MLA Harry Bains says Surrey city politics remind him of 2005

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      Surrey’s evolving civic political scene looks somewhat like 2005.

      Surrey-Newton MLA Harry Bains makes this observation following the resignation of councillor Barinder Rasode from the Surrey First team of Mayor Dianne Watts.

      Rasode, who will run as an independent in the 2014 civic election, has indicated that she’ll run for mayor if Watts doesn’t seek another term.

      “She will be a strong contender,” Bains said about Rasode in a phone interview with the Straight today (April 17).

      What’s interesting to Bains is the situation’s resemblance to 2005.

      “It’s similar circumstances,” the B.C. NDP representative said. “It’s a similar environment that I could see that is developing.”

      Then a councillor, Watts had a spat with her Surrey Electors Team ally and then mayor Doug McCallum. The fight was over issues that included bullying and crime.

      “She [Watts] felt that she was being silenced by then mayor Mr. McCallum at that time,” Bains recalled.

      Watts went on to run as an independent mayoral candidate and defeated McCallum. She eventually formed Surrey First, and Rasode successfully ran for council under its banner in 2008.

      There has been talk that relations between Watts and Rasode have been under strain for some time. If this is true, Bains’s community was the setting of what may triggered the final stages of their breakup.

      Last year, hockey mom Julie Paskall was murdered while waiting for her son at a Surrey-Newton rink. Following her death, Rasode began speaking openly about Surrey’s crime situation.

      Rasode has claimed that in doing so, her relationship with council became hostile.

      Before Rasode’s decision to leave Watts’s team, Surrey First had total control over council, having won every seat in 2011.

      According to Bains, having a “diversity of voices” on city council after this year’s municipal election would be a good thing.

      “It will be very healthy if there’s a strong opposition,” Bains said.

      There is speculation that Watts may run as federal candidate in next year’s federal election. But if Watts goes for another term as mayor and Rasode decides to take her on, Bains said that it may become another Watts-McCallum story, with probably a similar outcome.

      “It could be a repeat of that,” Bains said. “It could be, but it will be a very very, I think, closely fought election if that happens.”

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