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OOL Dix visits the region
Official Opposition Leader Adrian Dix spent last weekend in the East Kootenay, making appearances at Kimberley and Cranbrook.
He made an early afternoon appearance at BJ’s Creekside Pub in Kimberley, speaking to a full house on a variety of issues.
And later that day he was hosted by the Kootenay East NDP Constituency Association at a well-attended reception at a private residence on Summit Drive in Cranbrook, though it was open to the public.
Dix, speaking in Kimberley, said he has had a busy year since becoming leader of the NDP, noting Kimberley is the 61st community he’s visited.
Event host, Columbia River-Revelstoke MLA Norm Macdonald, told the audience that Dix is trying to get the know the province as best as he can in order to serve it best.
“I’ve known Adrian since 2005 and he was almost immediately our most effective critic (in the Legislature),” Macdonald said. “He is one of the most intelligent people in the Legislature and one of the hardest working.”
Dix returned the love. “Norm is the single best performer” in the Legislature, he said, praising the two-term MLA and Rural Caucus chair’s preparedness and oratory skills. “There is an authenticity to him,” he added.
Polite formalities aside, Dix then launched at attack at the ruling Liberal Party.
“We need change in this province,” he said. “The Liberal Party is out of touch with the people.”
Dix highlighted adults with disabilities as one of the many groups in the province that have been left behind by Liberal government cuts.
“There are 2,500 people in B.C. on waiting times,” he said, pointing out how people who have given their entire lives to being a part of the provincial community and looking after others have been hung out to dry.
“This just isn’t right. We spent $600 million on a roof to a football stadium. All these priorities of a government in the last days of its life,” he said.
Dix didn’t sugarcoat his views of the immediate future.
“These are tough times for many people in our province,” he said, noting many communities in the province are experiencing declining school enrolments.
A fresh approach is needed for the province, he continued.
“We are going to run the next election on the economy. This government has the worst record of economic growth in the entire time I’ve been alive,” he said, comparing it to Thomas Pattullo’s (1933-1941) Liberal government which took power during the Great Depression.
Among issues Dix sees as important for B.C. moving forward are the need for more trained workers and a need to rectify the province’s floundering timber industry.
And returning B.C. to being a province that looks after its people is another priority, Dix said. “Writing off people is not the right thing.”
During his hour-long talk in Kimberley, with several city council candidates and Mayor Jim Ogilvie in attendance, Dix fielded a variety of questions, including one from Invermere resident Kimberly Harris, who was in attendance with her husband Norm Gagatek, the survivor of a massive stroke a few years ago.
Davis asked how the government could ensure that fewer people would fall through the cracks?
Dix replied by first noting how “incredibly moving” Norm’s story is, considering how far he has come since his stroke, also crediting his wife for “extremely remarkable advocacy” on his behalf and on the behalf of other brain injury survivors in the province.
“Community programs are absolutely essential and they are dirt cheap,” Dix said. “This is an area of care we’ve got to address.”
Above photo: Adrian Dix, centre, with Columbia River-Revelstoke MLA Norm Macdonald, greet people at the start of the Nov. 13 event in Kimberley.
Ian Cobb/e-KNOW
