The Done with Dalton recall campaign has been recalled.
Instead, organizers are going to concentrate their efforts on battling the HST leading up to the June 24 mail-in vote.
But that only proves further that the true motivation behind the recall campaign had nothing to do with the performance of individual Liberal MLAs, only that petitioners were picking on the most vulnerable ones, like Marc Dalton, who won the last provincial election by just 68 votes.
Most curious, local recall organizers didn’t know how many signatures they had when they decided to fold up their tents.
Of course, they said the campaign was going well.
B.C. is the only province in Canada with recall legislation, and maybe now we know why: while an available and potentially useful tool, like a hammer it can be used for malice. It has yet to be successful.
Voters in Dalton’s riding of Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge-Mission will still get to show their contentment with the job he has done in the next election.
Rhetoric will persist throughout the lead up to the HST mail-in and an election, and the governing Liberals, new leader and all, will be held to account.
But there will be other, more pressing issues to debate than just the HST; Christy Clark can’t write a cheque to everyone and expect there to be none.
Until then, we will be happily distracted by the federal election, then the municipal ones.
The provincial Liberals, for now, have bought themselves some time.
Politics is a shrewd business, as evidenced by the looming Liberal-NDP-Bloc coalition in the federal realm, and the provincial recall attempts.
So pay attention. Vote for what really matters to you.
– The Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows News