#terry beech

On Friday, (Burnaby North-Seymour Liberal MP) Terry Beech sent me a postcard. I'm a PhD candidate in physics at SFU and my research and teaching work involves some statistics and data analysis and so I looked into the data provided on the postcard through that lens.

First, I have comment on the graph itself. When I mark lab reports, if I see a bar graph like Terry's graph, with the vertical axis starting at 15 and going to 30, it's an instant F. The only reason to set the axis that way is to manipulate the reader.

Second, I looked at the data source 338canada.com. It turns out this particular "data" uses no local polling information and is several weeks old. This is why the "data" has a party without a candidate, the Conservatives, in second place. Cherry-picking data to support your point, while ignoring other more recent and reliable data, is another manipulation that will get you an F.

Third, the whole premise of this postcard is that we need to vote strategically. In 2015, Terry promised this would be the last election under first past the post. He lied. Instead of being accountable for his actions, now he's using his own failure to promote his re-election.

These types of lies and manipulations are what turn people off politics. Rather than talk about policies and issues that matter to Burnaby-North Seymour residents, Terry has chosen to fear-monger about strategic voting because a party that can't win because it has no candidate, might win.

Some 25 people demonstrated in front of Liberal MP Terry Beech’s constituency office in Burnaby this afternoon, demanding that the federal government go back on its promise to financially back the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion.

Protesters, including SFU students and Burnaby residents, beat pots and pans with wooden spoons, chanted, raised signs, and passed out fliers to passersby at Beech’s constituency office on Hastings Street. They also asked people to sign a petition demanding the federal government refuse to bail out the project. Tuesday’s protest is part of a larger movement by environmental activist group 350 asking groups to protest at federal Liberal constituency offices.

Susanne Jackson, who lives in Beech’s riding, is worried that expanding the tank farm on Burnaby mountain will be dangerous for her friends who live in the area, and for the children who attend Forest Grove Elementary School nearby.

Jackson said she’d like to see her MP publicly denounce the pipeline.

“Terry has not done enough. He has not spoke up in parliament. He says he’s doing what his residents want, but from my experience, when I’ve gone in to talk to him, it’s like there’s a wall. It’s like he can’t do stuff because he’s being muzzled by the Liberal Party,” she told the NOW.