John Weston, MP for West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country, participated in Powell River’s Bike to Work week on Monday, May 30. Weston rode a bike from the airport down Duncan Street to city hall, along with City of Powell River Mayor Stewart Alsgard and community cycling advocates to show his support for the event.
Weston, who was re-elected on May 2, said that since the election, he has been in contact with mayors, regional district board chairs and first nations leaders in the riding to get a better sense of their priorities as he enters his second term.
“I wanted to ask what priorities they see in their communities to better help inform what I do and to formulate a plan to ensure that we’re focusing on the priorities of the riding,” he said.
Powell River benefited from a number of federal grants through the government’s Economic Action Plan, Weston said. “It’s going to be difficult to keep that kind of investment flow going, because we know the Economic Action Plan is not going to continue with investment,” he said. “It’s now going to be focused on deficit control, but we can accomplish many great things.”
Weston said he’ll likely find out around the time that the parliamentary session opens on Thursday, June 2 what committees and roles he has been assigned to. During his first term, “I thought my role in Fisheries and Aboriginal Affairs were pertinent to BC and to my constituents. The [local] fisheries advisory group that we formed with many well-informed volunteers was very productive, and with three prominent first nations in our riding, I felt my position on the aboriginal affairs committee was appropriate to the riding as well,” he said.
Tla’Amin (Sliammon) First Nation is still waiting for the federal government to initial a negotiators’ agreement reached a year ago. (See story on page 5.) Weston said right after the election, he contacted John Duncan, minister of aboriginal affairs and northern development. “We definitely need a resolution and people in Powell River would like to see that,” he said. “I’ve made that very clear to both the Prime Minister’s office and the minister.”
Weston also said he has asked for a meeting with Duncan to re-emphasize that initialling the treaty is a priority for the community. “We’ll see where it goes from there,” he said.
The federal budget, due out on June 6, will be similar to the one presented by Finance Minister Jim Flaherty in April, before the minority government fell, Weston said. The priorities will likely be continued economic recovery and job creation, he added.
He said that in a broad sense, those are his own priorities for the riding as well.
“Continued economic development and the sustaining and creating of jobs underlies much of what we do,” Weston said. “We had good success on that front in my first term, in cooperation with the leaders in each of the communities that we serve. I will continue that theme in this second term.”
One offshoot of that effort is continued engagement between the riding and the Pacific Rim—China, Japan, Hong Kong, et cetera—in promoting tourism, trade and educational interaction, he said.
“We will continue to promote human rights, both in Canada and abroad,” he said.
Weston said he will continue to operate four offices—constituency offices in West Vancouver, Sechelt and Powell River and his parliamentary office in Ottawa. In the previous Parliament, only five of the 308 MPs operated four or more offices.
“I’m really looking forward to how the country will benefit from the stability that four years of the same government will bring,” he said.
-with files from Dave Burke, Squamish Chief
