Amongst the gloomy financial report delivered by newly minted Finance Minister Mike De Jong this week was news the B.C. legislature won't be sitting this fall.
That's not going to happen, said De Jong, because MLAs and cabinet ministers will be too busy consulting their constituents and working on their budgets.
We doubt many in the governing party will be holed up in their offices with calculators, devising solutions to the revenue gap that has so far eluded the best minds in the finance ministry.
The more likely explanation is that they'll be too busy with photo ops and spin to be bothered with running a functioning democracy. With only eight months to go before an election, it's time to down tools and switch into campaign mode.
The lengthening of campaigns and shortening of the governing between them is a modern phenomenon that's afflicted all levels of government. It's not an encouraging one.
We recognize that what happens in the legislature isn't necessarily the meat and potatoes of government.
It is, however, one of the last bastions of government being held to account.
When huge amounts of money are missing from the budget, it drives all other agendas. A halt to public service hiring and talk of a wage freeze aren't issues to be taken lightly. Those are issues that deserve public debate.
We have fixed election dates now. Why not minimum dates the legislature is required to sit as well?
Democracy is a messy and timeconsuming institution. It's also worth preserving.
