Secret Deal or Open Letter? The NDP Wrote One Too

Let's talk a little bit about ICBC and whether or not, you know, people support no-fault insurance. And look, we're in the fog of an election. So this is the last place where truth is discussed sometimes because, you know, you have accusation from one side against the other and everybody's trying to spin everybody. Now, yesterday, Lauren Dirksen, there was a letter from Lauren Dirksen, the leader of the BC Conservatives, that was released by the NDP saying, And basically the NDP claims that the letter itself was leaked and it was secret. It was neither. It was an open letter to the Law Society of BC, the Trial Lawyers Association, the Canadian Bar Association's BC branch and Insurance Bureau of Canada. It circulated widely among many lawyers in our province, thousands of lawyers. And so it's not a secret when you send a letter basically stating your party's position on what you think you hope or what you hope to do and aspire to do if elected as premier. Here is David Eby yesterday saying, talking about and referring to this as a secret letter in which he believes that there is a desire to privatize ICBC. Take a listen to David Eby's comments.

He says that we'll replace. We will replace the system. The current sheriff says it's not ambiguous. He made a promise in writing to those lawyers that they would get paid again by your money. And guess how he finishes the letter? He says that everything is on the table. Well, you know what he means when he says everything is on the table? He means British Columbians are on the table. And he is serving you up to the private interests of trial lawyers and private insurance companies by doubling your insurance in order to win their support without telling you about it. It is disgraceful, it is embarrassing, but worse to be confronted about it and deny it when we have the receipts

Gotcha. Gotcha. That's what Mr. Eby is trying to do there. It's hard to believe just last week this election was about Donald Trump. Open letters to stakeholders, look, are a normal thing. They're part of elections. They're part of democracies. You write to doctors. You can write to nurses associations, unions, chambers of commerce. They all request... a party's position during an election on specific policy. They'll even write to MLAs. I've had it many times when I was an MLA. They'll invite you to specific debates. It's how democracy works. So it's not some secret letter that was sent. And this morning on social media, I released a letter in 2017, then written by an opposition MLA named Adrian Dix saying, sent to the Trial Lawyers Association that were making similar promises on no-fault insurance as well. So this notion that something new is happening or something nefarious is happening here is just plain wrong. In fact, in that letter the NDP sent back in 2017 from Mr. Dick said, quote, to its nonprofit status and listen to those who know best, end quote. So at that point, they were saying no to no fault, and that's fine. That's their position. Of course, four years later, they brought in no fault. And so look, no one's going to feel sorry for trial lawyers. I get that. But the conversation, and what you can hear from Mr.