Posts by Keith Reynolds

Keith Reynolds

About Keith Reynolds

Keith Reynolds is the former National Research Representative for the Canadian Union of Public Employees. He has done policy work for all three levels of government. His areas of expertise include privatization, P3s, and municipal government and finance. Follow Keith on Twitter

Property taxes: are major industries suffering?

Nov 3, 2009
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Businesses across Canada have been complaining about what they pay in property taxes, well, since there were property taxes.  But the issue in BC came into sharper definition in July when Catalyst Paper hand-delivered cheques to four municipalities that only covered 25% of their property tax bill.  Timberwest, Celgar and West Fraser Timber joined Catalyst… View Article

CPRN: RIP – the loss of an independent voice

Oct 30, 2009
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There was sad news yesterday for those of us who are policy wonks and for anyone else who pays serious attention to public issues in Canada. After 15 years of public policy research the Canadian Policy Research Network is closing its doors.  The organization’s president, Dr. Sharon Manson Singer announced they were no longer financially… View Article

Something missing from the H1N1 fight

Oct 2, 2009
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When the government announced its plans for dealing with H1N1 in schools on August 24th there was something missing. The government’s “pandemic response framework”, announced by the Ministers of Education and Healthy Living and sport deals with issues like transporting the sick, communications, roles of emergency response teams, school instruction and post-pandemic recovery plans. What… View Article

Poltergeists and P3s: They’re back

Sep 24, 2009
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In February, with the spectacular collapse of the $3 billion Port Mann Bridge public private partnership, many people thought P3s in British Columbia were a dead item.  They’re back. With the Fort St. John Hospital project the government’s privatization agency, Partnerships BC (PBC), has found a way to drastically reduce private investment in P3s while… View Article

And from the department of kicking kittens……

Sep 10, 2009
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Vaughn Palmer asked the Finance Minister a question in the Budget lock-up on the day of the Budget speech.  How about a list of all those programs you’re going to cut?  No can do, Finance Minister Colin Hansen replied.  You’ll just have to wait until the Public Accounts are published next year. In the Liberal… View Article

Teeny Budget factoid

Sep 3, 2009
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It appears when it comes to the heavy lifting of cutting spending in BC, not all public agencies are equal. The February Budget documents stated that: To ensure that health services are protected in the current economic environment, the Ministry of Health Services and health authorities will be required to achieve efficiencies and administrative savings… View Article

People don’t want cuts in government services: Ipsos-Reid

Aug 28, 2009
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An Ipsos-Reid poll of 800 British Columbians indicates people would rather see a deficit than see public services slashed. The poll was conducted in early August for the BC Federation of Labour.  It shows a solid majority of British Columbians disaprove of the way the government is handling the economic downturn.  Only 45% of people… View Article

Watch out for that train

May 13, 2009
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Is it too early to start talking about what happens now the election is over? Because that light at the end of the tunnel really is a train. In their February Budget the Liberals said they were going to have a $500 million deficit this year. Nobody believed them then. Marc Lee called the Budget… View Article

Report finds government stonewalling on FOI requests

May 8, 2009
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BC’s Freedom of Information and Privacy Association (FIPA) released a report yesterday showing secrecy in government is even a bigger problem that we thought. A February report from BC’s Information and Privacy Commissioner’s described what he called, “an unacceptable pattern of government-wide failure to respond to access requests in as timely a fashion as it… View Article

The Premier speaks out on labour issues

Apr 30, 2009
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On April 27th I posted about the BC Federation of Labour’s report on the impacts of changes to BC’s workers compensation system under the current government. Today Tom Sandborn writing for the Tyee posted a story quoting Premier Campbell’s response to health and safety issues. The story also dealt with the NDP and labour issues,… View Article