Thousands Protest B.C. Government's Anti-Social Offensive

An estimated 30,000 people crowded the streets of Victoria on February 23 to protest the escalating anti-social offensive of the Gordon Campbell government in British Columbia. Thousands more participated in smaller demonstrations in Vancouver and other centres.

The Campbell government, nominally Liberal but actually a coalition of Liberals, Conservatives and Social Credit, swept the discredited NDP from power in last year's provincial elections, taking 97 percent of the seats in the legislature.

Shortly after taking power, the Campbell government implemented massive tax cuts, reducing government revenues by $1.6 billion. It then "discovered" that the B.C. economy was in the midst of a recession and declared that drastic measures were necessary to save the province from bankruptcy. Those drastic measures did not include cancellation of the proposed tax cuts.

Instead, the Campbell government announced that it would be eliminating 11, 700 public sector jobs (one third of the public sector) over the next three years, along with many of the public services that those workers provided. Cutbacks have been announced to welfare rates, Pharmacare coverage and health care expenditures. Many hospitals, especially in smaller centres, are to be closed and private hospitals are being introduced. B.C. Hydro is being prepared for sale to the private sector. In order to achieve this agenda, the Campbell government has torn up the collective agreements with its employees and has removed the right to strike from public sector workers, transit workers, nurses and teachers.

Workers in both the public and private sectors have found themselves under attack on other fronts, as well, with the slashing of the minimum wage and proposed amendments to the Labour Act and Employment Standards Act which will further erode the rights of workers. Students face sharply rising tuition fees. Aboriginal peoples are being subjected to racist campaigns under the guise of referenda on treaties negotiated with the previous government.

The ferocity and pace of the cutbacks being pushed through by the Campbell government eclipses even those of Mike Harris' Ontario government, forcing many sections of the people to take action in defence of their rights. Not since the 1983 Solidarity mobilization against the Vander Zalm Social Credit government have so many people participated in actions against the B.C. government. However, 19 years has done little to heal the rifts opened up in the course of that mobilization, especially between the B.C. Federation of Labour and various social activist groups. The acceptance by the B.C.F.L. of the Kelowna agreement was viewed by many social activists as a betrayal of the coalition and abandonment of their struggles. The similar experience of the Ontario Days of Action against the Harris government has reinforced suspicions amongst these activists about the agenda of the B.C.F.L., as have statements by some of the leaders of the public sector unions complaining that the proposed cuts are too deep, rather than condemning the cuts outright.