‘Students shouldn’t have to pay for Hydro’s failures’: NDP
Posted November 30, 2013 3:55 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – BC’s education minister continues to draw criticism, a few days after he suggested the Vancouver School Board look at closing schools to deal with the coming increased hydro rates.
NDP Leader Adrian Dix is the latest to decry the comments, calling them disrespectful.
This past week, the province announced hydro rates are about to rise by 28 per cent over the next five years, leaving cash strapped school boards wondering how they’re going to cover the increased costs.
The Vancouver School Board figures it’s going to spend nearly half a million dollars more for hydro by 2016.
Education Minister Peter Fassbender has suggested the Vancouver School Board consider closing schools.
Dix says school kids are paying for the government’s mismanagement.
“The hydro rate increases are the direct cause of Liberal energy policy. BC Hydro is paying for expensive power it couldn’t sell, it launched a billion-dollar smart meter program it didn’t need, it’s got a $400-million cost over-run on a northwest transmission line,” he says.
Plus, he says the Crown corporation has been hiding its expenses, which it can no longer conceal.
“The government is deceiving people about the nature of the budget. So they clearly should stop doing that. They’ve been doing that for years, where they’ve been borrowing money in deferral accounts at BC Hydro, like an elaborate Ponzi scheme.”
Vancouver School Board Chair Patti Bacchus has already called Fassbender’s comments “a bit disingenuous.”
