Letters: No answers for recovery benefit ‘debacle’

Dear Editor,

It has now been more than a month since I applied for the B.C. Recovery Benefit, and almost as long since I submitted the additional information which the government for some reason requested.

There is no indication if/when I may receive the benefit and only silence on the matter from our government.

When the NDP promised this benefit to eligible residents it was presented as a quick and easy process to “get money into the hands of deserving people in time for Christmas.”

What it appears to have been, unsurprisingly, was a crass and politically calculated attempt to buy votes by offering voters some of their own money back.

Also, not surprisingly, the plot worked to perfection.

I have contacted our newly elected NDP MLA for Richmond South Centre, Henry Yao, to ask for his comments about this debacle but have not received a response, let alone a simple acknowledgement of receipt of my inquiry. 

It seems that even rookie MLAs are quick to learn the lesson that it is more important to serve party leadership through silence than to be responsive to the electors.

The Vancouver Sun published an article last month by Jonathan Manthorpe in which he outlined some of the dangers to democracy that we are now facing. 

One of those is the ever greater power that resides with the premier and his close circle of advisors, effectively sidelining MLAs who nominally are in the Legislative Assembly to represent the wishes and needs of their constituents. 

Peter Eriksen

RICHMOND