In an interview with NowMedia Group's Jim Csek, Peter Milobar, the BC Conservatives' finance critic, delivered a scathing assessment of the NDP government's handling of British Columbia's economy.
Drawing on recent fiscal updates showing provincial debt nearing $134 billion, the pair's discussion touched on the escalating deficit despite record revenues, deteriorating healthcare outcomes despite massive spending increases and the outsourcing of a major BC Ferries contract to a Chinese shipyard.
On the fiscal front, the pair pointed to the province's ballooning debt, which has risen from about $89 billion when Eby took office in 2023 to over $133 billion.
"We've been setting records year after year after year for the last three, four years of revenues coming to the government, so the revenues actually haven't been the issue for the government," Milobar said.
"What has happened, though, is they've increased spending at a much faster rate than those revenues have increased, and in fact, they're not even staying within their spending allotment."
Milobar was equally critical of healthcare under the NDP, where spending has more than doubled from $17 billion annually when they took power in 2017 to $38 billion in the current budget, yet service quality has plummeted.
"By every measure, though almost everything in healthcare has gotten worse," Milobar stated.
"We were even sending patients to the United States for a couple of years for treatment at for-profit US hospitals because we couldn't manage cancer care in BC. We went from the best in Canada to the worst under the NDP and in only a few short years."
He emphasized that taxpayers deserve measurable results for such expenditures, not just announcements of funding increases.
The interview also delved into the contentious BC Ferries contract, recently awarded to China Merchants Industry (CMI) Weihai Shipyards for four new major vessels at a cost of $690 million, backed by a $1 billion federal loan.
The pair lambasted the decision for failing to prioritize Canadian shipbuilders, citing unfair advantages like state subsidies, low wages, and lax environmental and labour standards in China, which have drawn widespread criticism from unions and politicians.
"The contract was given to China and that's because they didn't put in any procurement measures that would create a level playing field to enable a Seaspan or the shipyards out in Eastern Canada or even the ones in Europe in more friendly-aligned geopolitical countries to bid competitively," Milobar said.
Milobar concluded by stressing the need for fiscal discipline, such as a modest 2% spending reduction to save billions without slashing services, and called for policies to restore investor confidence and stem the exodus of young workers to provinces like Alberta.
Click the above video to also hear more from the pair's discussion about the challenges the forestry sector is facing, people moving away from BC and more.
