Posted 28 July 2012 - 06:54 PM
Some of you don't seem to remember when this kind of slight of hand started. Well, I may not either, but I do remember that the Socreds under W.A.C. made a big deal about all the money the government owed and promised to solve it. And what he did was pass a law that put all the outstanding debt on the books of the existing crown corporations and some new ones he created. Then he claimed that B.C. was "debt free", although in point of fact not one dollar of the existing debt had been paid back.
While an auditor general existed in B.C. since around 1918 the office held no real power. This was changed in 1977 during the Barrett government and given independent powers and the mandate to report to the legislature, not the cabinet.
Since then governments of both stripes have often ignored the Auditor General's advice and not one budget of any government has conformed to the generally accepted auditing standards of the day. The current government is making things worse, not better and we are nearly back to the days of old Wacky so far as knowing what our government is actually spending and taking in.