Fired LNG advocate and former BC Liberal leader Gordon Wilson is defending his record, one day after being dismissed by the new BC NDP government.
Jobs, Trade and Technology Minister Bruce Ralston fired Wilson on Tuesday, saying he hadn’t produced any measurable results or any written records while on the job, for which he’d been paid $550,000.
WATCH: Former BC LNG advocate Gordon Wilson defends his record with CKNW’s Steele & Drex
The firing prompted a discussion on CKNW’s Steele & Drex on Tuesday.
And then a sharp rebuke from Wilson himself that night.
Wilson joined Steele and Drex for a showdown on Wednesday, where he made his case for the effectiveness of the LNG Buy BC program.
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He said that producing records wasn’t his job, and he called the criticism of the lack of documentation a “tawdry defamation campaign.”
“I was not hired to write reports,” he said. “Reports had been filed, there are binders of material that were handed over to Mr. Ralston.”
Wilson also shrugged off suggestions from some critics that his job was a patronage appointment from former premier Christy Clark, whom he had backed in the 2013 provincial election.
“Well, they’re entitled to their opinion. I don’t think it’s an informed opinion because they obviously haven’t looked at anything we’ve done,” Wilson said.
He said the job involved engaging with multinationals, B.C. companies and First Nations to ensure they would have a place in the province’s LNG industry as it developed.
Pressed on what had been accomplished during his tenure, the former advocate said the LNG industry has spent billions in B.C., that it led to numerous contracts being landed, and “many, many people” becoming employed.
“There’s been all kinds of work done in the province of British Columbia,” Wilson said.
“You guys need to take your blinkers off.”
Wilson also addressed the lack of briefing notes left from the oral reports he made to the former BC Liberal government, saying that Minister Ralston had never asked him for any kind of a meeting or briefing before letting him go.
“There are binders of material in terms of the transition work that’s been done, not just on the LNG Buy BC program, but on the supplier development aspects of the work that’s also been done in that ministry,” Wilson said.
“There’s all kinds of information if the minister wanted it.”
Last week, oil and gas company Petronas announced that it had cancelled its multi-billion Pacific NorthWest LNG project in Port Edward, raising new questions about the future of B.C.’s LNG industry.
To date, just one project of moderate size, the Squamish-based Woodfibre LNG plant, has signed a final investment decision.