As Phil Hochstein tells it, he's only been saying publicly what many other business leaders and government supporters were fret-ting about privately as regards the political situation in B.C.
"Everyone's talking about it," says the longtime president of the Independent Contractors and Businesses Association, representing more than 1,000 non-union firms in the construction sector.
By "everyone" Hochstein means anyone with a more than passing interest in the outcome of the next provincial election. By "it" he means the prospect that the New Democratic Party is poised to take power because the non-NDP vote is split between two rival parties, one calling itself Conservative, the other B.C. Liberal.
"I get two or three calls every day, from people saying 'what the hell's going on?,' " says Hochstein. "They can't under-stand why it is happening, given the implications of the split."
{snippety doo-dah}
He speaks with some authority, being no fair-weather friend to the province's free enterprise forces, but rather an unswerving advocate for the cause for 25 years. His dedication has lately extended to mounting his own attack ads - witness that recent series targeting Dix.
The timing is telling too. He began airing his concerns about vote-splitting against the back-drop of the byelection campaigns in Port Moody-Coquitlam and Chilliwack-Hope, both wrapping up today.
Presuming his fears are borne out when the vote count is completed tonight, one can expect to hear a lot about the need for the centre-right side of the political spectrum to get its act together. "Anyone who frustrates that is selfish and irresponsible," says Hochstein.
He places no specific blame on the Liberals and Premier Christy Clark, except to note that on the evidence of the opinion polls, she hasn't clicked with a big enough share of the electorate.
Nor does he single out the Conservatives and John Cummins, except to maintain that the party's undiluted version of conservatism is not likely to win over British Columbians on its own: "We're not that far over to the right."...
{snippety doodle-dandy}
...He'd like to see them pull together the kind of big-tent party that kept the NDP at bay in the past. Bill Bennett's Social Credit party, which ruled the province in the 1970s and 1980s, included federal Liberals, Conservatives, populists and even an old Socred or two. Gordon Campbell rode to power a decade ago at the head of a Liberal party that included Socreds, Reformers, Conservatives and more than a few actual Liberals.
"It's time to repair the tent and move on," says Hochstein. "People should focus on the similarities, not the differences."...
