Surrey city councillor and former BC Liberal MLA Brenda Locke isn’t taking sides in the provincial election, but she wants whatever party that comes to power to take action against her own city council’s formation of a new police board.
“The whole process should be paused,” said Locke, citing reasons such as pending reform of the Police Act, costs to citizens, a lack of transparency and the potential of having Lower Mainland police forces face officer shortages as the Surrey Police Department “poaches” from its neighbours — resulting in a risk to public safety, thus jeopardizing the Solicitor General’s primary mandate.
And, Locke added, the province should force a referendum, which Mayor Doug McCallum and his majority slate on council have declined to do.
But neither BC Liberal leader Andrew Wilkinson or NDP leader John Horgan took such a stance on the matter on the second day of campaigning Wednesday. Horgan called the issue a “hornet’s nest” created by McCallum. Wilkinson criticized the NDP for “ragging the puck” on the matter and not being transparent.