Stoking B.C.’s sputtering economy will trump all other government plans, Gordon Campbell said Wednesday, hours after winning a third term as B.C.’s premier.
“Without a strong economy we can’t do the other initiatives we’d like to undertake,” Campbell said at the Pan Pacific Hotel.
Less than 12 hours earlier, Campbell saw his B.C. Liberals nab 49 of 85 seats to form their third consecutive majority government.
Campbell, citing a platform promise to expand kindergarten to include four-year-olds, said such a plan would require a ”strong economy to be able to expand those services and provide those new resources.”
Campbell listed four files that he hopes to move forward on: education, health care, climate change and reconciliation with Aboriginals.
“Each depends on the other,” he said. “The economy rests on the certainty that we can create with First Nations people. The health-care system rests on the strength of the economy.
“Our education system will actually generate economic opportunity, but it requires a strong economy to be able to invest in it.”
