IN THE LEDGE – Premier is in full political control mode on decrim
MLA Peter Milobar during Question Period. (Image: BC Hansard)
Excerpt from debate during Question Period in the B.C. Legislature today (April 30, 2024):
P. Milobar: Well, it’s very clear that with five months to go before an election, the Premier is suddenly concerned about what he has been hearing for the last 15 months of pressure across British Columbia, from B.C. United to municipalities to other agencies. The Premier is now in full political control mode with the election on the horizon. Yet he refuses to end decriminalization despite the carnage in our streets and in our hospitals. I wonder why, Mr. Speaker. It’s because he very clearly has a decrim caucus. His Minister of Mental Health and Addictions said on Friday she remains committed to “the original objectives of decriminalization.” And let’s take a look at what those objectives might be, because two years ago the Health Minister said: “We’re ready for decriminalization. We support that. We think it’s necessary. It’s fair to say that we don’t think 2½ grams is enough.”
They didn’t think 2½ grams was enough drugs to be flooding our streets with. No, they wanted it to even be more. Let’s be clear. NDP ministers of the decrim caucus want more decriminalization, not less.
Will the Premier finally say no to his decrim caucus, adopt B.C. United’s plan to scrap his failed decriminalization disaster today?
Hon. M. Farnworth: I appreciate the question from the member.
Decriminalization has never been about public drug use. We’ve never supported public drug use ever in this House. Decriminalization has been about saving lives — saving lives from the very beginning. Given what we’ve heard from the opposition in the past, I thought that’s what they believed as well. Clearly things have changed.
Let’s go back to what the Leader of the Opposition said. “Some of the chiefs of police were supportive of decriminalization. What they are supportive of is not charging people for small amounts of drugs, and I agree with that.” Those are the words of the Leader of the Opposition.
That’s why when we brought in the changes that we did, we worked and consulted with police to ensure that we’re both on the same page. Those are the limits that were put in place. When it became clear that communities had concern about public drug use — which again, as I said, was never, ever condoned or anticipated or approved — we worked with local government, we worked with police to put in place the changes that were announced on Friday to ensure that we keep our communities safe, that public drug use is something that will not be tolerated.
Source: BC Hansard.
ArmchairMayor.ca 
What other jurisdiction did this fail in?
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The claim is that decriminalization failed in Oregon. The numbers don’t verify this as the death rate is 26.8 per 100,000 in Oregon. Rather than dealing with the problem of homelessness, street protests, exodus of downtown businesses, homicide increase and the rapid spread of fentanyl that caused overdose deaths the Democrats, Gov. Tina Kotec and Mayor Tim Wheeler like Caputo and Falcon blamed it on decriminalization. The knee jerk reaction was “Law and Order” which did not work when they were in power before decriminalization was implemented.
After Wheeler was pressured to ask for Law and Order he said this about decriminalization “There’s no question that the state botched the implementation. And as I say, the timing couldn’t have been worse. In terms of the botched implementation: To decriminalize the use of drugs before you actually had the treatment services in place was obviously a huge mistake.” So, what is it Mr. Wheeler decriminalization or implementation? So, what is it Mr. Caputo, Falcon and others in the political opposition provide your evidence that we can verify so stop the BS lets have your facts.
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It’s hard to follow Mr. Eby. Isn’t this change making criminals of drug users? Wont this change “force them into the shadows”? Wont this change increase the stigma?
Mr. Eby has pleaded for other jurisdictions to take lessons from B.C. when considering their own decriminalization experiments. But why didn’t B.C. take lessons from every other jurisdiction where this has failed, before starting their own experiment with even less guardrails and supports?
Would any of our progressive friends or editorialists care to chime in? They’ve been conspicuously quiet as of late.
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