Darrel Plecas turned against the B.C. Liberals and is paying the price by being thrown out of the party and shunned by his colleagues and those who supported him.
I am sure that the hand-shaking and back slapping he is getting from the NDP and Greens is not what is allowing him to sleep at night, as I doubt members from either of those parties would have crossed the street to greet him had he not solved their Speaker of the House dilemma.
I believe Plecas can sleep at night because he made a decision that was good for governance.
MLA Plecas is an educated man, holding two degrees and having numerous roles, such as the RCMP Research Chair and Director for the Centre for Public Safety and Criminal Justice Research at the University of the Fraser Valley, where he has worked for 34 years.
I attended one of his lectures relating to crime when I was a politician and I got the distinct feeling he had little time for me and politicians in general, so I was quite surprised when his name surfaced as a candidate for the B.C. Liberals in 2013.
I have always believed that just because a person is accomplished in a respected field it doesn’t mean they will make a good politician.
There is a skill to being a politician and when an accomplished person also possesses political skills, the combination can result in good governance.
However, when one attribute is present without the other, on either side of the equation, the potential diminishes considerably.
The Trump experience is a clear example of how someone who had the persona of being an accomplished business man — I know, even that is questionable, but enough Americans believed it — but having no political skills, or ability to grasp them, has resulted in a performance level to that of a trained monkey.
Even though the ensuing circus and the monkey are not ours, we are mesmerized by his antics and drawn to news coverage about him. Most notably, for me, was the recent coverage of Trump saddling up to the Democrats earlier this month, which caused me to draw parallels between him and Plecas.
The parallel being that both men are political novices who never displayed an ardent respect for politicians prior to entering politics, have a reputation for speaking their minds, often sans filter, and brought skills that were stymied by party and system frameworks.
Furthermore, they both speak openly about their frustrations and both, in the incidents I am comparing, felt they needed to respond to public need, as opposed to party needs.
Other than these similarities, though, I would draw no further comparisons between the two, as I see Plecas as being polar opposite to Trump’s lack of political skill, integrity and intelligence and have high hopes for Plecas’ effectiveness as Speaker.
The incident with Trump that made me draw a comparison to Plecas was Trump’s decision to vote with the Democrats to raise the debt limits, which his own party was standing in the way of. By doing this end run on his party he was able to provide aid to the victims of Hurricane Harvey and Irma. In the past, the debt issue, driven by hard line partisan stands being taken in Congress, has damaged the U.S. economy, weakened their credit rating and shut down government services for months at a time, all in order to achieve partisan outcomes.
Trump, a novice with a loaded ego, ignored party loyalty as he had seen the devastation of the hurricanes and wanted funds to assist the people.
Meanwhile, in B.C., Plecas, another political novice who carries his own sizeable ego, reached his frustration point with being rebuffed by the party elite who dismissed the concerns he was raising, so he resorted to doing the only thing he felt would give him the ability to make decisions for his constituents — agreeing to take the Speaker of the House role, which was seen by B.C. Liberals as the ultimate end run, as this move lost them any hope of regaining strength in the legislature.
Whether or not you agree with the power shift it has provided, Plecas’ decision has enabled governance to move forward, which is expected and needed after an election, especially when the results are so fragile; even the Lt. Gov. Judith Guichon recognized the need for this.
All of the nonsense on social media about Plecas doing it for the money and his own self-interest falls flat when you look at both his performance as an MLA and his character.
Even though he was given committees that did not take advantage of his vast knowledge of the justice system, he did not falter in applying his professional lens and work ethic to the tasks he was assigned last term.
And if anything is a testament to his strength of character and commitment to his community, it’s the fact he suffered the tragic loss of one of his children during the last term and never missed a beat in serving his constituents, or his party.
He suffered like any parent would suffer, but he persevered through his anguish in order to serve his constituents.
I see Plecas as a man of integrity, who made a difficult decision in order to move governance forward.
Yes, it hurt Liberals, but I respect him for this decision.
Trump? Well, yes, he did something good for once, but it will be a cold day in hell when I say I respect him.
Cheryl Ashlie is a former Maple Ridge school trustee, city councillour, constituency assistant and
current citizen of the year.