Doerkson puts Pacific Link pipeline and an independent look at the BC NDP's books at the top of his post-election 'to-do list'

VANCOUVER — Premier-designate Lorne Doerkson told reporters that getting the Pacific Link oil pipeline moving will be among his first acts once sworn, and that an independent review of the provincial books will start the same day..“Among my first calls as premier, will be to the prime minister and to (Alberta) Premier Smith to get the Pacific Link (pipeline project) moving,” Doerkson said. “Our resources are the strongest hand that British Columbia hold and we will for sure play them.”Multiple outlets reported the comments from his Vancouver news conference hours after the Conservatives were projected to win about two-thirds of the 93 seats. Results remain preliminary until the final count on November 6..Pacific Link is the name given October 1 to the proposed one-million-barrel-a-day crude pipeline from the Bruderheim area northeast of Edmonton to a marine terminal at Roberts Bank in Delta. It largely follows the existing Trans Mountain corridor on a southern route. The estimated project cost is $35.2 billion to $43.7 billion. The federal government listed it as the first project of national interest under the Building Canada Act. Ownership is split between the Trans Mountain Corporation, the Alberta Petroleum Marketing Commission, and Pembina Pipeline (10% initial equity), with an indigenous stake contemplated. Construction targets remain in the late 2020s or early 2030s. The north-coast tanker ban, which Doerkson remained uncommitted to any changes on during the election campaign, is likely to stay in place..Outgoing Premier David Eby had shifted from calling an earlier northern version “fictional” to saying BC would not fight the southern route in court once a compensation package was in place. Doerkson’s stated approach is active support. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith posted Monday that she is “excited to work with British Columbia’s new government and Premier Lorne Doerkson to make Pacific Link a priority.”.Doerkson also said the government will launch an independent review of the provincial finances once sworn. “The deficit, as you know, is nearly $14 billion, and B.C. has had eight credit downgrades in three years. We need to know where things stand, and so do British Columbians. Before we table a budget, you will have the full picture.The Ministry of Finance’s First Quarterly Report, released September 14, put the 2026-27 deficit at $13.759 billion, $450 million higher than the February Budget 2026 figure. Taxpayer-supported debt is forecast at $141.139 billion by March 31, 2027. Interest is projected to consume 6.1 cents of every revenue dollar this year. Real GDP growth for 2026 was revised down to 0.9%..One documented hole is the natural-gas royalty forecast. Budget 2026 booked roughly $1.46 billion more over five years than the corrected path after calculation errors in the plant-inlet price. The province later called it a “serious mistake” and an “administrative error.” .Energy Minister Adrian Dix said it was a human error involving unit and currency conversions. Eby said on August 25 he was “not familiar with any error in the budget related to oil and gas revenues.” The quarterly report attributed about $300 million of the current-year royalty cut to the calculation error.Separate from that is the Auditor General’s ongoing qualification of the province’s Summary Financial Statements over deferred-revenue accounting. The cumulative overstatement trajectory reached approximately $10.76 billion by the 2025-26 Public Accounts.Things are already changing before Doerkson's swearing-in.Two days after the election, the BC Ferries board removed CEO Nicolas Jimenez and launched what it called a “leadership transition” and “revitalization review.Brian Anderson, the company’s vice-president of strategy and planning, was named interim chief executive effective immediately. Executive vice-president and chief financial officer Dallyn Willis takes on strategy and planning and will lead the review.Rob Shaw of CHEK reported the move Monday..The board’s statement thanked Jimenez for his contributions and said a search for a permanent successor would follow the review. No specific reason was given for the timing. The Conservatives called last year for Jimenez and then-board chair Joy MacPhail to be removed after BC Ferries awarded a roughly $1 billion contract to China Merchants Industry Weihai Shipyards for four new vessels. The party said the decision showed “a complete failure of judgment” amid Canada’s trade dispute with China. Jimenez, who moved to BC Ferries in 2023 from the CEO post at ICBC, had worked closely with Eby on the insurer’s no-fault transition..Doerkson’s other Day 1 items include raising the basic personal exemption to $32,000 — he said that would put about $1,000 a year back in the pocket of nearly every working British Columbian — and a pledge not to raise taxes or introduce new ones. He did not rule out a fall legislative session. Kim Henderson, a former deputy to the premier under previous Liberal governments, will chair the transition team on a volunteer basis while on unpaid leave from her interim vice-president role at Trans Mountain Corporation.The Conservatives’ own costed platform, released during the campaign, still projected multi-billion-dollar deficits through the next term, ending at $10.799 billion in 2029-30 under its growth and restraint assumptions. The NDP platform kept the deficit near $12 billion in 2028-29. Neither path reaches balance inside four years.

Doerkson puts Pacific Link pipeline and an independent look at the BC NDP's books at the top of his post-election 'to-do list'

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