Dear Editor:

Re: Steve Soames’ letter to editor Aug. 23:

I have the greatest of respect for educators and the fantastic job they do teaching students. I naively expected Steve Soames – an educator who likely makes an annual salary of $80,000* per year, plus a good pension plan and generous benefits – to make more informed commentary than the statements he made in ignorance of the facts.

First, an MLA’s annual salary is $103,000 and not “in excess of $130,000” as Mr. Soames claims. The MLA’s re-imburseable travel, food and lodging expenses are similar to what teachers gets when they do Teachers’ Union or School Board business. Like most employees, when called upon to take on additional duties that take an MLA away from home and family (I am presently in the Deputy-Chair of a Select Standing Committee of the Legislature charged with revamping the MLAs’ Conflict-of-Interest Act) MLAs are paid an extra stipend.

Secondly, in the ongoing public roads issue involving the Douglas Lake Ranch, Mr. Soames’ involvement with my office amounts to a single meeting (March 19, 2010) as a ‘tag-along’ to one of the prominent figures in the dispute. Sadly, while others continued to meet and work with my office over the next two-and-a-half years, Mr. Soames’ went missing and only re-surfaced to make uninformed, baseless comments against myself and the NDP.

Thirdly, had Mr. Soames bothered to check with my office in those two-and-a-half years, he would have learned of the ongoing work and efforts of the MLA and staff. This is the same issue both my staff and I worked on for years in the 1990s and again presently on behalf of Mr. Rick McGowan and other citizens.

My former constituency assistant, Shirley Rhodes, who has recently taken retirement made countless phone calls, wrote letters and emails, and researched public road issues (including working with various land surveyors) in support of the citizens fighting for their rights. Mr. Soames might think a public war of words between the MLA and the cattle company and/or the provincial government might be in the best interests of the citizenry; however, he is again uninformed.

Fourthly, it may serve Mr. Soames well to check with those in the Merritt area who are members of the BC Wildlife Federation and become educated with the internal split within the BCWF that derailed the efforts of so many dozens of good people fighting for public access to public roads within B.C. Late in the spring, there was a resolution before the BCWF’s annual convention where members wanted to set up a legal fund from membership dues in order to fight the access issue in the courts, a case many BCWF members believe will go in favour of public access. The BC Liberals, in conjunction with their surrogates (i.e., card-carrying BC Liberals and/or die-hard BC Liberal supporters) on the BCWF Board of Directors, worked behind the scenes for months in advance and helped to defeat the resolution at the convention that would have hiked members’ annual dues by $2 per year and raised thousands of dollars to fight the BC Liberal Government in court.

Fifthly, it is no accident that those very same Liberal surrogates in the BCWF, wanting to deflect the heat off Christy Clark’s Liberal government, are behind the recent spate of misleading letters to the editor. Mr. Soames is an educator, and the public expects its educators to be a bit more informed. However, in his misdirected efforts, Mr. Soames has become an unwitting and uninformed victim of a co-ordinated BC Liberal letter-writing campaign against the local MLA and the NDP aimed at deflecting from the real issue – that of BC Liberal favouritism against citizens for public access to public roads. Congratulations, and welcome to Political Science 101, Mr. Soames.

I hope Steve Soames is a better informed teacher than he is a political commentator.

Harry S. Lali, MLA

Fraser-Nicola

*Editor’s Note: Lali based this figure on the average provincial salary of a teacher who has been teaching for more than 10 years.