Back from two weeks of lovely vacation, dear readers. Did I miss anything?
I kid. In this, the year of the world’s most entertaining Legislature, I was bound to have missed something. And it snuck in last Friday, whilst I was still away.
Perfidy, thy name is Plecas. Yes, Darryl Plecas, a name most of us had never heard before, although some of us gave him brief attention when he brought the Festivus ritual of airing grievances to the BC Liberal caucus meeting this past summer. But on the whole, we’d never spent much time considering the motives and desires of one Mr. Plecas.
We are now.
The name Darryl Plecas will now live in infamy with BC Liberals everywhere.
Mr. Plecas, who though disgruntled, and apparently not much of a fan of former Premier Christy Clark, had apparently assured his caucus colleagues that he would not put his name forward as speaker. He continued to assure them of that right up to last Friday morning, when he… put his name forward as speaker.
Double crosser! Judas! Betrayer! The condemnation from the BC Liberals was swift, as was his removal from the Party.
In an interview with The Province, Plecas said he was doing it for the province — to provide much needed stability to the current situation.
And it does. The NDP/Green agreement is in a far better position than if they had to put forward one of their own as Speaker. Currently, the Greens and NDP account for 44 of the 87 votes in the Legislature. The Liberals have 41. They had 42, but… Plecas. There is one vacant seat — that of Christy Clark — and the BC Liberals are fairly confident they will retain it, bringing them up to 42. If Plecas hadn’t done what he did, and the BC Liberals do win that by-election, they would have had 43 votes. And the NDP and/or Green Party would have had to put one of their members forward as Speaker, effectively dropping their vote count to 43, as the Speaker only votes to break ties.
So we have gone from 43 to 43, with a tie broken by the Speaker, to 44 votes to 41, or 42. Given that situation, it’s likely John Horgan will be Premier for four years.
Plecas said he never really said he wouldn’t put his name forward as Speaker. “That wasn’t really from me,” he told The Province. “That was from the premier’s office.”
Now Plecas had told Mike Smyth of The Province, and the Abbotsford News, back in June that he would never be speaker without the blessing of his colleagues, but he insists circumstances were different then.
In any event, Plecas has a raise (his salary is now $150,000) and a new position as chief MLA wrangler.
Some say he did it for the money and/or prestige. Others say he did it out of bitterness because he was never appointed to cabinet under Clark.
Others say that the BC Liberals screaming about betrayal is pretty rich considering, Plecas got the nomination in Abbotsford South in 2012 by some suggestion of BC Liberal shenanigans to force another BC Liberal candidate (Moe Gill) into another riding. Cosmic justice, says Georgia Straight’s Martyn Brown.
Plecas says he did it because it was a position that was suitable to himself and his background as a judge. And also the aforementioned stability for BC.
That can all be argued back and forth forever.
What cannot be argued is that the Legislature of British Columbia is the best show in politics.
Also this week, hard-right Conservative U.S. Senator Ted Cruz got in some hot water when eagle-eyed Twitter users noticed that his official account “liked” a porn video. Cruz blamed his ‘staff’. You cannot make this stuff up.
And finally, just in case Toronto residents were recovering from the shame of the Rob Ford years, brother Doug has tossed his hat into the ring as a mayoral candidate. Fun times ahead.