This Q&A has been edited for length and clarity.

Peter Milobar

Leadership candidate for the Conservative Party of B.C.

What is the first thing you would do to address B.C.’s housing crisis?

Freeze the Step Code at Step 3, restore in-stream application protections, and work with the federal government on an infrastructure deal to reduce the $75,000 to $100,000-per-door servicing cost that is the single biggest barrier to new construction.

What measures would you take to reduce household costs?

Remove PST from capital investments, repeal the NDP’s PST expansions on essential services, reverse the carbon tax hikes, reset the luxury vehicle tax threshold to reflect real vehicle prices, and remove PST on used vehicles under $20,000.

What is your plan to diversify B.C. trade?

Remove interprovincial trade barriers, support pipeline development to get B.C. resources to tidewater for true international pricing, and work assertively with the federal government on trade agreements and tariff relief for B.C.’s forestry, agriculture, and resource sectors.

What is your plan to provide all British Columbians with access to a family doctor?

Accredit specific international universities attended by B.C.-raised high school graduates so they can return without restarting their training, help doctors with charting software to free up the equivalent of up to 1,500 GPs, repeal Bill 36, and listen to frontline health-care workers whose suggestions have been ignored for years.

What is your timeline and plan for balancing the budget?

Find 3% to 4% spending efficiencies across government saving $3 to $4 billion, reduce the inflated contingency fund, and grow GDP 50% above the NDP’s baseline 1.3% projection year over year. Balancing the budget is a multi-year process and anyone promising it overnight is not being honest.

If you were to repeal DRIPA, what legal framework would you pursue for consultation and consent?

Replace DRIPA with a framework grounded entirely in Supreme Court of Canada precedent. The courts have already established clear constitutional obligations for consultation and accommodation and that is the legal foundation I would build on, not the UN Declaration or any external framework.

The key elements are straightforward. The Minister of the Crown is the final decision maker on every land use and resource development decision, full stop. Consultation is genuine, meaningful, and respectful but there is no veto from any party. Timelines are firm and consistent so every proponent, every Indigenous nation, and every community knows exactly what the process looks like, how long it takes, and what the criteria are for a final decision. The current open-ended ambiguity that allows projects to be stalled indefinitely would end.

All affected parties including Indigenous leadership, municipalities, regional district directors and affected residents would be brought into the same room rather than the current model that excludes everyone except the province and First Nations.

A full legislative audit would remove all DRIPA-derived language from existing legislation so the repeal is comprehensive and does not leave loopholes in other acts.

The goal is a framework that delivers certainty and clarity for everyone including Indigenous nations who also benefit from knowing exactly where the lines are drawn.

What’s the first BC NDP policy you would reverse if you were to form government?

DRIPA.

How do you plan to address the opioid crisis that’s now in its 10th year? What would you do differently?

Expand involuntary care for those unable to care for themselves, aggressively build a voluntary treatment system backstopped by government when public beds are full. We need serious, accessible treatment options available early so that people struggling with addiction can get the help they need before their situation becomes desperate. Families should not have to watch their loved ones spiral downward while waiting for a system that intervenes too late, if at all. Early intervention saves lives, preserves families, and ultimately costs far less than managing the devastation that follows when people fall through the cracks.

What was your very first job as a teenager, and what is the one lesson from that experience that you still apply to your leadership style today?

I worked in the family hospitality business from a young age. The lesson I carry is that you learn the most about people and about what actually needs fixing by working alongside them, not by managing from a distance.

If you had a free weekend and a full tank of gas, which B.C. gem would you drive to and why?

The Thompson-Nicola region: camping, fishing and hunting. There is nowhere else in B.C. where you can move from desert landscape to lake country to mountain terrain in a single afternoon, and after nine years as mayor and regional district chair, it still takes my breath away every time.