Although Gordon Campbell is doing his best to keep up his usual facade of an aloof, buttoned-down arrogant sociopath, Friday's Supreme Court of Canada ruling still forces his BC Liberal administration to comply with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Campbell says his government won't rewrite Bill 29 without maintaining "flexibility" in B.C.'s health care system. However, as anyone who has been paying attention knows, "flexibility" is BC Liberal-speak for continuing to fire front-line health care workers and feeding their jobs to multinational corporations (or smaller companies that support the BC Liberals).
The Liberals have 12 months to either scrap fix Bill 29, and of course will try do it with as little public scrutiny as possible. Can these capitalist lapdogs comply with the court ruling and still deliver for their corporate masters? Let's take a look at a few of the options:
Option 1: Invoke the Notwithstanding Clause - Since the ruling establishes Free Collective Bargaining as a Charter Right, why not just opt out of the charter on this one? Mind you, If this page wasn't from this country and I was looking to invest some money, I don't think it would be in the province where contract law isn't a constitutional right.
Option 2: Pull a 'Ralph Klein' - in 1994 the Alberta Conservatives used a phony deficit 'crisis' to pull the rug out from public sector workers. Their unions were told that the government needed a 5% rollback to prevent layoffs. The unions took the layoff notices, and almost immediately, many of their members were quickly axed. Of course, the whole Bill 29 mess started with Campbell stabbing people in the back...
Option 3: The Fake Consensus - While this page expects the Liberals to shun transparency, there is always the chance they could go the other way and manufacture themselves a little consent. Instead of sitting the Legislature this fall, they may opt to gather around their pals from the Fraser Institute and the Canadian Taxpayers Federation at the so-called "Conversation" on Health to bitch about apocryphal hospital janitors in Vancouver making 17 dollars an hour.
Option 4: Self-Destruct - If there's one thing BC governments of any stripe know how to do, it's devolving and reorganizing the health care system for the sake of devolving and reorganizing the health care system. Bring back Hospital Boards and shut down Regional Health Authorities, disband or replace the Health Employers Association of BC, anything to make it look like the people who were responsible aren't around anymore. Unfortunately for the Liberals, shuffling the deck chairs means a few of those friends may get a deck chair upside the head.
Option 5: Wait until it blows over - If Gordon Campbell didn't have to resign after being found guilty of drunk driving, why should the Supreme Court of Canada be able to tell him what to do about ripping up collective agreements? It's not like a Stephen Harper federal government is going to be big on enforcing any pro-union rulings out of the Supreme Court anyway.
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