AHA! I think we now know a key source of NDP leader Adrian Dix's professed desire to bring a "modest" approach to governing.
Why, it's none other than his mentor and ex-boss, former premier Glen Clark!
After staying out of the public eye for a decade, Clark gave a wide-ranging interview with my Global BC colleague Jas Johal, and in it he showed he has a far different perspective as a businessman than he did as a politician.
The Clark of today seems less enthralled with government being the answer to so many problems, thinks unions need to be more flexible and cooperative with management and understands the business of business is to make money and profits.
When he was premier, government intervention in the economy was a key part of his agenda. So were high taxes on businesses, another thing Clark the businessman doesn't like today. Government is a big operation, and Clark is now leery of its effectiveness.
"I have less confidence in big bureaucracies, government or business, because they become so unwieldy and difficult to manage," he told Johal.
He still believes in fundamental rights for workers, but warns unions have to change attitudes in the modern economy.
"In the world we're in now . . . labour really has to think hard about how they approach private business," he said.
He thinks Crown corporations exist to make money for government and not to simply "treat people better" without making a profit.
He's acutely aware that free trade and globalization are here to stay, and that businesses have to adapt quickly to change - it's this kind of attitude that is viewed with horror by a number of NDP activists.
Clark is, of course, the righthand man of the godfather of B.C. business, Jimmy Pattison. When Clark was hired by Pattison soon after leaving office in a cloud of controversy, many people were shocked by the appointment.
But I wasn't surprised at all, given Clark's intelligence and instincts and the fact that Pattison had long before voiced his support for him (which infuriated the B.C. Liberals in the run-up to the 1996 election, which Clark won).
I'm not surprised Clark has risen through the ranks of Pattison's empire to become company president. Clark is the type of guy who tends to dominate whatever group he happens to be part of.
The question that arises now, of course, is what kind of influence will this ex-politician, who has significantly changed his philosophy, have on the man who has a very good shot at taking on the same job he used to have?
The ties between Clark and Dix are deep and significant. Clark always struck me as a mentor of sorts for Dix, as the two men forged a close bond between 1991 (when Dix began working for him as a ministerial assistant) and 1999, when Dix was forced to quit as his chief of staff.
In 2005, Dix ended up taking over Clark's old riding of Vancouver Kingsway and the two remain close friends. So it's hard to think that a more conservative Clark won't have a significant impact on Dix's own political philosophy.
Although the B.C. Liberals are trying to portray Dix as some kind of far-left socialist menace, the only evidence - if you can call it that - to back up that assertion is dredging up the track record of the NDP government of the 1990s.
Dix has offered precious little evidence of his own to help them. He's proposed raising corporate taxes to the levels the B.C. Liberals themselves established in 2008, which is hardly a radical socialist policy.
Instead, Dix is talking about narrowing the activities of government instead of expanding them - just as his old boss advocates.
So don't be surprised if Dix turns out to be closer to the new Glen Clark than the old one: more moderate, businessfriendly and less activist.
After all, if one of the top figures in the former NDP government can change so much, why can't another?
[email protected] Johal's three-part series on Clark and Pattison, The Odd Couple: the Premier and the Billionaire, can be seen on Global BC's website. It contains more extensive footage of the interview with Clark.
Keith Baldrey is chief political reporter for Global BC.
