It should come as no surprise that Mr. Delich, as one of the Kootenay East BC Liberal candidate's more enthusiastic supporters, once again dredges up the hoary old cliches about the NDP's Naughty Nineties in his letter of May 2 in The Free Press.
Mr. Delich should perhaps take to himself the accusation that he levels at Ms. Blissett, namely that he, not she, 'clearly does not understand fundamental economics.'
When he says how absolutely dreadful things were back then, he should consider the following.
The nineties were the second half of a 20 year decline in demand for B.C.'s resources which was halted only by China cranking up demand for metallurgical coal and other commodities at the millenium.
In the nineties too, the Pacific Rim experienced economic crises which affected B.C. – and yet the government of the day could produce two back-to-back surpluses in 2000 and 2001, and also boast the second-best GDP to debt ratio in Canada. For all his hype, Mr. Bennett's government, in the boom of the early 00s, could only manage third place.
Demand for Elk Valley coal rose quickly, and was just as quickly supplied. As Mr. Delich knows perfectly well the global law of supply and demand works independently of provincial governments, regardless of their political stripe.
Secondly, 'tourism', despite Mr. Delich's allegations, boomed in the second half of the NDP nineties when the price of oil increased and Calgary money flooded into the valley. One developer had already started building condos at the ski hill.
Since he has not seen fit to mention them, we can perhaps assume that Mr. Delich is comfortable with another aspect of his 'fundamental economics': for nine years the B.C. Liberal government has engineered the greatest gap between rich and poor, and has supervised the second worst child poverty rate, of anywhere in Canada.
I guess these are the things that those of us who 'clearly [do] not understand fundamental economics' just have to live with.
JC Vallance
Fernie