WHAT The VOICE had been exposing in the past few months is now out in the open as the Surrey Board of Trade issued a press statement on Thursday that said that they met with Solicitor General and Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth on Monday to reiterate their position in support of keeping the Surrey RCMP.
On March 8, The VOICE wrote: “Councillor Linda Annis – the sole Surrey First candidate to win after she ditched her own party’s stand on development in Rosemary Heights at the last minute, stunning her own party’s candidates – seems hell-bent to sabotage that mandate using all kinds of tactics.
“Sources told me some time ago that she had also reached out to two Safe Surrey Coalition councillors including Jack Hundial, a former RCMP officer, to sabotage [Surrey Mayor Doug] McCallum by raising issues of transparency and costs at this stage and even demand a referendum. She was also being helped by Surrey Board of Trade (SBOT) CEO Anita Huberman and some former senior RCMP officers.”
Photo by Jay Sharma of Mahi Photo Studio
These people were apparently behind the recent leak of a confidential document on Surrey policing.
The SBOT press release stated: “The Surrey Board of Trade discussed public engagement, cost impacts to business taxpayers, public safety as it relates to business sustainability and
attraction, interim issues on technology, training.
“After speaking to Minister Farnworth, it was made very clear to us that there will be a considered and thoughtful provincial process to evaluating Surrey’s policing plan.”
Surrey-ites are angry at the low tactics that these people are using to sabotage McCallum who was elected on the issue of establishing a Surrey municipal police force.
As McCallum noted in March: “On the night this new Council was sworn in, Council voted unanimously in favour of cancelling the contract with the RCMP and moving ahead with a municipal police department. For critics to now say that there is a lack of a mandate or public consultation for Surrey to have its own municipal police department shows little to no regard for our most basic democratic principle of respecting the will of the people.”
McCallum also pointed out: “Councillor Hundial, a retired 25-year RCMP officer, ran on that commitment and pledge to carry it out if elected. The voters entrusted us to deliver on our promises and that is a trust that Councillor Hundial is now breaking. I have no intention of breaking my campaign promises or the public’s trust.”
Premier John Horgan should be aware that if his government sabotages McCallum’s policing plan, his party is bound to lose seats in Surrey. This will for sure result in the formation of a B.C. Liberal government.
Many are resentful of Huberman’s pushy tactics and believe she is just a stooge for the RCMP.
The Surrey Board of Trade does not control Surrey and has absolutely no right whatsoever to stick their noses into other people’s business. Their personal vendetta against Doug McCallum is getting old, so they need to step back and let the man do his job. At least he’s trying to improve public safety by implementing a Police Force that will actually work for our city, not Ottawa. Victoria, Vancouver, Delta, New Westminster and Abbotsford have their own Municipal Police forces, so why not Surrey? And whatever the cost is, lest we forget the old saying: you get what you pay for.