into the situation that we have with housing when the government stopped building affordable housing back in the 1970s. Do you believe that?
Michele Babchuk: “We had opportunities back then, we’ve talked about co op housing which was a big precedent back then.”
She alluded to the previous BC Liberal government “for 20 years certainly didn’t invest in any sort of affordable housing for the people of British Columbia. I’m very confident in saying that.”
Cortes Currents: We’re finding that the number of people who are using food banks, I think in BC generally, but definitely on Cortes, has grown dramatically and some of the users are also immigrants from out of province. Is there anything the government can do about that?
Michele Babchuk: “We live in the most beautiful part of the province, in my opinion. I’ve been over on Cortes a few times, and it doesn’t surprise me that people are moving to Cortes Island.”
“The BC NDP is committed to growing communities across BC.”
“I was on Cortes in July, meeting with people, and we talked about the growing need of the food bank. Through the community prosperity fund, we did give the Cortes Community Foundation $105, 000. After speaking to those people, I also realized and learned that’s not quite enough, and it certainly didn’t address the operating component of that facility or the fact that they’re having to purchase food to move that ahead. So, I did very much connect with the Ministry of Social Development and Poverty Reduction to make sure that those concerns are heard. We’re continuing to help, but we know that we need to do some more. So lots done, but lots more to do.”
Cortes Currents: What about the employment problem? I’m especially thinking of rural islands like Cortes, where maybe 10 percent of the population have full time jobs and most of the working population are either part time or have multiple jobs.
Michele Babchuk: Rural BC struggles with that.
That’s one of the reasons why we invested so heavily in the Connected Coast project to make sure that there was communication and service there. We are seeing a demographic of people who are choosing to live rural and can work from their desktops and computers. That’s certainly going to help, but we do need to do some work on sustainable economic development in our rural communities to make sure that those jobs are there.
“We’re seeing that a lot of industry is having a hard time finding people. We are certainly looking at how we can mitigate that, and we’re looking at ways to build training.”
Cortes Currents: What about the lack of secondary level education in rural islands. Some of our families are having to move off island so their children can be educated. Do you have any further help there?
Michele Babchuk: “This is a great question. As most people know, I started my service career in the school board and I still believe that there’s an educational inequity between urban and rural learning opportunities for students.”
“So rural school districts are given additional targeted funds for remote communities. I’ve had discussions with Manda Aufochs Gillespie from the Cortes Island Academy and the senior administration at School District 72 and I’m quite confident that these funds are being funnelled into our rural communities and more actually are being used to support Cortesian students.”
“That said, the Cortes Island Academy model not only needs to be taken a good look at, because it will expand educational opportunities, but also offer programming that reflects the environment, Indigenous and social values that are embedded and unique to the culture of Cortes Island. So I have been working with Manda and the Cortes Island Academy, along with School District 72 Senior Management, and I have committed to continue to take a look at how we can expand those rural learning opportunities for kids on Cortes so that we’re not having to move them off the island.”
Cortes Currents: Is there anything else you would like to bring up?
Michele Babchuk: “It’s no surprise to Cortes residents that the ferry dock replacement project is starting soon, and that’s to facilitate the new island class hybrid ferry, which will be coming online.”
“This is an important election. The conservative message on the environment is extremely concerning to me, and should be for Cortesians as well. John Rustad, his climate denials are not in line with any reality that I’m witnessing, and he’s been quoted as saying that climate science is a lie, and we shouldn’t be trying to fight climate change.”
“We developed CleanBC with the Green caucus of the day. They have some great ideas on climate change and how we can combat that. I just want to leave that with Cortesians because , I really think that in the next election, in order to make sure that Mr. Rustad and the Conservatives are not there, it’s imperative that we elect a BC NDP MLA. I’m looking for their support.”
Cortes Currents: I thought he admits that the climate is changing. He just thinks it isn’t the top priority, that economics are more important, and that jobs are more important.
Michele Babchuk: “What he is quoted as saying is that climate science is a lie, and that we shouldn’t be trying to fight the climate. He believes that we should be doing more for adaptation, which is fine but in the meantime we are seeing all these extreme weather changes. I know it’s on the bottom of his priority list, but it’s certainly not on the bottom of mine.”
As Cortes Currents was preparing this article, there was also an attempt to organize an all candidates meeting on Cortes Island.
This did not work out as planned, but as Mike Moore explains, “The FOCI Climate Action Committee is super excited to have invited all three MLA candidates in our riding. On, October 7th, at Manson’s Hall from 1:00 to 3:00 in the afternoon, our Green candidate, Nick Dedeluk, will be here to answer questions. On October 12th, from 3:00 to 5:00 PM at Manson’s Hall, our NDP candidate, Michelle Babchuk, will be here.”
“Unfortunately, the Conservative candidate, Anna Kindy, has a super full schedule, as you can imagine that would be the case. She hasn’t been able to commit to a time yet. She does hope to get here, but she does welcome phone calls. She has given me her personal number and has asked people to phone her if they have questions, concerns or comments. Her number is 250-287-1962.”
“The Climate Action Committee has pre-sent, with our invitation, a list of questions to each candidate so that they can prepare answers. So you can come out and listen to those answers. You can ask your own questions and really talk about what matters to you.”
Links of Interest:
- Elections BC
- BC NDP website
- Conservative Party of BC website
- BC Greens website
- North Island riding page, 338Canada
- Articles about, or mentioning, the 2024 provincial election
Top image credit: Michele Babchuk surrounded by supporters – Michele Babchuk Facebook page
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