Dawson Creek mayor Mike Bernier’s steps into the fray of an Occupy protest in Vancouver last fall continue to resonate – now with Finance Minister Kevin Falcon breathing life into the idea of shipping welfare recipients to northeast B.C. to fill industrial job vacancies.

Falcon pitched the idea at a Kamloops Chamber of Commerce meeting yesterday (March 13), revealing a vague plan for the province to work with industry on developing a welfare-to-work program.

Falcon cited Bernier’s unusual approach of handing out business cards at the Occupy encampment, and encouraging protesters to head north to get jobs.

Getting jobs for the unemployed is a nice gesture – but this notion of shipping job seekers north is completely unrealistic. It also ignores the fact that housing is in short supply across much of northern B.C., and that the positions to be filled involve skills and trades which can’t necessarily be learned on the job.

It’s a bizarre and simplistic solution, one that only the most gullible of voters will see as a solution. In short – it’s another sign of a government that’s flailing for simple solutions to complex problems.