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Third-party panel to review political fundraising in BC

VICTORIA (NEWS 1130) – The BC Liberal government has announced an independent panel will take a closer look at political fundraising in this province. This comes following reports the party received illegal contributions from lobbyists.

NEWS 1130 has learned the deputy attorney general will be in charge of developing this panel.

It will be non-partisan and those on it will need to receive unanimous backing from the Legislature — it will review proposals on electoral finance reform every eight years.

Those on the panel would review proposals put forward by all parties including bills that have been brought before the house previously, study changes in other jurisdictions, and make recommendations on their findings back to the Legislature.

The premier’s announcement comes after Elections BC referred its investigation into indirect political contributions and other political contraventions of the Election Act to the RCMP. The BC Liberals have said their fundraising practices are transparent and the party will fully co-operate with an Elections BC review of potential Election Act violations.

“I don’t know what they’ll recommend. But I do know that questions have been raised on a whole range of different things, some of which have been spoken to in legislations before the house — some of which are not,” says Premier Christy Clark. “If we’re going to make change, if people want to change or if we’re going to stay with the status quo or elements of it, then let’s look at it holistically and come up with a set of changes every eight years.”

The Liberals recently reported it raised $12.4 million in donations last year. While the BC NDP, who have yet to report their finances for 2016, received $3 million in political donations in 2015.

Disclosure bill “too little too late”: Democracy Watch

Long-time political watchdog Democracy Watch says Clark’s promise of future changes “shouldn’t be believed,” even if the bill is enacted before the May 11th election.

“The BC Liberals’ donation disclosure bill is too little, too late,” Democracy Watch co-founder Duff Conacher says in a statement. “If the BC Liberals were serious about changing the province’s unethical, undemocratic political donation system, they wouldn’t have spent the past year dishonestly claiming that the current system is fine and rejecting changes proposed by the opposition parties and many others.”

Instead, Conacher’s group has endorsed a list of changes they want to see enacted before the current legislative session ends, including a total ban on corporate and union donations, individual donations limited of $100 per year, prohibiting loans to parties except from a public fund, and strengthen enforcement and penalties for violations.

An online petition calling for these changes has garnered over 6,200 signatures as of Monday afternoon.

Opposition says BC voters “have no reason” to believe Clark

BC NDP Leader John Horgan has issued the following statement on banning money from politics.

“Even when facing an RCMP investigation, Christy Clark is more interested in protecting herself and her rich friends than in taking real action on the issues British Columbians care about.

After years of watching Christy Clark fight to maintain the influence of big money, British Columbians have no reason to believe her claims that she might finally do the right thing after the election.

Make no mistake: Christy Clark knows that the real issue is big money’s influence on government, and she could put a stop to it today. Instead of doing the right thing for British Columbians, she has sided with the corporations who paid her secret second salary.

We could get big money out of our politics today. All that’s missing is a yes from Christy Clark.”

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