BY ANDREW WILKINSON
B.C. Liberal Party Leader
AFTER nearly three years of waiting for promises made to them by the NDP government, the people of Surrey have been left empty-handed. [Premier] John Horgan promised Surrey that if they voted for him, he’d eliminate school portables, expand SkyTrain further into the city, and build a brand new Surrey Hospital.
People were quick to get excited about the prospect of the NDP finally delivering on something for Surrey. However, a closer look at the budget documents reveals a devastating truth: not a single cent was allocated to building a new hospital in Surrey.
The six NDP MLAs have refused to deliver for their constituents in Surrey. There is no new hospital in the works. The Health Minister himself confirmed that funding for the hospital is not in the current three-year budget, so why are the NDP be telling people that it is? The people of Surrey deserve so much better than this.
It is absolutely essential Surrey receives more infrastructure and services to keep up with its rapidly growing population. Surrey is the fastest growing city in British Columbia, so we need to invest in the community to handle that rapid growth. A good government should keep building to support that. What a good government shouldn’t be doing is misleading people into thinking they are getting a new hospital. The six NDP MLAs need to tell the truth: every single one of their campaign promises for hospitals, SkyTrain and schools in Surrey has been broken.
As Leader of the Opposition, I’ve travelled across the province and, everywhere I go, I ask people if they can point to anything the NDP has actually built for their communities. No matter where I go, the answer is always silence. John Horgan talks a big game about infrastructure but he never actually builds anything.
In fact, the only thing the NDP has built in Surrey are more school portables — after years spent promising the opposite. Back in 2017, John Horgan pledged that Surrey’s 273 school portables would be reduced to 136 by summer of 2019. Today under the NDP, the Surrey School district is now home to 350 portables.
Instead of keeping their promises, John Horgan and the NDP tabled another tax-and-spend budget with no plan to grow the economy or help people get ahead. Since taking power, they have introduced 23 new or increased taxes and squandered the opportunity to help people in Surrey.
Budget 2020 should have been a blueprint for creating more opportunity for all of B.C. Instead, it was full of broken promises from John Horgan. Surrey deserves better.
I have yet to see Jas Johal or Andrew Wilkinson give any opinion about the big issue in Surrey which is getting rid of the Surrey RCMP by useless Mayor McCallum. The NDP have built a primary care center next to SMH. The transit expansion is destined to go ahead but I want it down King George Hwy hang a left at Highway 10 and on to Langley instead of Fleetwood and 152. The grounds for the hospital in Cloverdale have been built. The BC Liberal creeps had 16 years to do something on that front and did nothing. NDP under pragmatic John Horgan is doing a good job.