COLUMN: Think Again – Interesting insights from John Horgan

John Horgan served as premier of British Columbia from 2017 to 2022. After stepping down, he was appointed ambassador to Germany. Sadly, Horgan’s ambassadorship was cut short when he succumbed to his third bout with cancer last November.

Many readers might be surprised to hear that I held John Horgan in high regard. Yes, Horgan was a New Democrat, but he had a refreshing level of candor that is often missing in public life. Horgan cared more about achieving practical results for the people of his province than slavishly adhering to political ideology, and that is something we can all learn from.

Thus, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that Horgan left a written record about his life in politics. John Horgan: In His Own Words came out last month and it is well worth the read. Horgan did a series of extensive interviews with journalist Rod Mickleburgh shortly before he passed away. While Mickleburgh was left with the daunting task of turning these interviews into readable prose, Horgan’s voice comes through loud and clear in this book.

One thing that surprised me was the extent to which Horgan took responsibility for his mistakes. For example, Horgan acknowledged that his government’s push for the decriminalization of hard drugs was a serious error that led to unintended consequences. As Horgan put it, “No one anticipated the open drug use and how big a problem that would be.”

I also found it interesting that Horgan rejected some of the most onerous COVID restrictions being pushed by Health Minister Adrian Dix and provincial health officer Bonnie Henry. In one particularly colourful exchange, Horgan yelled at Dix, “You don’t run the goddamn government! The next time you try and shut something down without talking to me, you won’t be a minister anymore!”

Horgan describes himself in the book as a political moderate. Unlike many of his fellow New Democrats, Horgan recognized the importance of supporting resource extraction and promoting big energy projects. Sadly, Horgan didn’t use the same reasoning with the Trans Mountain pipeline, which he opposed for purely political reasons. But then nobody is perfect.

I was amused by Horgan’s unvarnished depiction of many of his NDP colleagues. For example, he noted that former NDP MP Svend Robinson was “very effective, even if it was for Svend J. Robinson and not so much for anybody else.” Meanwhile, he described former Vancouver Mayor Kennedy Stewart as someone “who saw himself as czar of saving the world without much idea of what he was talking about.”

Perhaps what stood out to me in the book was Horgan’s honesty. He was reluctant to become NDP leader, and he admitted that he even thought about crossing the floor after his party lost the 2013 election. Given the scorn that diehard party members hold for floor crossers, the fact that Horgan admitted to even thinking about crossing the floor was an impressive moment of honesty.

Political memoirs are often an opportunity for politicians to settle old scores. However, that’s not what I found in Horgan’s book. Rather, his book seemed like the reflections of a leader who honestly tried to do his best and yet recognized that he made significant mistakes along the way. These are the marks of a good leader.

However, while I admired Horgan as a person, I still wouldn’t vote for his party or support his government. The policy differences I have with him remain significant. Nevertheless, Horgan’s book is a useful reminder that there are good people in all political parties.

In the end, we all benefit when people like John Horgan get involved in politics.

Michael Zwaagstra is a teacher and deputy mayor of Steinbach. He can be reached at mzwaagstra@shaw.ca.