Yesterday, I presented 3,200 signatures on our Stop the BC Ferries Gravy Boat petition to Transportation Minister Todd Stone. The petition calls on government to “Make BC Ferries subject to B.C. government rules on executive compensation, bonuses and collective bargaining mandates – starting with an executive pay cut.”

Hopefully, there will be some good news on this soon. We’re not the only ones getting anxious – Premier Christy Clark weighed in on this yesterday and it was like she was singing from the CTF song sheet.

Still, the BC Ferries issue is a nuanced one, as this great piece by Vaughn Palmer today points out. If you’re wondering why the Premier doesn’t just step in and lop BC Ferries’ heads off, here’s the crux:

The ferry service debt stands at $1.35 billion, mostly because of borrowings to finance the modernization of the fleet and terminals. If the ferries were brought back into government, the debt would have to come with them.

The service, being heavily subsidized to the tune of almost $200 million a year, would not qualify as a self-supporting Crown corporation.

So the $1.35 billion would be tacked onto the taxpayer-supported debt of the province, pushing the total to $44 billion — or almost 19 per cent of gross domestic product. Throw in the debt from self-supporting Crown corporations, mainly BC Hydro, and total provincial debt eclipses $62 billion.

While I would never suggest adding more debt, the truth is BC Ferries is the responsibility of taxpayers anyway. That debt IS our debt, whether on the government books or not. While adding $1.35 billion is a lot, one should note that the debt is currently growing at roughly a billion dollars every three months anyway. Not sure why this would push BC’s credit rating down and pushing to $69 billion in debt over the next few years wouldn’t.

By the way, check out the up-to-the-moment provincial debt at our new DebtClock.ca.

Here's a CBC news clip about our petition: